October 2019: I’m Going Back to North Carolina

Traditional
Introduced by Judy Cook
Performed by Frank Proffitt

I love this traditional song from the southern Appalachians for its simplicity, accessibility, and poignancy. It’s easy to keep it going by adding either the first or third verse as a chorus between every verse, or by adding any number of “zipper verses” that might suit the situation. We have the song sung by Frank Proffitt on the album Frank Proffitt of Reese, NC (1962), Folk Legacy Album #1. The entire Folk Legacy catalog is now available on the Smithsonian Folkways label.

Lyrics:

I’m going back to North Carolina
I’m going back to North Carolina
I’m going back to North Carolina
And I never expect to see you any more

How can I ever keep from crying
How can I ever keep from crying
How can I ever keep from crying
When I never expect to see you any more

My home’s across the Blue Ridge Mountain
My home’s across the Blue Ridge Mountain
My home’s across the Blue Ridge Mountain
And I never expect to see you any more

I’m gonna leave here Monday morning
I’m gonna leave here Monday morning
I’m gonna leave here Monday morning
And I never expect to see you any more

I’m a-going back to North Carolina
I’m a-going back to North Carolina
I’m a-going back to North Carolina
I never expect to see you any more

Judy Cook performs each year throughout the United States and Britain with concerts of folk song and multi-media historically themed programs. Judy has one book and nine CDs of traditional Anglo-American, 19th Century, and occasionally contemporary songs. The two most recent, Light and Shade and Well Met: Songs of the Sea, were released in 2018. Her first book, A Quiet Corner of the War, presents the Civil War letters of her great-great grandparents with extensive notes and research; it is published by the University of Wisconsin Press (Fall 2013). Three of her many multi-media programs feature letters from that book. She coproduces a weekly broadcast folk radio program, “Glad4Trad,” of which you can hear the most recent sample on her website. Learn more about Judy at her website.