Red Wing - Banjo version

"Red Wing" is a popular song written in 1907 with music by Kerry Mills and lyrics by Thurland Chattaway. Mills adapted the music of the verse from Robert Schumann's piano composition "The Happy Farmer, Returning From Work" from his 1848 Album for the Young, Opus 68. The song tells of a young Indian girl's loss of her sweetheart who has died in battle.

Woody Guthrie changed the words to this song for his song, Union Maid. I sang a verse at the end.

This was my Grandma`s favorite song. She sang the chorus different though. I sang the last chorus like she used to.

I sing and play it on the banjo, clawhammer style this time.

Red Wing - Lyrics

There once was an Indian maid,
A shy little prairie maid,
Who sang a lay, a love song gay,
while on the plain she'd while away the day;

She loved a warrior bold,
This shy little maid of old,
But brave and gay, he rode one day
To battle far away.

Chorus:
Now, the moon shines bright on pretty Red Wing
The breeze is sighing, the night bird's crying,
For afar 'neath his star her brave is sleeping,
While Red Wing's weeping her heart away.

She watched for him day and night,
She kept all the campfires bright,
And under the sky, each night she would lie,
And dream about his coming by and by;

But when all the braves returned,
The heart of Red Wing yearned,
For far, far away, her warrior gay,
Fell bravely in the fray.

Now, the moon shines bright on pretty Red Wing
The breeze is sighing, the night bird's crying,
For afar 'neath his star her brave is sleeping,
While Red Wing's weeping her heart away.

How my Grandma used to sing it:

Oh the sun shines bright on pretty red wing.
on pretty red wing, on pretty red wing. Oh
the sun shines bright on pretty red wing, on
pretty red wing, so far away.

(Chorus)