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Pancho and Lefty

Sing Out! Posted on by
Walking Man, by Alberto Giacometti

A Work of Betrayal


I’m about to spill a good bit of ink, figuratively speaking, on a song that is only around 270 words long (including repeated words).  I want to (re)introduce you to “Pancho and Lefty” as a murder ballad, and talk about why I think it’s most likely a relatively sophisticated bit of storytelling (or, perhaps, an incredibly evocative failure).  I’ve tried thinking about how to separate these two points of emphasis, and realized that I’ll have to cover them both at once.


First, those ~270 words:

Living on the road my friend
Was gonna keep you free and clean                        
Now you wear your skin like iron
Your breath’s as hard as kerosene                  
You weren’t your momma’s only boy
But her favorite one it seems      
She began to cry when you said goodbye
And sank into your dreams
 
Pancho was a bandit boys
His horse was fast as polished steel
Wore his gun outside his pants
For all the honest world to feel
Pancho met his match you know
On the deserts down in Mexico
No one heard his dying words
That’s the way it goes
             
All the Federales say
They could have had him any day
They only let him hang around
Townes Van Zandt (1944-1997)

Out of kindness I suppose

 
Lefty he can’t sing the blues
All night long like he used to
The dust that Pancho bit down south
Ended up in Lefty’s mouth
The day they laid poor Pancho low
Lefty split for Ohio
Where he got the bread to go
[Ah] There ain’t nobody knows.
 
[Well] The poets tell how Pancho fell
Lefty’s livin’ in a cheap hotel
The desert’s quiet and Cleveland’s cold
So the story ends we’re told
Pancho needs your prayers it’s true,
But save a few for Lefty too
He just did what he had to do
[Ah] Now he’s growin’ old
 
A few gray federales say
They could have had him any day
They only let him go so wrong
Out of kindness I suppose
[repeat]






The performance above, about as unadorned as it can get, is Van Zandt performing the song in the late 80s. The song originally appeared on The Late, Great Townes Van Zandt (1972).  That version can be found here:


“Poncho & Lefty” by Townes Van Zandt (Spotify)  (You’ll note that as with many of our other songs, standard spelling of track names proves elusive.)


The studio version involves a more elaborate arrangement, including mariachi-like trumpets, and Townes’s voice is considerably more even and mellifluous.


My favorite versions, though, are the solo live performances.  His April 19, 1985 performance at 12th & Porter in Nashville, Tennessee (as recorded on Live and Obscure) is probably my favorite.


A similar version can be found on the album Texas Outlaws.  


“Pancho and Lefty – Live,” by Townes Van Zandt (Spotify)


Toward the end of the week, I’ll post a link to my “P&L” playlist for you to try out a few different versions.


Whodunnit?


One of the things I love about “Pancho and Lefty” is its remarkable economy–that it tells a lot of story in the mind of the listener without specifying absolutely everything.  There’s an old adage from E.B. White that explaining a joke is a lot like dissecting a frog…edifying, but generally fatal for the frog.  While “Pancho and Lefty” is not a joke, White’s lesson is probably not lost on Van Zandt.  It’s not lost on me, either, so I’ll try to be careful here and create more questions than answers–or at least I’ll do my best to avoid the wrong kind of answers.  I don’t think “Pancho and Lefty” yields to easy explanation–either because Van Zandt was either completely successful or he kind of screws up in an evocative way.


The song yields to a number of interpretations.  The Wikipedia entry on the song is reasonably concise, and notes Lefty’s implied betrayal.  It links to Van Zandt’s own somewhat less than straightforward exegesis of the song, where he mentions that Pancho dies by hanging:





The Wikipedia entry also links to the song review of “Pancho and Lefty” on the Allmusic.com web site.  There, the reviewer writes about 820 words on the narrative of the song itself, filling in some gaps with his own take, and does not suggest at any point in his analysis that Lefty was responsible for Pancho’s death–a theme that, for my own part, seems rather central to the song’s power.  But, I’ll leave it that there are apparently multiple interpretations.


