"Parchman Farm" or "Parchman Farm Blues" is a

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

song first recorded by American

Delta blues Delta blues is one of the earliest-known styles of blues. It originated in the Mississippi Delta, and is regarded as a regional variant of country blues. Guitar and harmonica are its dominant instruments; slide guitar is a hallmark of the s ...

musician

Bukka White Booker T. Washington "Bukka" White (November 12, 1906 February 26, 1977) was an American Delta blues guitarist and singer. Biography White was born south of Houston, Mississippi. He was a first cousin of B.B. King's mother (White's mother and ...

in 1940. It is an autobiographical piece, in which White sings of his experience at the infamous

Mississippi State Penitentiary Mississippi State Penitentiary (MSP), also known as Parchman Farm, is a maximum-security prison farm located in unincorporated Sunflower County, Mississippi, in the Mississippi Delta region. Occupying about of land,Jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

pianist-vocalist

Mose Allison Mose John Allison Jr. (November 11, 1927 – November 15, 2016) was an American jazz and blues pianist, singer, and songwriter. He became notable for playing a unique mix of blues and modern jazz, both singing and playing piano. After moving to N ...

adapted it for his own "Parchman Farm" and "New Parchman", which are among his most popular songs. Numerous artists have recorded their own renditions, usually based on Allison's songs.

Background

Early in his recording career in 1937, Bukka White was arrested and convicted for a shooting incident and was sentenced to Parchman Farm prison in rural

Sunflower County, Mississippi Sunflower County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2010 census, the population was 29,450. Its largest city and county seat is Indianola. Sunflower County comprises the Indianola, MS Micropolitan Statistical Are ...

. The institution was operated as a hard-time prison labor work farm, which was notorious for its harsh conditions and use of the trusty system. His recording of "

Shake 'Em On Down "Shake 'Em On Down" is a Delta blues song by American musician Bukka White. He recorded it in Chicago in 1937 around the beginning of his incarceration at the infamous Parchman Prison Farm in Mississippi. It was his first recording for produc ...

" became a hit while he was there and as a result, White became somewhat of a celebrity at the prison. While incarcerated, he recorded two songs for

John Lomax John Avery Lomax (September 23, 1867 – January 26, 1948) was an American teacher, a pioneering musicologist, and a folklorist who did much for the preservation of American folk music. He was the father of Alan Lomax, John Lomax Jr. and Bess Lo ...

, who was conducting

field recordings Field recording is the term used for an audio recording produced outside a recording studio, and the term applies to recordings of both natural and human-produced sounds. It also applies to sound recordings like electromagnetic fields or vibrat ...

for the

Archive of Folk Culture The Archive of Folk Culture (originally named The Archive of American Folk Song) was established in 1928 as the first national collection of American folk music in the United States of America. It was initially part of the Music Division of the Libr ...

at the U.S.

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

. When White was released two and one-half years later in 1940 (the circumstances of his early release have been questioned), he resumed his recording career with producer

Lester Melrose Lester Franklin Melrose (December 14, 1891 – April 12, 1968) was a talent scout who was one of the first American producers of Chicago blues records. Career Lester Franklin Melrose was born in Sumner, Illinois, the second of six children ...

in Chicago.

Lyrics and style

In March 1940, White arrived at the recording studio prepared to record with several songs. When Melrose saw that they were mostly reworkings of current popular blues numbers, he encouraged White to take a couple of days and prepare some new material. White later recalled, "I got down to it" and returned on March 7 with twelve new songs. One was "Parchman Farm Blues", which he recorded that day (all twelve were recorded over two days, May 7 and 8, 1940). The song has the elements of Delta blues, including a one-chord modal arrangement and a

slide guitar Slide guitar is a technique for playing the guitar that is often used in blues music. It involves playing a guitar while holding a hard object (a slide) against the strings, creating the opportunity for glissando effects and deep vibratos tha ...

break. However, the melody line is distinctive and relies less on

blue note In jazz and blues, a blue note is a note that—for expressive purposes—is sung or played at a slightly different pitch from standard. Typically the alteration is between a quartertone and a semitone, but this varies depending on the musical co ...

s. White delivers the vocal in his characteristic grainy, guttural style accompanied by his acoustic guitar, with

Washboard Sam Robert Clifford Brown (July 15, 1910 – November 6, 1966), known professionally as Washboard Sam, was an American blues musician and singer. Biography Brown's date and place of birth are uncertain; many sources state that he was born in 191 ...

on washboard percussion. His lyrics allude to his time at Parchman: Parchman prison convict labor 1911

White never denied responsibility for the shooting, which he claimed was in self-defense: "I shot him where I wanted to shoot him. Broke this thigh". Although he usually downplayed his time at Parchman, the difference in his songs after his release is apparent. According to music historian

Ted Gioia Ted Gioia (born October 21, 1957) is an American jazz critic and music historian. He is author of eleven books, including ''Music: A Subversive History'', '' The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire'', ''The History of Jazz'' and ''Delta Blu ...

