I happened to hear a great old-time tune from my iTunes pile the other day, “Fair Miss in the Garden,” by Roscoe Holcombe from Mountain Music of Kentucky, a fantastic collection of field-recorded tunes laid to tape on the porches of Hazard County in the mid-fifties. To my aggravation, nor Google nor Digitrad unearthed the lyrics. Adding to my frustration, I have not yet found any references to the song but the two-or-so released versions. The song, in form and language, sounds very much like a Childe ballad, medieval ballads that survived into the twentieth century in various backwaters and which form the foundation of the cult of authenticity in folkloric circles, to my personal derisive amusement and pseudohistoricist fascination.

Ah well, I’m reduced to the same technique I employed some twenty-odd years ago in seeking to lean the lyrics of songs by the commercially unsuccessful likes of The Gizmos or the (1980s) Ramones. I’ll hafta transcribe ’em.