A key question is:  Who is the narrator and when?  The answer to this question implicates how and to what extent “Pancho and Lefty” can be considered a murder ballad, even under our loose definition of the term.


Where to begin?  Shaleane’s recent discussion of “The Ballad of Hollis Brown” noted the crucial change of perspective that Bob Dylan introduces us in the last stanzas, shifting our gaze from being shared with the protagonist, and somehow implicating us all in the narrative.


In “Pancho and Lefty,” verse one is in the second person.  The remainder of the verses are in the third person.  The choruses are also in the third person, but it’s not entirely clear that the “him” being referred to is always the same person.  If you take Van Zandt at his word, which I think all fair-minded readers would consider a bit of a gamble in this regard, the “him” in the first chorus is Pancho, because “hanging around” is a reference to how Pancho supposedly dies.


I’ve spent a good deal of time thinking about this song, and every time I do I come up with different plausible interpretations of what’s going on.  I know that Pancho dies, but I don’t know who did it, and I don’t know just how responsible Lefty is, regardless of how he seems to feel.  I have some reasonably good hunches that he’s responsible for Pancho dying.  But, did he actually kill him?



Help me answer these questions:  


Is the first verse about Pancho or Lefty?  Is Lefty the speaker in this verse or is it someone else?  Is Lefty the speaker of the next verse as well, or have we switched off to an unnamed, third-party narrator?


Assuming that Lefty would have some tolerance for Bob Dole-like third-person self-reference, is it plausible that the entire song is sung as though Lefty is the narrator?  If this is the case, was Lefty’s betrayal to turn Pancho over to the federales, or did Lefty kill Pancho himself?


And, who is the “him” that the federales could have had any day, was it Pancho or Lefty?  Despite Van Zandt’s hanging allusion, could it be that both Pancho and Lefty eluded them?  If so, then how did Pancho die?





The Rhetoric of “Pancho and Lefty”


I know just enough about the late Professor Wayne Booth‘s seminal work, The Rhetoric of Fiction (1961), to get myself in trouble.  (Incidentally, I’ll invite any part-time ironists to go to Professor Booth’s Wikipedia entry and rate its trustworthiness.)   It’s a bit outside my areas of expertise, but that hasn’t stopped us before.

Wayne Booth (1921-2005)

And, I am leery of bringing the critical theory equivalent of a Sherman tank to what may seem to some a knife fight of a song.  I suspect, though, that there may be a few things we can learn from Booth’s book that will help us do one or both of two things:  a) decide who we feel killed Pancho and what Lefty’s responsibility is; and b) if Van Zandt succeeded marvelously or merely screwed up in interesting ways.  That is, did he made a great song, but maybe not great literature?  Or, is the song successful because it’s incapable of being tied up into one coherent story?


“Pancho and Lefty” is, after all, a work of fiction, and understanding this a bit better will not only resolve for us what happens, but also, perhaps, why some people like to sing it.  We’ll go into that a bit more in the next post.


Booth’s book is famous for elaborating the concept of the “unreliable narrator.”  The unreliable narrator is not one who is consciously deceptive, but one who speaks or acts not in accordance with the norms of the work.  According to Booth, this most often happens when narrators declare themselves to have some capacity for judgment that their authors somehow deny them.  That is, distinct from an attempt at deceiving us, it becomes clear to the reader that the narrator is self-deceiving.  


It’s not clear that we have that here, but it is fairly clear that we can’t trust all the words at face value.  The key phrase for unlocking the song is: “Where he got the bread to go, there ain’t nobody knows.”  (Ironically, and somewhat beside the point, Van Zandt’s use of the term “bread” for money here, is somewhat anachronistic to the implied time period of the song.  But, that’s another story.)  