, "the rollicking, carefree ethos of 'The Panama Limited', of 'Shake 'Em On Down', is replaced by a darker, more introspective mood in his later recordings. A sense of pathos enters his music ... nd theytake on a more overtly artistic dimension". When he last recorded commercially in 1937, rural-style blues was giving way to urban, ensemble blues styles. By 1940, performers, such as

Louis Jordan Louis Thomas Jordan (July 8, 1908 – February 4, 1975) was an American saxophonist, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and bandleader who was popular from the late 1930s to the early 1950s. Known as " the King of the Jukebox", he earned his high ...

with

jump blues Jump blues is an up-tempo style of blues, usually played by small groups and featuring horn instruments. It was popular in the 1940s and was a precursor of rhythm and blues and rock and roll. Appreciation of jump blues was renewed in the 1990s as ...

and

T-Bone Walker Aaron Thibeaux "T-Bone" Walker (May 28, 1910 – March 16, 1975) was an American blues musician, composer, songwriter and bandleader, who was a pioneer and innovator of the jump blues, West Coast blues, and electric blues sounds. In 2018 ''Roll ...

with

West Coast blues West Coast blues is a type of blues music influenced by jazz and jump blues, with strong piano-dominated sounds and jazzy guitar solos, which originated from Texas blues players who relocated to California in the 1940s. West Coast blues also ...

, were becoming popular and the electrified-Delta sound of

Muddy Waters McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913 April 30, 1983), known professionally as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer and musician who was an important figure in the post-war blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of modern Chicago b ...

and

John Lee Hooker John Lee Hooker (August 22, 1912 or 1917 – June 21, 2001) was an American blues singer, songwriter, and guitarist. The son of a sharecropper, he rose to prominence performing an electric guitar-style adaptation of Delta blues. Hooker often ...

was still a few years away. As Gioia notes, "It's not clear what audience Melrose had in mind when he agreed to record these songs". When "Parchman Farm Blues" was released as a single by

Okeh Records Okeh Records () is an American record label founded by the Otto Heinemann Phonograph Corporation, a phonograph supplier established in 1916, which branched out into phonograph records in 1918. The name was spelled "OkeH" from the initials of Ott ...

in 1940, it went largely unnoticed. A brief review in the ''

Amsterdam News The ''Amsterdam News'' (also known as ''New York Amsterdam News'') is a weekly Black-owned newspaper serving New York City. It is one of the oldest newspapers geared toward African Americans in the United States and has published columns by s ...

'' in July 1940 referred to White's songs as "folk music" and not part of any current popular style. Subsequently, he only performed sporadically until his rediscovery during the

American folk music revival The American folk music revival began during the 1940s and peaked in popularity in the mid-1960s. Its roots went earlier, and performers like Josh White, Burl Ives, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Big Bill Broonzy, Billie Holiday, Richard Dyer-Benn ...

in the early 1960s, when

Bob Dylan Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan, born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career sp ...

and others began recording his songs, such as "

Fixin' to Die Blues "Fixin' to Die Blues" is a song by American blues musician Bukka White. It is performed in the Delta blues style with White's vocal and guitar accompanied by washboard rhythm. White recorded it in Chicago on May 8, 1940, for record producer ...

". "Parchman Farm Blues" is included on numerous Bukka White and various artists compilations.

Mose Allison version

In 1957,

recorded "Parchman Farm" for his album '' Local Color''. Although it is inspired by White's song, Allison uses a different arrangement and some new lyrics. In pondering his detention in the first verse, the singer claims "I ain't never done no man no harm"; however, by the last he admits "all I did was shoot my wife". The song is performed by a trio with Allison on vocal and piano, backed by Addison Farmer on bass and

Nick Stabulas Nicholas Stabulas (December 18, 1929 – February 6, 1973) was an American jazz drummer. Career After working in commercial music, Stabulas was a member of Phil Woods group from 1954 to 1957. He did extensive work as a sideman in the 1950s, ...

on drums. It is an uptempo song, which gains even greater momentum through

modulation In electronics and telecommunications, modulation is the process of varying one or more properties of a periodic waveform, called the ''carrier signal'', with a separate signal called the ''modulation signal'' that typically contains informatio ...

in the second verse. "Parchman Farm" is one of Allison's best-known songs. In 1964, he re-recorded it with some new lyrics as "New Parchman" for ''

The Word from Mose ''The Word from Mose'' is a 1964 jazz album by the jazz pianist and singer Mose Allison. The album, described by Allmusic as "light, swinging jazz with a distinctly rural, Southern influence", has been listed as one of the "core collection" album ...

'' album. Heightening the irony, the first verse includes "Sittin' over here on Parchman Farm, the place is loaded with rustic charm". "Parchman Farm" since has been recorded by variety of artists.

References

{{Mose Allison 1940 songs Blues songs Bukka White songs American jazz songs Okeh Records singles Songs about Mississippi Songs about prison Vocal jazz songs