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Shortnin' Bread

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This article is about the song. For a similarly named but different food, see shortbread.

"Shortnin' Bread"
Song
Written1900
Songwriter(s)James Whitcomb Riley

"Shortnin' Bread" (also spelled "Shortenin' Bread", "Short'nin' Bread", or "Sho'tnin' Bread") is an African-American folk song dating back at least to the 1890s.[1] James Whitcomb Riley published a poem building on older lyrics in 1900. A "collected" version was published by E. C. Perrow in 1915. It is song number 4209 in the Roud Folk Song Index.

Shortening bread refers to a bread made of corn meal and/or flour and lard shortening. It should not be confused with shortbread.

Origins

"Shortnin' Bread" is a plantation song. Its first written version was captured by poet James Whitcomb Riley in 1900. He titled the song "A Short'nin' Bread Song—Pieced Out", and wrote the first verse as:

Fotch dat dough fum the kitchin-shed
Rake de coals out hot an' red
Putt on de oven an' putt on de led
Mammy's gwiner cook som short'nin' bread[2]

The dialect rendered into common English would be:

Fetch that dough, from the kitchen shed
Rake those coals out, hot and red
Put on the oven and put on the lid
Mommy's going to cook some short'nin' bread

The verse includes:

When corn plantin' done come roun'
Blackbird own de whole plowed groun'
Corn is de grain as I've hearn said
Dat's de blackbird's short'nin' bread

Another pair of verses may be later, and exist in several versions:

Three little children, lying in bed
Two was sick and the other 'most dead
Send for the doctor and the doctor said
"feed them children on short'nin' bread"

When those children, sick in bed,
heard that talk 'bout short'nin' bread.
They popped up well, to dance and sing,
skipping around and cut the pigeon wing.

(In some versions there are two children instead of three - and the "other" either "bump'd his head". or "was dead". Neither of these quite scan, and seem unlikely to have been the original. The children (or "chillun") were once referred to by one of several racist terms.

Other verses include:

Pull out the skillet, pull out the led,
Mama's gonna make a little short'nin' bread
That ain't all she's gonna do,
Mama's gonna make a little coffee too

I slipped to the kitchen, slipped on the led,
slipped my pockets full of short'nin' bread.
I stole the skillet, I stole the led,
I stole the girl who makes short'nin' bread

They caught me with the skillet, They caught me with the led,
They caught me with the girl who makes short'nin' bread.
I paid six dollars for the skillet, six dollars for the led,
Spent six months in jail eating short'nin' bread.

Folk version

Titled "Shortened Bread", E. C. Perrow published the first folk version of this song in 1915, which he collected from East Tennessee in 1912.[3] The folk version of the song—as with Riley's—does not have any distinct theme, but consists of various floating lyrics, some relating to "shortnin' bread", some not. The traditional chorus associated with the folk song goes:

Mammy's little baby loves short'nin', short'nin'
Mammy's little baby loves short'nin' bread (rpt.)

The Beach Boys version

"Shortenin' Bread"
Song by The Beach Boys
from the album L.A. (Light Album)
Released19 March 1979 (1979-03-19)
Recordedc. 1979
Length2:50
Songwriter(s)Traditional, arranged by Brian Wilson
L.A. (Light Album) track listing
Template:L.A. (Light Album) tracks
The Beach Boys with American Spring – "Shortenin' Bread" (Adult/Child bootleg)
Wilson's earliest attempted recording of the song, 1973
Problems playing this file? See media help.

The song was recorded by the American rock band the Beach Boys numerous times. Only one version has seen official release, as the final track on their 1979 album L.A. (Light Album).

