The Deadwood Stage (Whip-Crack-Away!)
"The Deadwood Stage (Whip-Crack-Away!)" is a song in the 1953 film Calamity Jane, written by Sammy Fain and Paul Francis Webster, and performed by Doris Day.[1] It was also used in the London stage show Calamity Jane in 2003[2] and the musical based on Doris Day's greatest hits, A Sentimental Journey.[3]
The song's opening lines are:
- Oh! The Deadwood Stage is a-rollin' on over the plains,
- with the curtains flappin' and the driver slappin' the reins.
- Beautiful sky! A wonderful day!
- Whip crack-away!, Whip crack-away!, Whip crack-away!
It goes on to contain a macabre line about Wild Bill Hickok, "on his gun there's more than twenty-seven notches".[4]
In 1957, Clint Walker sings the song in the Cheyenne episode "The Conspirators".
In 2010, Australian singer Melinda Schneider recorded the song for her Doris Day tribute album Melinda Does Doris.
References
[edit]- ^ Tom Santopietro (2008), Considering Doris Day, p. 77
- ^ Lizzie Loveridge, Calamity Jane, Curtain Up
- ^ Alvin Rakoff gets sentimental over Doris Day, The Daily Telegraph, 13 Feb 2009
- ^ Alan Clayson (1997), Death discs: an account of fatality in the popular song, p. 42
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