JESSE JAMES country ballad folk Lyrics Words Sing Along Music bluegrass train cowb song Jimmy Howard

Video and Vocals/Instrumentals COPYRIGHT (c) 2020
by CHARLES ELMER SZABO, BMI

"Jesse James" is a 19th-century American folk song about the outlaw of the same name, first recorded by Bentley Ball in 1919[1] and subsequently by many others, including Bascom Lamar Lunsford, Vernon Dalhart, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, The Kingston Trio, The Pogues, The Ramblin' Riversiders, The Country Gentlemen, Willy DeVille, Van Morrison, Grandpa Jones, Bob Seger, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (on the Uncle Charlie & His Dog Teddy album), Sons of the Pioneers, Johnny Cash, Liam Clancy, Mungo Jerry and Bruce Springsteen. Members of the Western Writers of America chose it as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time.

The lyrics are largely biographical containing a number of details from Jesse James' life, portraying him as an American version of Robin Hood, though there is no evidence to indicate that he actually "stole from the rich and gave to the poor". The song is the starting point of the Jesse James panel of a mural on American folk songs by Thomas Hart Benton.[3]

But that dirty little coward
That shot Mr. Howard
Has laid poor Jesse in his grave.[4][5]

Robert Ford, who killed Jesse, was a James' gang member. Mr. Howard was the alias that James lived under in Saint Joseph, Missouri at the time of his killing.

The song was recorded in 1924 by Bascom Lamar Lunsford and subsequently by many artists, including Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Eddy Arnold, Jackson C. Frank, The Country Gentlemen, The Pogues, The Kingston Trio, Van Morrison, Bob Seger, Willy DeVille, Mungo Jerry and Bruce Springsteen. It is the most famous song about James. Part of the song is heard at the end of the 1939 movie, Jesse James. The song was used in a 1958 episode of the TV western series Lawman, in which the marshal tries to get Robert Ford (played by Martin Landau) out of town safely. Ry Cooder's arrangement of the song plays over the end credits of Walter Hill's 1980 movie The Long Riders and a portion of the song is performed on-screen by Nick Cave, who plays a strolling balladeer in a bar patronized by Robert Ford in the 2007 movie The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.

The folksinger Almeda Riddle, born Almeda James, was a first cousin twice removed of Frank and Jesse James. On a recording of the song she noted, "I'm sure you've read of Frank and Jesse James. Well, my father's grandfather and their father (Robert S. James) was brothers. I never was ashamed of the James boys was my cousins, but neither was I proud of it."

The composer of the song is unknown, but it is attributed in the lyrics of some versions to a to "Billy Gashade" or ""Billy LaShade", though no historical record exists for anyone under either name.[1]

This song is popular in the bluegrass repertoire; it is usually played as an instrumental, most often in the key of B.

Above info from WIKI

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