“c u @ the river (Banks of the Ohio)” by Julyan Davis, 2009

Read Part One of our discussion on “The Banks of the Ohio” here.

I asked my love to take a walk

When I asked Julyan Davis if I could use his painting “by her lily white hand” as the cover image for a post, I was expecting to use it for this post, not the previous one. I changed my mind when I saw the title of the painting above, one of his earlier works that I did not remember seeing. I changed my mind because the title alludes to the theme that I saw opening this second post.

That we believe “Banks of the Ohio” originated in the 19th century, from an unknown songwriter, without any particular historical reference, made me wonder if this song, more so than others we’ve listened to was a contrivance. Was it explicitly written to capture the themes of “Omie Wise,” “Down in the Willow Garden,” or “Pretty Polly,” without the more organic or historical lineage of those songs–not to mention clear ties to any gory details.. Like “Omie Wise,” was it sung by some as a warning, as a guardian of chastity?

This warning theme made me wonder how the song might have been heard slightly differently in the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. Is the crime as it would have been understood then exactly the same as it would be understood now? Certainly, it is equally horrible. Certainly, the central betrayal still rings true to contemporary ears. We can find some shades of difference, however, in the history of courtship in America.

“Love’s Reward,” Library of Congress, c. 1908.

I was helped in thinking about this issue by PRX’s “The History Guys,” in a piece you can listen to in Segment B here. The essence of the transition in courtship in the period we’re concerned with, at least in much of mainstream American society, was between a calling culture and a dating culture.

Although clearly under the control of her family, the calling culture, in which a woman agreed to receive suitors in her home, was one where a woman had some control over who was welcome to call and who was not. If you listen to the more extended “History Guys” piece, you’ll see that this was a step away from the 18th century New England practice of “bundling,” in which prospective marriage partners tested their compatibility by spending the night together bundled on opposite sides of a bed in the woman’s family’s home. Incidentally, there were a lot of pre-marital pregnancies at this time…

As society moved into the 20th century, the dating culture shifted more control over courtship to the man. It no longer occurred in a private setting under family surveillance. Dating occurred in public places, but was in more secluded from those watchful, protective eyes. The man paid for the evening’s entertainment–another shift in the balance of power.

We surely know from songs like “Omie Wise” and from the twisted, syphilitic mess that is the real story behind “Tom Dooley,” that secluded rendezvous did happen. If “Banks” originated in the 19th century, however, the song’s opening lines would send a different signal to the audience than they do within a culture accustomed to courtship by dating. Something is already very off for some of those listeners. Even if the song originated or became widely known in the 20th century with the advent of recorded music, it’s still possible that its themes played out within a culture still in the midst of that transition–compounded by increasing urbanization and a change in the social liberties afforded women.

“On the Banks of the Ohio” by Ellen Greene (click for larger detail)

Proposing this contextualized reading is not meant to “blame the victim,” in this story, for agreeing to “walk a little ways” with the ominously-named Willie, but rather to suggest that at least some of the song’s warning function may have been specific to stepping out of the “calling” protocol. It suggests that Willie’s betrayal really happens at the very start. What to our ears might sound like a story of a sweet, idyllic walk gone tragically wrong, might then have sounded like the more logical outcome of transgressing boundaries.

The other thing that emerges from the History Guys show is that romantic love was a luxury over much of this time–that courtship before, but to a lesser extent after, was oriented to family continuity and land management. Romance was an ideal for some, and possible for social elites, but within the context of much of American society, economic means and lack of geographic mobility meant a constrained range of marriage partners and less of an opportunity to be “impractical” about whom one married. This provides another perspective, perhaps, on the reception of the song–and another perspective on the idea that not only were Willie’s hopes dashed, but his prospects as well. Again, this is not an apologia for the narrative, but an explanation of how folks might have heard it differently from us. The song’s love and death appeal may have alluded to a luxury of romance many could not afford or access.

Julyan Davis’s title for the painting above struck me as apt–a realist painting invoking a 19th century ballad with 21st century texting jargon built into the title. Themes of romance, communication, trust, privacy, and betrayal play out in complex ways through the generations of listeners to this song–equally compelling, perhaps, but quite likely for slightly different reasons. Just as the texting language in Davis’s painting title is an ironic anachronism for a 19th century murder ballad, our suppositions about what exactly is being depicted here and why it’s been meaningful might also have their own anachronisms of perspective.

What have I done?

The Kossoy Sisters

I promised to bring you more music in this post, and specifically to feature women performers taking up the song. That “Banks of the Ohio” tells no particular story also means that it tells a universal story. That this universal story is one where the woman’s choices, in retrospect, appear to have been marriage or death is just one component of how this ballad contributes to the misogynistic themes associated with the murder ballad tradition.

Navigating this kind of tragedy in the modern age has led to some compelling performances and some creative re-framings of the song, each of which sheds light on how we might understand how the murder ballad can “function” in the minds and hearts of singers and listeners. That is, to whom does the song urge empathy and how? Which character, male or female, do we see as the principal actor in the tragedy, and how do they act?

For women artists who sing the song in a straightforward way, you can look through the generations of performers from The Kossoy Sisters and Joan Baez (Spotify) in the folk revival period of the mid 20th century to Suzy Bogguss (Spotify) and Kathy Kallick (Spotify) more recently.

