Cliff Edwards Videos : 78's - Stack O' Lee - Cliff Edwards (Ukulele Ike)

78's 78 s stack o lee cliff edwards ukulele ike

78's - Stack O' Lee - Cliff Edwards (Ukulele Ike)

Recorded on July 25, 1928. "Stagger Lee", also known as "Stagolee", "Stackerlee", "Stack O'Lee", "Stack-a-Lee" and several other variants, is a popular folk song based on the murder of William "Billy" Lyons by Stagger Lee Shelton. The first published version of the song was by folklorist John Lomax in 1910. The song was well known in African American communities along the lower Mississippi River by the 1910s. Before World War II, it was commonly known as "Stack O'Lee". WC Handy wrote that this probably was a nickname for a tall person, comparing him to the tall smokestack of the large steamboat Robert E. Lee[citation needed]. By the time WC Handy wrote that explanation in the 1920s, "Stack O' Lee" was already familiar in United States popular culture, with recordings of the song made by such pop singers of the day as Cliff Edwards. In Mississippi John Hurt's version, as in all such pieces, there are many (sometimes anachronistic) variants on the lyrics. Several older versions give Billy's last name as "De Lyons" or "Deslile".

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