Sugar in My Coffee
DESCRIPTION: Complaints about life laced with the refrain, "(How in the world do the old folks know) That I like sugar in my coffee-o." The singer may describe how he likes to drink, or wishes he were/were not living the life of a white man
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1915 (Brown)
KEYWORDS: nonballad playparty
FOUND IN: US(SE,So)
REFERENCES (4 citations):
Randolph 565, "Sugar in my Coffee" (1 fragment, 1 tune)
Brown/Belden/Hudson-FrankCBrownCollectionNCFolklore3 92, "I Do Love Sugar in My Coffee O" (2 short texts)
Brown/Schinhan-FrankCBrownCollectionNCFolklore5 92, "I Do Love Sugar in My Coffee O" (1 tune plus text excerpt)
NorthCarolinaFolkloreJournal, Charles Bond, "Unpublished Folklore in the Brown Collection," Vol. XX, No. 1 (Feb 1972), p. 16, "Sugar in my Coffee" (1 text)
Roud #7659
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "What'll I Do with the Baby-O" (floating lyrics)
NOTES [78 words]: The Randolph fragment is so short that it could just be a piece of "What'll I Do with the Baby-O," and Brown's texts are also distinct. The mention of "sugar in my coffee" may just be a floating line. But it's going to be very hard to identify any of these scraps with a "real" song.
Randolph suggests that the origin of this may be in the fiddle tune "Sugar in My Toddy-o." Certainly possible. In which case it may be related to "Jingle at the Window (Tideo)." - RBW
Last updated in version 6.1
File: R565A
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