Annotation:I'm Off to Charlestown: Difference between revisions

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'''I'M OFF TO CHARLESTOWN'''. AKA and see "[[Off to Charleston]]." American; Air and dance tune (2/4 time). D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). One part. The first several bars of melody are shared with the American old-time song "[[Old Plank Road]]." The tune is included in Kerr's along with a hodgepodge of tunes, including several from America. "I'm Off to Charlestown" [http://www.loc.gov/resource/sm1850.652020.0#seq-4] was popularized by Christy's Minstrels, a blackface minstrel troupe, and was written by William Donaldson and dedicated to Charles White Esq. It was published in 1850.   
'''I'M OFF TO CHARLESTOWN'''. AKA and see "[[Off to Charleston]]." American; Air and dance tune (2/4 time). D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). One part. The first several bars of melody are shared with the American old-time song "[[Old Plank Road]]." The tune is included in Kerr's along with a hodgepodge of tunes, including several from America. "I'm Off to Charlestown" [http://www.loc.gov/resource/sm1850.652020.0#seq-4] was popularized by Christy's Minstrels, a blackface minstrel troupe, and was written by William B. Donaldson and dedicated to Charles White Esq. It was published in 1850.   
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''My massa and my missus have both gone away, ''<br>
''My massa and my missus have both gone away, ''<br>
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''I'll go down to Charlestown, the pretty gals to see.''<br>
''I'll go down to Charlestown, the pretty gals to see.''<br>
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See also the march variant "[[Off to Charleston]]" in Hopkin's '''American Veteran Fifer''' (1905).  
William Donaldson was a left-handed banjo-player who hailed from Poughkeepsie, New York, whose career alternated between clowning for the circues and performing as a theatre minstrel. He made his debut in 1836 at the age of thirteen, as “Young Jim Crow,” and ten years later was known mainly as a clown. The individual he dedicated the song to, Charles White, owned a minstrel company, White’s Melodeon on the Bowery in New York.  William Donaldson, Dan Bryant, Lilly Coleman, and Dan Emmitt performed together for Charlie White in the mid-1850s. See also the march variant "[[Off to Charleston]]" in Hopkin's '''American Veteran Fifer''' (1905).  
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