"Hallelujah, I'm a Bum" (Roud 7992) is an American folk song that responds with humorous sarcasm to unhelpful moralizing about the circumstance of being a hobo.
Video Hallelujah, I'm a Bum
Song
The song's authorship is uncertain, but according to hobo poetry researcher Bud L. McKillips the words were written by an IWW member. Some verses, though, may have been written by a Kansas City hobo known only as "One-Finger Ellis," who scribbled it on the wall of his prison cell in 1897. There is also a questionable theory that Harry McClintock could have written it in 1897 when he was only fifteen.
Sung to the tune of the Presbyterian hymn "Revive Us Again", the song was printed by the Industrial Workers of the World in 1908, and adopted by its Spokane, Washington branch as their anthem later that year. The success of their Free speech fights of 1909 led to its widespread popularity.
The version published in 1908 goes:
- Why don't you work like other folks do?
- How the hell can I work when there's no work to do?
- Refrain
- Hallelujah, I'm a bum,
- Hallelujah, bum again,
- Hallelujah, give us a handout
- To revive us again.
- Oh, why don't you save all the money you earn?
- If I didn't eat, I'd have money to burn.
- Whenever I get all the money I earn,
- The boss will be broke, and to work he must turn.
- Oh, I like my boss, he's a good friend of mine,
- That's why I am starving out on the bread line.
- When springtime it comes, oh, won't we have fun;
- We'll throw off our jobs, and go on the bum.
Maps Hallelujah, I'm a Bum
Other versions
The New Christy Minstrels created another version which added more story to the original. This version goes:
- I went to a house and I knocked on the door;
- The lady comes out and says, "You've been here before"
- She gives a loud whistle and I run for my life!
- Well, wouldn't you know, it's the constable's wife.
- Refrain:
- Hallelujah, I'm a bum,
- Hallelujah, bum again,
- Hallelujah, gimme a handout
- And you'll be my friend
- "Now, why don't you settle down and get yourself a wife?"
- "I'd rather be a BUM for the rest of me life!"
- "If you got a job, then you'd be my honey"
- "I wouldn't marry you if I had lots o' money!"
- Refrain
- "
- "And shing for my thupper when I'm down and out"
In 1961, the Freedom Riders adapted the song, with these lyrics:
- Hallelujah, I'm a-travelin',
- Hallelujah, ain't it fine?
- Hallelujah, I'm a-travelin',
- Down freedom's main line.
Recordings
- Harry McClintock 1928
- Vernon Dalhart 1928
- Al Jolson 1928
- Jack Kaufman 1928
- Frank Luther 1928
- Hobo Jack Turner 1928
- Pete Wiggins 1928
- Ted Fiorito 1932
- George Olsen 1933
- Dan Ritchie 1933
- Fats Waller 1939 Fine Arabian Stuff
- Utah Phillips Legends of Folk, We Have Fed You All
- Pete Seeger 1962 on American Favorite Ballads
- The New Christy Minstrels
- "Spider" John Koerner Some American Folk Songs Like They Used To
- Tony Gilkyson 1998 Sparko
- Daniel, Fred & Julie 2009
- Wee Weary Willie (Unknown) 78 RPM with B side The Bum Song
Janne Westerlund 2012
Published versions
- 1908 song card, Spokane IWW
- American Songbag 1927 Carl Sandburg pp. 184-185
- George Milburn, The Hobo's Hornbook, 1930
- Margaret Bradford Boni, Fireside Book of Folk Songs, 1947
- Edith Fowke and Joe Glazer, eds., Songs of Work and Protest 1973 p. 127
- Little Red Songbook Centenary Edition, 2005
- Rise Up Singing p. 181
In popular culture
A 1933 musical comedy film is entitled Hallelujah, I'm a Bum.
The music was quoted in the Charlie Chaplin movie Modern Times (1936), when Charlie is released from the home for the bewildered and trudges along the street before picking up a red flag that has dropped off the back of a truck.
The song is requested of Larry "Lonesome" Rhodes by a co-prisoner in an early scene of the Elia Kazan movie A Face in the Crowd (1957).
The Porky Pig cartoon Confusions of a Nutzy Spy depicts a spy attempting to plant a bomb on which "Hallelujah, I'm a Bomb!" is written. Used in an episode of television series "Checkmate" where Doug McClure investigates a hobo camp. In 2012, the rock band, Local H, released their seventh studio album, "Hallelujah! I'm a Bum".
The 1928 recording of the song was featured in Bob Dylan's Thanksgiving "leftovers"-themed episode of his Theme Time Radio Hour program.
References
External links
- 1909 Spokane, Washington Free Speech Campaign
- Scene in Modern Times on Youtube
Source of article : Wikipedia
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