Lefty’s possession of the monetary means to flee is what signals his betrayal.  Once this line is flipped from being able to be understood straightforwardly, go back and see for yourself how many others fall into doubt–“nobody heard his dying words”?  “he just did what he had to do”?  (I’ve noted before that lines like “that’s how the story goes” introduce a bit of uncertainty as to the reliability of the story being told–see the “Coda” to this post.  I think in this case, though “So the story ends we’re told” is mainly a device to get the rhyme right.)  Is there inconsistency between “nobody heard his dying words” and “poets tell how Pancho fell”?


So, a lot turns on which “voice” is singing the song and in what part.  Again, I’m not entirely un-self-conscious about bringing such theory on the craft of narrative fiction to bear on this short bit of 20th century songwriting. I am also aware that what we have in this song is a few “tells” regarding things not being as they seem, rather than the full-on “unreliable narrator” as Booth describes him, but, that depends on who the narrator really is.  If it’s Lefty, the narrator is deceptive.  If it’s an unnamed third party, the narrator is unreliable.


Van Zandt, though, leaves us guessing.  


Showing, Not Telling


Booth’s Rhetoric also discusses the importance to narrative fiction of showing, not telling–that is, having the characters demonstrate themes or their inner character through their actions, rather than the author interjecting those characterizations in prose directed to the reader.  Van Zandt’s “Pancho and Lefty” is interesting, not so much because it can be neatly sewn up.  Indeed, I have done my best to avoid drawing conclusions akin to those made by the writer at Allmusic.com, because I think that the song succeeds–wittingly or unwittingly, because it resists those conclusions–whether because the point of view of the song shifts, or because one or more narrators can’t really be trusted to give us the real story.  In other words, Van Zandt’s artistry provides only a gaunt frame upon which singer and listener separately hang the details of the song.  In other words, the song as sung is inevitably different than the song as heard.


Let me know what you think, though.  Did Lefty betray Pancho?  (You could also read the song as Pancho betraying Lefty).  And, how and in what way did this betrayal lead to his death?


What’s next?

Later this week, I’ll take up a few covers of “Pancho and Lefty,” which I think tell a story of where the song itself might fit in the lives of its performers.  After that, I’ll introduce a few songs that could be considered, in one way or another, thematic heirs or relatives of “Pancho and Lefty.”


Before going on, though, and because this post has been a little short on music, I’ll add Emmylou Harris’s performance of “Pancho and Lefty.”  Her release of the song on Luxury Liner (originally 1977, re-released 2004) proved pivotal for the most significant popularization of the song, which we’ll get to in the next post.


A studio performance can be found on Spotify:


“Pancho & Lefty” by Emmylou Harris on Spotify


This early live version from “The Old Grey Whistle Test” is probably my favorite of hers.  Amazing vocal power.







A similarly strong performance from Dutch TV, recorded the following year, can be found here.


The song has remained a part of Harris’s repertoire, performed here at a Farm Aid concert in 2003:









[Thanks to my friends, Dave and Bob, as well as my to my spouse and son for their thoughts about “Pancho and Lefty,” and helping me field-test some of my thinking about it over the past few weeks.]

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Comments

Pancho and Lefty — 8 Comments

  1. This is an excellent analysis, but I think there is a second piece of information that the song is offering that tells us more about how we are meant to view the saga of Poncho and Lefty.

    The last repetition of the chorus shifts from “all the Federales say” to “A few grey Federales say”. I think the narrator is to be identified with those aging Federales, who lament the circumstances that drove the pair to outlawry, even as they admit a begrudging kind of admiration for the pair, who “wore [their] guns outside [their] pants/ for all the honest world to feel”. Of course, years later looking back they can hardly admit that they were worthy adversaries, even to the point of prolonging matters out of mutual regard, so they say instead that they were being “kind” to the pair.

    It can be seen that the Federales were in active pursuit of the pair, as they insist now (after the fact) that they “could have had them any day”. The pressure of this inevitability is the justification offered for Lefty’s actions, and why we are asked to pray for him too, since he “only did what he had to do”.

