Cottonpatch Rag is one of my old-school contest fiddle tunes. I originally learned it from Tony Ludiker, and there are parts in there from me, Terry Ludiker, Roberta Rast, and others. And, I didn’t even put
That’s one of the cool things about fiddling, is that learning a tune is just the beginning. Even if you learn a version of the tune that someone else has called their own. The tune you learn is just the roadmap, you can take a detour here, or a complete departure from the place you started, and as long as you maintain that frame of reference, it’s still going to be recognizable as the tune.
Cotton Patch is a classic tune, and there are so many cool parts that people have added to it over the years making it their own. As many parts as I remembered to play, there are a couple more that I thought of after the fact, and kicked myself for forgetting. 😉
Cotton Patch Rag according to Fiddler’s Companion
COTTEN PATCH RAG. Texas Style, Old‑time; Country Rag. USA, Texas. C Major. Standard tuning. AA’BB’ (Silberberg): AA’BCC’ (Phillips): AABCDEA (Brody). Claims are made that this was originally a Texas fiddle tune. It was one of two sides (with “Spanish Fandango”) recorded in March,1929, by Atlanta, Georgia, guitarist John “Seven foot Dilly” Dilleshaw, and released on OKeh records (two other pressings from the session were not released). Bluegrass fiddler Byron Berline relates: “I used to go to fiddle contests with my dad, but I never heard ‘Cotton Patch Rag’ played anywhere except in the states Texas and Oklahoma” (Frets Magazine). The tune uses ‘figure‑eight bowing’ in the ‘B’ part, while an added fourth part to the tune features ‘double-shuffle’ bowing.
Wonderful musical perfoemance !
Thanks, Michael.
Very fancy! I heard the double shuffle, I like the way you added that in. Great playing!
Hi Francis, That "hokum" shuffle bowing is part of what makes Cottonpatch Rag especially fun.
Wow! There is a lot of good stuff in that video. Heretofore, I assumed figure eight bowing, “hokum” and double shuffle were just different names for the same thing. In the various instructional books I’ve seen it seems like there is a variety of names are used for the same bowing pattern.
Do you have any material that presents these three bowing patterns outlined in standard notation along with the correct names?
Thanks, Jerry. There are a number of shuffle bowing patterns that I cover in my shuffle bowing series on my Talent Forge here: https://www.mytalentforge.com/series/shuffle-bowing/
Hokum is more of a generic term for any kind of fancy bowing that appears to be magic to the audience, and doesn’t refer to a specific bowing pattern, although it is often used to describe the syncopated shuffle that is used in Orange Blossom Special. This is sometimes called the Georgia Shuffle, although the name “Georgia Shuffle” is also sometimes used to describe a shuffle bowing that is one note in your down bow, and three in your up bow.