[MUSIC].
All right, so this song Knoxville Girl is
the first of two songs
by the Louvin brothers.
The song Knoxville Girl is very old.
It's an old murder ballad.
That comes from the British Isles.
Over there,
it was called the Wexford girl.
So there are many
inclinations of the song.
Let me talk a little bit
about the Loon Brothers.
I consider them the class
A harmony team of country music.
They're just fantastic blend.
Both amazing singers and they
contributed amazing original materials.
Great song writers as well and
they provided the kind of crucial
bridge between kind of the old
time gospel tradition and
also the brother tradition kind
of started in the late 40s.
Very much inspired by the Monroe Brothers
and the Delmore Brothers.
But through the 50's, they end up kinda
getting into some sort of kind of
pop crossover territory that was
very influential on the, sorry,
the Everly Brothers.
And So
there Everlys are really the brother duet
that hopped the fence over into
the rock and pop sphere and
of course,
were very influential on the Beatles.
Lennon and McCartney,
the way they sang and wrote together.
So really, you have this unbroken lineage
from the Munroe Brothers to the Beatles,
when you think about it.
Anyhow, but this is a murder ballad.
There's also just a great
tradition of murder ballads.
There are a bunch of them
that are really great.
Pretty Polly, Katie Dear,
it just goes on and on.
Almi Wise, Poor Allen Smith.
They're all gruesome.
Usually, the perpetrator is named Willy.
And often, there's a river involved.
I saw a bumper sticker one time that says,
if you're an ill timed song,
don't go to the river.
Anyway, it's kind of a familiar trope
that has a lot of different
incarnations in various songs.
But it's great tradition
in this music we're doing.
It's a little bit like watching
a horror film or something.
Before there was such a thing,
they had songs to kind of get out
that gruesome, brutal experience.
And an interesting thing,
historically speaking, is that evidently,
in the British Isles,
the old versions of the murder ballads.
Often times, there were just brutality and
that was the end of it but
in the United States versions, it's sorta
this puritanical influence came in so
you have this brutal murder but then often
the perpetrator was brought to justice.
So, anyhow,
it's just kind of an interesting study.
You can look into that on a historical,
musicological basis.
There's a lot been written about
murder ballads and ballads in general,
in that tradition.
So, look into it.
Here we go.
So we're gonna start with the low
version of Knoxville Girl.
[MUSIC].
Let me go for the chords first.
So it's in, the low version,
we'll do here in D.
So it's mostly one, four, five but
it's got a two chord in there.
So the one, the four is G five is A.
Now, the two cord is D up to E and
often times,
you have two chord coming in as major.
Even know it's not major within
the involve the note it's not
know in the major scale we'll
talk more about that later.
It's good to understand what
makes those chords tick and
why you might have a chord
bar from another key.
But anyhow,
this is a good example of that.
So you've got 1, 1, 1,
1, 1 to 4, 4 back to 1.
[MUSIC]
1.
1, 1, 1, 1, 1.
Here your big two chord and
onto the 5.
Back to the 1, 1, 1,
1, 1, 4, 4, 1.
1, 1, 1, 1, 5, 5, 1 and it's a waltz.
1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3.
1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3.
See if you can get that boom,
chuck, chuck, boom, chuck,
chuck rhythm backing it up.
Okay, so here's the lead.
Now in this Louvin Brothers version,
it's actually quite intricate.
And it's really fascinating to me
how the parts fits together and
that you get a lot of instances where one
part is moving and the other is not and
also a lot of times the parts
are like one court tone away.
So like from the five to the one,
or from the three to the five.
But then sometimes they split.
So like you'd have the three in the little
part and the one in the high part, so
a bigger spread and
then they come back together.
You really pay attention to the detail
of the movement in this part.
It really has a big influence on
how the whole song fits together.
[MUSIC]
>> I met a little girl.
It says, 3, 2, 5, 5, 6, 5.
In Knoxville, so it's 3,
2, 1, 2 to 3,
I met a little girl in Knoxville.
[MUSIC]
So that's one,
then slide into 2 and back to 1.
And then slide
from 6 up to 1.
[MUSIC]
So 5 to 1 and
on the end of Sunday,
you go from 1 to 5.
So it's important to think on what
syllable that new change is and
every Sunday, that's 5 to 3.
[MUSIC]
Out in her
home, I dwell.
So that's 3, 2, 2, 2, 2, 3, 2, 2.
And that's on the two chords.
So you've got a lot of two.
Out in her home, I dwell.
So let me sing that up to that point.
I met a little girl in Knoxville.
A town we all know well.
And every Sunday
[MUSIC].
Now the third line is
similar to the first.
We went to take an evening walk.
So, we that's 3, 2,
5, 5, 6, 5.
We went to take 3, 2, 1, 3, 3.
[MUSIC]
1, 2, 1, 1,
1, 6, 1, 1.
[MUSIC]
Here's that third line.
[MUSIC]
We went to take a evening
walk about a mile from town.
And then I've picked that's 5, 1, 1, 1, 1.
[MUSIC]
3, 5, 5.
I pick the stick above the ground 3,
2, and not, 1, 2, 2,
that fell, 2, 3, 3, 2.
1, 2,
1.
[MUSIC]
Okay,
so here's the full
melody part.
I meet a little girl in Knoxville,
a town we all know well.
And
every
Sunday
[MUSIC]
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