    I take it as given that Lefty sold out Poncho for a relatively trifling amount, one that now only allows him to grow old in drunken regret and superficial comfort if not dignity. The Federales can’t admit they paid off Lefty for a tip, so “nobody knows” where Lefty got the money. They get the jump on Poncho, who because of Lefty’s betrayal now dies alone, with no one to hear his dying words. Lefty leaves the day of the funeral – but please note that there is no indication that he didn’t stay for the service itself.

    Of course now, the Federales themselves feel partly cheated and partly guilty for their own roles in the betrayal of a relationship they feel a certain romanticized attraction to. They didn’t *beat* the strong, romantic Poncho, but rather the naive dreamer-turned-alcoholic cynic Lefty. The desert is now quiet, and all Cleveland has is cold, and the days that the poets speak of are now firmly in the past never to return. These grey Federales are now left to contemplate their own mortality as the friends they once hunted the outlaws with dwindle away, and realize to their sorrow they have more in common with Lefty than Poncho. Embarrassed now by the way things have turned out, they offer their prayers for Poncho, and in penance for their hypocrisy, Lefty as well, even as they lie about the details of the story in the retelling in favor of one which calls up the romantic, poetic vision of the past.

    TL;DR: First verse is about Lefty, the narrator is one of the Federales retelling the saga in a somewhat self-serving manner.

    • It took me a while to get back to this, but thanks for your insights here. You make a very persuasive case on many points.

  2. I think the first verse is just Townes singing directly about himself. After he wrote that first verse he must have thought that’s pretty good I have to make a song out if this but where do I go from here? I’ve already told my life story in just one verse. Which is what made him a master songwriter BTW. So I guess then he decided to make it a story song. But I believe it’s still all about him. I think pancho and lefty are the same person which is Townes. I think the rest of the song after the first verse is just one big metaphor for self betrayal. I think the song is simply asking the question “Is it better to burn out or fade away”? If you die the tragic hero you”ll be remembered forever but if you “sell out” so to speak just to improve your longevity you’ll grow old alone and forgotten. The first verse has always seemed disconnected to the rest of the song. And I think being how strong a verse it is, maybe the strongest ever written, that people just assume it must be part of the story of the rest of the song. I don’t think so. I think Townes just left it like it was cause it sounded so good. The song could have easily began ” Pancho was a bandit boys…”

  3. Poncho and Lefty were not sidekicks and they didn’t know each other. Lefty is a washed up blues singer who sings about cowboys and has been on the road gigging since he left his momma’s home. Both are alcoholics, poncho drank himself to death in Mexico and Lefty is drinking himself to death in Ohio. One an outlaw hero of the 1800’s the other an outlaw hero of the 1900’s. Both living and dying on their own terms.

  4. 1) Is the first verse about Pancho or Lefty? Is Lefty the speaker in this verse or is it someone else? Is Lefty the speaker of the next verse as well, or have we switched off to an unnamed, third-party narrator?

    It’s an all-knowing narrator talking about both Pancho and Lefty, and all cowboys, outlaws, and singers who hit the road and leave their mamas behind. This verse could be about, and is about, any number of such figures in any number of such songs and tales.

    2) Assuming that Lefty would have some tolerance for Bob Dole-like third-person self-reference, is it plausible that the entire song is sung as though Lefty is the narrator? If this is the case, was Lefty’s betrayal to turn Pancho over to the federales, or did Lefty kill Pancho himself?

    Anything is possible. But why are we assuming Lefty killed Pancho at all, either directly or indirectly? Lefty could also have betrayed Pancho, and the mythic status of all cowboys, simply by going quietly away instead out going out in a blaze of glory. Pancho: bit the dust, laid low by the law. Lefty: that dust ends up in his own mouth, and he spends the rest of his life spinning no tales and the subject of no tales, unlike Pancho. As a cowboy-outlaw-singer, he’s a failure. That’s his betrayal. That’s why we should have a few prayers for him too.

