Library

Angeline the Baker

Traditional

Style
Old-time
Tradition
American old-time
Form
Reel
Key
D
Level
1
Played on
Fiddle

In the public domain. Source

Music

Learn the melody first. Each step adds to the one before it.

Adds old-time hammer-ons, slides, triplets and an open D drone under the long B.

80bpm

Click any note to start from there

History

The tune grew out of "Angelina Baker," a minstrel song by Stephen Foster (1826 to 1864) about an enslaved woman sold away from the man who loved her. Fiddlers kept the name and a few of the words but changed the melody over time.

Uncle Eck Dunford cut an early version for Victor in 1928. The version most old-time players use today came into the revival from two Virginia and West Virginia fiddlers: J. W. "Babe" Spangler of Patrick County, through a County Records album, and Franklin George, who taught it to younger players before that album came out.

Angeline the Baker, her age is forty-three, Feed her candy by the peck but she won't marry me.
Old-time recordings
Angeline the baker, left me here alone, Left me here to weep a tear, and play on the old jawbone.
John J. Sharp

Read more on the Traditional Tune Archive