Green, Green Rocky Road (African American Children's Game)

Edited by Azizi Powell

This pancocojams post showcases the African American originated children's game "Green Green Rocky Road".

The content of this post is presented for cultural and recreational purposes.

All copyrights remain with their owners.

Thanks to all those who were associated with creating this children's game. Thanks also to all the students from Lilly's Chapel School (Alabama, USA.) for performing this and a number of other ring games and play party songs. Thanks also to all those who helped collect and popularize this singing game.

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ARTICLE EXCERPTS ABOUT THE CHILDREN'S SINGING GAME "GREEN GREEN ROCKY ROAD"
Excerpt #1: From https://www.elijahwald.com/songblog/green-rocky-road/ GREEN ROCKY ROAD (LEN CHANDLER, BOB KAUFMAN, ETC.) published MAY 27, 2016 by ELIJAH WALD
"One of the early songs Dave Van Ronk taught me, this was largely composed by Len Chandler, one of the most musically sophisticated writers on the Village folk scene. len chandlerChandler had been a classical oboe player in Akron, Ohio, and Dave recalled Variety referring to him as “musician turned folksinger.”

[...]

Both Dave and Chandler remember hearing the traditional version of “Green, Green Rocky Road” from the poet Bob Kaufman, who had learned it as a child in New Orleans. It was a popular African American children’s game song throughout the South, and there’s a nice version recorded by Harold Courlander in Alabama that was issued by Folkways in the early 1950s*. It’s in Dave’s recollection, Kaufman sang it for him and Chandler backstage at the Commons, the coffeehouse where Dave was doing most of his playing in the late 1950s, but Chandler recalls learning it from Kaufman over dinner in Chandler’s apartment.

In any case, Chandler came up with a new melody and wrote the verses, Dave learned it from him, and it became one of the most enduring and requested songs in Dave’s repertoire, as well as one of his fundamental Dave Van Ronk 10 copy guitar arrangements in dropped D tuning....
To finish off, here are Courlander’s notes on the children’s game:

Ring Game songs: “The children form a circle with the leader in the center. The group sings ‘Green, green’ and the leader answers, ‘Rocky road,’ skipping around the ring. As the chorus is sung the leader is deciding which person to choose. As he picks one, the group sings the first line of the verse, naming the child selected. The leader brings his choice to the center and kisses her...”

Hence, “Tell me who you love, tell me who you love.”
-snip-
I added italics to highlight this portion of this article excerpt.

Notice that, according to this description, boys play this game along with girls. Presumably, when the girl is the center person, she would pick a boy next to kiss.

Needless to say, because of several reasons, this game would have to be modified if it were introduced to children for play nowadays. Here are two reasons for this that immediately come to mind: 1. Boys rarely play non-competitive singing games with girls; 2. Children nowadays aren't encouraged to kiss any other child in public or in private and most children of certain ages probably wouldn't want to kiss anyone on their cheek and definitely not on their mouth because they consider doing so to be "yucky". (That said, although my six and 1/2 year old grand daughter went through a phase when she was late five years and early six years old when she looked forward to the kiss at the end of the pretend wedding ceremony when her "Barbie" and "Ken" dolls-those weren't the names she gave them- got married. Her favorite male Ken doll would frequently get married to a different "Barbie" doll-which I hastened to tell her wasn't the way marriage and divorce works in the real world."...

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*The YouTube example that is mentioned in that article is no longer available except for its title and publisher's name/date. However, that same sound file is given in the YouTube example showcased below.

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*Len Chandler and Bob Kaufman are African American. [Update: Thanks for Anonymous Oct. 4, 2022 for correcting the misinformation I had about Bob Kaufman's race.]

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Excerpt #2
From https://www.musicconnection.com/len-chandler-true-tales-gaslight/
“If it was never new, and it never gets old––it’s a folk song,” proclaims Oscar Isaac as the title character in the feature film Inside Llewyn Davis. For Len Chandler, these words are prophetic. “Green Green Rocky Road,” a song he co-wrote and registered for copyright over a half century ago, has two prominent placements in the film. Performed on camera by the lead character, it is also featured as the film’s end title, in a version recorded by the late Dave Van Ronk.

Chandler and poet Robert Kaufman penned it on the bones of a traditional folk song collected in Negro Songs From Alabama by Harold Courlander. Chandler remembers the collaboration like this. “Kaufman was at my $34 a month New York apartment on Stanton Street for dinner. I had already put the music together. Kaufman said, ‘Dooka dooka soda cracker/Does your momma chew tobacco?’ and I said, ‘If your momma chews tobacco/ Dooka dooka soda cracker.’ We were just playing.” In addition to Van Ronk, the song was covered by numerous artists including Judy Henske, Leroy Inman and Ira Rogers, and Chubby Checker."...
-snip-
Click http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2013/05/debunking-urban-myth-about-hooka-tooka.html for a related 2013 pancocojams post entitled "Debunking The Urban Myth About "Hooka Tooka Soda Cracka".

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INFORMATION ABOUT THIS SINGING GAME
From https://folkways.si.edu/lillys-chapel-school-ala/green-green-rocky-road/african-american-music-american-folk-childrens/track/smithsonian
"Track Info
ALBUM: Ring Games: Line Games and Play Party Songs of Alabama
YEAR RELEASED: 1953
CATALOG NUMBER: FW07004_106
DISC / TRACK NUMBER: 1 / 6
DURATION: 1:30
COUNTRY(S): United States
CULTURE GROUP(S): African American
LANGUAGE(S): English"
-snip-
That page includes a .30 audio file.

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SHOWCASE YOUTUBE EXAMPLE: Green Green Rocky Road



Lilly's Chapel School (Ala.) – Topic, May 30, 2015

Provided to YouTube by Smithsonian Folkways Recordings

Ring Games: Line Games and Play Party Songs of Alabama
℗ 2004 Smithsonian Folkways Recordings / 1953 Folkways Records

Released on: 1953-01-01
-snip-
In contrast to the play instructions that are included in the article excerpt which is given in italics above, in this sound file a leader sings the word "Green Green" and the group sings the words "rocky road".

Here's my transcription of this sound file. Additions and corrections are welcome.

Leader – Green Green
Group- Rocky road
Leader- Come a lady’s green
Group- Rocky Road
Leader -Tell me who you love
Group- Rocky road
Leader -Tell me who you love
Group- Rocky road

[One girl says her name. I think the girl in the recording says "Minnie Moore".}

{The entire group except for the person who said her name says - Dear Miss Minnie your name been called
Come and take a seat there by the wall
Give her a kiss and let her go
She’ll never sit in that chair no mo’

[The song begins again from the beginning, substituting the next girl's name.]
-snip-
I wonder if the third line "Come a [pronounced "ah"] lady's green" may have originally been "[Here] come's a lady in green". I also wonder if the color mentioned changed depending on what color dress (or other clothing) the girl wore.

By the way, I have a vague recollection of singing a brief segment of some African American girls singing this game on Sesame Street when that television series first started. I remember this segment because it was so unusual to see Black girls on television in and of itself, and especially playing singing games on television. With regard to the lyrics "Come a lady's green", I thought the girls were singing "come a lady's dream", but that doesn't make much sense in terms of the singing game.

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