    3) And, who is the “him” that the federales could have had any day, was it Pancho or Lefty? Despite Van Zandt’s hanging allusion, could it be that both Pancho and Lefty eluded them? If so, then how did Pancho die?

    Both. They could have had Pancho any day, but they got him one specific day. Could have been earlier though, if they had wanted, ’cause they are the federales. They are just playing with him like a cat with a mouse. In regard to Lefty, they could have bothered to get him any day, but he wasn’t worth the bother. And, anyway, he was already dead in the sense that he’s wasn’t going to do anything to anybody anyway (see above).

    In regard to some other points, and moving this interpretation along: isn’t the fact hat no one was around to hear Pancho’s dying words what allows the poets to tell tales about his death? In regard to the bread that Lefty used to get to Ohio, it clearly wasn’t much bread, and as the song says, who *does* know how he got it? Any manner of ways that outlaws usually get bread. All we know is that, again, he didn’t go out in a blaze of glory like Pancho. In regard to the kindness the federales show, it’s the law’s form of poetic justice — they’ll hang the glorified outlaw right and proper, and they’ll let the loser bandit skulk into oblivion, right and proper.

    Just some thoughts.

    • And good ones, too. Thanks for offering them. It’s definitely reasonable to propose that we don’t need to go so far as to believe that Lefty’s betrayal, whatever it was, played any kind of direct or indirect role in Pancho’s downfall–that what Lefty betrayed was an ideal. This interpretation pretty much takes murder(even with a generous stretch of the definition) out of the picture. Do you think that it simultaneously reduces the importance of the relationship between the two protagonists? That is, rather than a story about some central event or sequence of events that affect the lives of the two characters, that what we have is just a study in contrasting trajectories of banditry.

      The dynamic of an all-knowing, but not all-telling narrator opens up a lot of room, I think, for a range of reasonable interpretations. The lyrics conceal and reveal in interesting ways. The narrator will tell us the truth, but never the whole truth. I think that’s a big part of what gives the song it’s staying power. It is never just one song.

      Thanks again for weighing in. Good food for thought.

  5. Ken,
    Great post! The narration issues and application of Booth analysis are fascinating. I always assumed that the first verse described Pancho from the perspective of Lefty. Swapping these roles complicates the message considerably. The Lefty’s betrayal seems clear to me, assuming consumptive guilt drove him to split on the day of Pancho’s internment. Also, saving a prayer for Lefty suggests that his soul is a bit troubled to say the least. Lefty’s motivations are far from clear. Was Lefty “singing the blues” because he was tired of living in the shadow of Pancho’s out-sized reputation? The reference to “bread” and “cheap hotel room” implies that a nominal sum of money was probably involved. Perhaps he sold Lefty out to the Federales or perhaps he killed him during a poker game, or after robbing a train. The line line that “he just did what he had to do” suggests that there was an inevitability about this deed. Did Lefty facilitate Pancho’s demise as an act of mercy or possibly to protect the legacy of an aging friend?
    Dave

    • Thanks, Dave! I’m with you on the first verse now, but it took me a while to get there. I’m kind of embarrassed to say that, because it seems so obvious to me now. Everything else about the song has gone the opposite way for me, from certainty to doubt, particularly as I read others’ interpretations. To be clear, I’m not so much swayed by the substance of those interpretations as I am convinced that Van Zandt did a terrific job of eluding certainty.

      I also think that some perceptions of the song get skewed by the Nelson and Haggard version being their first exposure to it. I touch on that a bit in the next post.

      You raise an interesting set of questions. I’m particularly struck by the concluding one. It reminds me of Pat’s recent discussion of “Jack Straw” and its ties to “Of Mice and Men” (see “There ain’t a winner in this game…”) That there might have been some sort of “outlaw euthanasia” is not a prospect I had considered before.

      Thanks for the comment.

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