Sweet Sunny South

from Bowling Green by Alice Gerrard & Mike Seeger

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about

Traditional. Another of Tommy's favorites that we used to sing a lot when visiting him, and one of the most beautiful in a vast array of longing for home/memories of home songs.

Recorded by Mike Seeger at Tommy Jarrell's home near Mt Airy, NC in 1979.

lyrics

Take me back to the place where I first saw the light
To the sweet sunny south take me home
Where the mocking birds sing me to sleep every night
Oh why was I tempted to roam.

I think with regret of the dear home I've left
Of the warm hearts that sheltered me there
Of wife and of dear ones of whom I'm bereft
For the old place again do I sigh.

Take me home to the place where the orange trees grow
To my plot in the evergreen shade
Where the flowers on the rivers green margins did grow
They are sweet on the banks where we played.

Oh the path to our cottage they say has grown free
And the place is quite lonely around
And I know that the smiles and the forms I once knew
Now lie neath the dark mossy ground.

But yet I return to the place of my birth
Where the children have played round the door
Where they gathered wild blossoms that grow round the path
They will echo our footsteps no more.

Take me home, let me see what is left that I knew
Can it be that the old house is gone
Dear friends of my childhood indeed must be few
And I must face death all alone.

credits

from Bowling Green, released January 1, 2008
Vocal duet
Tommy Jarrell-fiddle AEAE
Mike-banjo aEAC#E
Alice-guitar

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about

Alice Gerrard image

Alice Gerrard Durham, North Carolina

A singer and songwriter, Alice’s recordings with Hazel Dickens during the 1960s and ’70s influenced a generation of women musicians from Laurie Lewis to the Judds. Nominated for a Grammy in 2015, she was inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Assoc. Hall of Fame in 2017. A documentary film about Alice, "You Gave Me a Song" premiered at the Full Frame Independent Film Festival in 2019. ... more

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