As I’ve mentioned before, I think these kinds of performances of the song with unaltered lyrics and unaltered perspective can be quite evocative. We hear the story of the woman’s death in feminine voices. The songs are often authentic, believable, and give the listener more than a little to ponder about love and betrayal. Far from reinforcing the misogynistic themes, they can open up a kind of reflection on them that a male voice would not inspire.

For reasons we can only guess at in most cases, other artists have tinkered with the roles of characters in the song or with the outcome of the story. I haven’t yet found an example of a solo male act that does this, but there are several interesting mixed combos or female solo performers who tweak the song in different directions.

Olivia Newton-John takes us down a number of strange paths in her 70s era revival of the song, particularly in the video performance below. Her version merely switches the pronouns. She makes the victim male and the killer female (as sung by Newton-John in the first person).

Other performers have followed in Newton-John’s footsteps down by that particular riverside. Liz Madden is one you can hear on Spotify. Here’s another group, Ulli Buth & the High Road, performing the song in Germany (Apologies for the background noise). I’m inclined to think that Newton-John’s performance has been more internationally influential than American versions.

One of our old favorites, Snakefarm, featuring Anna Domino, does a clever end-around on the narrator’s voice in its particularly cool, groove-driven version from Songs from My Funeral. Domino tells the story in the first person and second person only. As a result, we hear a truly post-modern approach, where we have no decisive reason to say the perpetrator is a man and the victim is a woman, or vice-versa. The gender equation is removed almost entirely from the song, or left to the inferences of the listener.

Somewhat similar to the approach taken by the Chicago-based murder ballad duo, Eileen, in some of their material, Hot Mustard takes the original story and twists the ending. Hot Mustard performs the song as a “feminist version,” with a mix of voices, with the female character surviving her attempted drowning in the concluding verses. He tells his story. She tells hers.

Finally, we have Dolly Parton‘s version, which appeared on her most recent album Blue Smoke (2014). I’ve mentioned in earlier posts that although Parton has taken on some difficult themes, you’re hard-pressed to find a true murder ballad among her work. If there’s death and violence in Parton’s songs, it’s often self-inflicted by the woman protagonist, and usually only implied. After reading Teresa Goddu‘s article, “Bloody Daggers and Lonesome Graveyards: The Gothic and Country Music,” I’ve hypothesized that Parton, like Loretta Lynn, has stayed away from this material as a strategy for mainstream acceptability and avoiding the marginalization or stigmatization of “Southerness” that attaches to the murder ballad tradition.

“Banks of the Ohio” truly gave me hope that Parton’s recent turn into more traditional material meant a full immersion into the murder ballad tradition. I was disappointed. She’s a sprinkler, not a dunker. Here is Parton’s take:

Listen on YouTube here. (You can also find abundant concert clips from her 2014 Australia and New Zealand tour there.)

Parton “frames” the song–introducing a reporter as the uber-narrator going into a jail cell interview the perpetrator. Parton explains her thinking to NPR here:

“I wanted to record it years ago,and I thought, ‘I don’t like to sing a song that’s just like a man, you know, just from a man’s standpoint.’ Because it was really about a guy that killed his girlfriend. So I thought, ‘I’m clever. I’m a writer. So why don’t I just kinda box this in a little bit and just kinda present myself as a reporter or a writer that goes into prison to talk to this guy?'”

I’m inclined to give Parton a lot of leeway, for a number of reasons, but I find this approach decidedly unsatisfying. The decision feels to me like it is more driven by the “Art of Being Dolly” than the Art of the Murder Ballad. The singer gets in the way of the song here. Part of the emotional power of  murder ballads is the experience of both singer and listener of putting oneself in the shoes of the killer. This step away from the action keeps us distance from the potential emotional power of the song, and diminishes our capacity for empathy with the characters.

Parton’s explanation doesn’t sway me, either. The song doesn’t tell any historical story, so there’s no inherent reason why it has to be about a man. Clearly, we’ve seen examples to the contrary. To be clear, I’m not responding negatively to her performance out of a concern for the purity of the original source material, but rather for the extent to which it keeps everybody at a supposedly decorous remove from the action. Oddly, this seems more unseemly to me.

I said in the last post that “Banks of the Ohio” doesn’t rank as one of my favorites, nor do I find it particularly distinctive or groundbreaking within the murder ballad tradition–at least in its raw form. Thinking through these re-negotiations with the male-female violence of the song, however, does bring out some themes for me that are quite vital about what these songs do. Most important, perhaps, is their immediacy in the minds and hears of listener and singer alike.

You may have reasons to opt for any of these creative alterations as a preferred course to the stereotypical, male-driven, love or death ultimatum. I hope I’ve made at least some headway in persuading you, though, that staying emotionally close to the action is a path that ultimately yields greater power and greater insight into these songs and why they stay with us. “Banks of the Ohio” retains its enduring popularity, through a number of different eras of gender politics and romantic protocols, because it speaks to a kind of universal story–not in a didactic way, one that tells you that this should be a norm–but one that gives emotional leave to the listener to experience loss, remorse, or regret and know that we’re not always best served by keeping those feelings at an arm’s distance.

Next up

With this post, we will edge over 500,000 lifetime page views at Murder Ballad Monday. We’d all like to thank you very much for reading and listening along the way. We hope to have some exciting news to share with you in the next few months, but will keep on plugging away at our work.

If I’m able to, I hope to put together one more “Banks” post before the weekend. Whether or not that comes together, we can look forward to Pat roaring back into Murder Ballad Monday posts with a new, old song next week.