During the 1970s, principal songwriter Brian Wilson was reportedly obsessed with the song, recording more than a dozen versions of the tune.[4] Beach Boy Al Jardine speculated that Wilson's obsession with the song may have begun after co-writing the song "Ding Dang" with the Byrds' Roger McGuinn in the 1970s.[5] McGuinn explained that Wilson had one day come to his house for amphetamines while escaping from his therapist. After McGuinn spent some time crafting "Ding Dang" with Wilson, he went to bed. The next day, he awoke to Wilson, still awake, and still playing "Ding Dang" on piano. Only one lyric was ever written: "I love a girl and I love her madly / I treat her so fine but she treats me so badly".[6] During sessions for The Beach Boys Love You, engineer Earle Mankey commented that "everybody who showed up got subjected to 'Ding Dang'."[5]

A significant number of "Ding Dang" and "Shortenin' Bread" permutations exist in the Beach Boys' tape vaults. Most of them are unreleased, with titles such as "Clangin'" (recorded with Harry Nilsson), "Brian's Jam",[4] and "Rolling Up to Heaven".[7] A version was completed for the unreleased album Adult/Child in late 1977.[8] This recording was developed from a 1973 session conducted with Wilson's girl group side-project American Spring.[9]

Numerous anecdotes have been reported about Wilson's obsession with the song:

  • Singer-songwriter Alex Chilton recalled receiving middle-of-the-night phone calls from Wilson asking him to sing on a recording of "Shortenin' Bread"' ("He was telling me I have the perfect voice for it").[10]
  • The Monkees' Micky Dolenz said that when he tripped on LSD with Wilson, John Lennon, and Nilsson, Wilson played "Shortenin' Bread" on piano "over and over again".[4]
  • Biographer Peter Ames Carlin wrote that Elton John and Iggy Pop were bemused by an extended, contumacious Wilson-led singalong of "Shortenin' Bread", leading Pop to flee the room proclaiming, "I gotta get out of here, man. This guy is nuts!"[11]
  • Musician Alice Cooper recalled that Wilson considered "Shortnin' Bread" to be the greatest song ever written, as he quoted Wilson for an explanation: "I don't know, it's just the best song ever written."[12]

Other renditions

Music

Film

  • In the Looney Tune Hare Tonic (1945), Elmer Fudd sings the song at the beginning of the cartoon but with the lyrics changed from "shortnin' bread" into "rabbit stew".
  • Nelson Eddy, as Willie the Operatic Whale, sings in the Disney animated feature Make Mine Music (1946).
  • Rosa Rio played the song in her original Video Yesteryear score for The Wizard of Oz (1925) in the mid-1980s as a theme for the character of Snowball (Spencer Bell, credited as G. Howe Black). Some reviewers found this reinforced the racist portrayal of the character.
  • In the film Police Academy 4 (1987), the character Captain Harris is seen singing the song into his cane.
  • Similarities have been noted in the main theme for Driving Miss Daisy (1989).[16]
  • In the movie Trainspotting (1996), Renton's friends and family sing the song in a celebration after he avoids being jailed.
  • At the end of the credits in the movie Secret Window (2004), Johnny Depp is heard singing the song.
  • Chris Rock sings this at a funeral in the comedy Death at a Funeral (2010).
  • Rod Steiger sings a modified version, "Mama's little Joy Boy loves lobster, lobster" in the black comedy The Loved One (1965), when describing a nightmare he had involving his mother and lobsters.

