WILDWOOD FLOWER
"Wildwood Flower" (or "The Wildwood Flower") is an American song, best known through performances and recordings by the Carter Family. It is a folk song, cataloged as Roud Folk Song Index No. 757. "Wildwood Flower" is a variant of the song "I'll Twine 'Mid the Ringlets", published in 1860 by composer Joseph Philbrick Webster, who wrote the music, with lyrics attributed to Maud Irving. Other versions of the song have evolved, including "The Pale Amaranthus" (collected in Kentucky and North Carolina, reported in 1911), "Raven Black Hair" and "The Pale Wildwood Flower" (collected 1915–1919), and "The Frail Wildwood Flower". The original Carter Family first recorded "Wildwood Flower" in 1928 on the Victor label. (More from Wikipedia)
One of the songs, "Wildwood Flower" has perhaps the loveliest melody in all of country music. At the time, I knew the song only by reputation, and mainly because of "Wildwood Weed" (1974) – which is basically about marijuana – a #7 hit song by Jim Stafford that mentions the song: "The name of this song is 'The Wildwood Flower' / Now 'The Wildwood Flower' is an old country classic / It gained a whole new popularity / The song isn't any more popular / But the flower is doin' real good". The song "Wildwood Weed" was written and originally recorded way back in 1964 by country singer and comedian Don Bowman.
(February 2015)
