Annotation:Peas in the Pot



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Sheet Music for "Peas in a Pot"Peas in a PotReelSource: Clyde Daventport (b. 1921), learned from his fatherDiscography: Clyde Davenport - Puncheon Camps (1992)Transcription: Transcribed by Andrew Kuntz



PEAS IN THE POT. AKA and see "Piece in the Pot," "Peas in the Pod." Old-Time, Breakdown. USA, Kentucky. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AA'B. Davenport knew this ditty, sung to the tune (although he played it as an instrumental):

Clyde Davenport

Peas in the pot, hoecake a-bakin',
Step girls step, the day’s a breakin'.

A similar rhyme appears in Newman Ivey White's American Negro Folk-Songs (1928, p. 304), collected in Durham, N.C., in 1919 from a manuscript of Walter J. Miller, who remarked it was "Heard several years ago":

Peas in the pot, hoecake a bakin',
Sally in the kitchen with her shift-tail a shakin'.

The first line is a 'floater' and turns up in other songs as well. Leadbelly (Huddie Ledbetter [1], 1888-1949) sang a song called “Green Corn, Come along Charlie” with the line: “Wake snake, day’s a-breaking/Peas in the pot and the hoe cake’s a-baking.”


Additional notes
Source for notated version : - Clyde Davenport (Monticello, Wayne County, Ky.) [Phillips], learned from his father.

Printed sources : - Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 1), 1994; p. 182.

Recorded sources : - Field Recorders Collective FRC-104, "Clyde Davenport, vol. 2." Clyde Davenport - "Puncheon Camps" (1992).

See also listing at :
Hear Clyde Davenport's 1992 recording at Slippery Hill [2]
Hear John Harrod's 1981 field recording of Clyde Davenport playing the tune at Berea Sound Archives [3], and at the Digital Library of Appalachia [4]
See Dave Bartlett's 1986 photograph of Clyde with banjo, front-porch picking [5]



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