Television

  • Willie the Whale sings the first verse and the chorus of the song in the animated short "The Whale Who Wanted To Sing At The Met" featured in the Disney film Make Mine Music (1946).
  • Donald Duck sings the song while making pancakes in the animated short Three for Breakfast (1948).
  • In the Warner Bros. cartoon, Hare Tonic (1945), Elmer and Bugs take turns singing the song, replacing "shortnin' bread" with "wabbit stew".
  • In the I Love Lucy episode "Ethel's Home Town" (1955), Ethel sings "Shortnin' Bread" while Lucy, Ricky, and Fred perform a comedy routine behind her.[17]
  • The Bullwinkle Show (1959-1964) Numerous characters sing this song in different contexts. In one Dudley Do-Right segment, "The Masked Ginny Lynne," Dudley begins leaping around and dancing while singing this song, as the opera singer renders everyone else inert with her soporific moan. One Fractured Fairy Tales retelling of Three Little Pigs begins with three pig sisters receiving a singing telegram, to the tune of this song, telling them they have inherited a fortune.
  • The Banana Splits (1969) "Tra la la" theme song uses a chorus derived from "Shortnin' Bread."
  • In 1984, the children's music trio Sharon, Lois & Bram performed this song in Season 1 of their hit TV Show Sharon, Lois & Bram's Elephant Show.
  • In the 1985 Kidsongs video, "A Day at Old MacDonald's Farm", "Shortnin' Bread" is sung in a different way pertaining to eating breakfast.
  • In the Ren & Stimpy episode, "I Love Chicken", Ren Hoek sings the song whilst preparing a meal.
  • At the end of a The Fresh Prince of Bel Air episode, Will is seen singing the song while scrubbing the floor with his cousin as the end credits roll.
  • In the Tom & Jerry cartoon, "The Milky Waif" (1946), the tune of Shortnin' Bread is played when Jerry and Nibbles daub themselves with shoe polish and appear in blackface to confuse Tom.
  • In Warner Brothers' Animaniacs, this song is part of the regular soundtrack for the adventures of Yakko, Wakko, and Dot, and is played over and over again throughout the series.
  • In the episode "Terms of Endearment" on the adult comedy show Drawn Together, the character Foxxy Love sings a few verses of the refrain.

References

  1. ^ Wade, Stephen. The Beautiful Music all Around Us: Field Recordings and the American Experience. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2012. p. 93.
  2. ^ Eitel, The Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley, p. 119.
  3. ^ Perrow, "Songs and Rhymes from the South," p. 142: "from Tennessee mountain whites, 1912".
  4. ^ a b c Chidester, Brian (7 March 2014). "Busy Doin' Somethin': Uncovering Brian Wilson's Lost Bedroom Tapes". Paste. Retrieved 11 December 2014.
  5. ^ a b Beard, David (Spring 2007). "Ding Dang". Endless Summer Quarterly.
  6. ^ Badman 2004, p. 368.
  7. ^ Chidester, Brian (30 January 2014). "Brian Wilson's Secret Bedroom Tapes". LA Weekly. Retrieved 11 December 2014.
  8. ^ "The Stylus Magazine Non-Definitive Guide: The Lost Album". Stylus Magazine. 2 September 2003. Retrieved 13 July 2014.
  9. ^ Lambert 2007, p. 316.
  10. ^ George-Warren 2014, p. 124.
  11. ^ Carlin 2006, p. 172.
  12. ^ Music-News.com Newsdesk (5 July 2011). "Alice Cooper was too afraid to argue with Brian Wilson". MusicNewsWeb.
  13. ^ Broven, John (2009). Record makers and breakers: voices of the independent rock 'n' roll pioneers. University of Illinois Press. pp. 363ff. ISBN 978-0-252-03290-5.
  14. ^ "Compare Dave 'Baby' Cortez' 'The Happy Organ' with James Whitcomb Riley's 'Shortnin' Bread'". who sampled: Exploring the DNA of music. Retrieved 18 October 2014.
  15. ^ https://www.billboard.com/music/paul-chaplain-and-his-emeralds/chart-history/hot-100/song/571137
  16. ^ Bettencourt, Scott. "THE YEAR IN FILM MUSIC: 1989". Film Score Monthly. Retrieved 29 June 2014.
  17. ^ Feldman, Leslie Dale (18 January 2019). The Political Theory of I Love Lucy: Speed It Up!. Lexington Books. p. 16. ISBN 978-1498541558. Retrieved 2 April 2020.

Bibliography

  • [1] – complete text of James Whitcomb Riley's "A Short'nin' Bread Song—Pieced Out".
  • A traditional version of lyrics and an MP3 clip are here [2].
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