Showing posts with label Western Writers of America. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Western Writers of America. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Western Writers of America: The Top 100 Western Songs

Western Writers of America:

Top 100 Western Songs

From the Wayback Machine website: “The Western Writers of America surveyed its members for the top 100 Western Songs of all time. The list was presented at the WWA’s Annual Convention Knoxville, Tennessee. This list is an interesting mixture of old, traditional songs, songs from the movies and songs which many might label ‘country.’” WB

Surprisingly, the list does not appear to be on the Western Writers of America website but has been posted on other sites, such as the Wayback Machine. The list seems to have originally been posted on October 19, 2010. The list did not indicate years or artists but I have filled in that information as much as possible. Some of these are well-established standards not associated with a particular artist but others are very identified with specific acts and have been indicated as such.

Click here to see other lists from publications and/or organizations.

1. Marty Robbins “Ghost Riders in the Sky (A Cowboy Legend)” (1969)
2. Marty Robbins “El Paso” (1959)
3. The Sons of the Pioneers “Cool Water” (1941)
4. Frank H. Maynard (writer) “Streets of Laredo/Cowboy’s Lament” (1911)
5. Gene Autry “Back in the Saddle Again” (1939)
6. Tex Ritter “High Noon (Do Not Forsake Me)” (1952)
7. unknown (w/m) “Shenandoah” (1837)
8. The Sons of the Pioneers “Tumbling Tumbleweeds” (1934)
9. Dr. Brewster M. Higley (w), Daniel E. Kelly (m) “Home on the Range” (1874)
10. traditional “Red River Valley” (1896)

11. Marty Robbins “Big Iron” (1959)
12. Bing Crosby with the Andrews Sisters “Don’t Fence Me In” (1944)
13. Unknown (w/m) “Bury Me Not in the Lone Prairie” (1910)
14. Eagles “Desperado” (1973)
15. Michael Martin Murphey “Wildfire” (1975)
16. Eddy Arnold “Cattle Call” (1955)
17. Townes Van Zandt (w/m) “Pancho and Lefty” (1972) / Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard (1983)
18. Howard “Jack” Thorp (writer) “Little Joe, the Wrangler” (1908)
19. Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe (writers) “They Call the Wind Mariah” (1951)
20. Don Edwards “Coyotes” (1993)

21. Dinah Shore “Along the Navaho Trail” (1945)
22. Roy Rogers “Happy Trails” (1948)
23. Frankie Laine “Rawhide” (1958)
24. Mitch Miller “The Yellow Rose of Texas” (1955)
25. Waylon Jennings & Willie Nelson “Mammas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” (1978)
26. Bill Hayes “Ballad of Davy Crockett” (1955)
27. Gogi Grant “Wayward Wind” (1956)
28. Curley Fletcher (writer) “The Strawberry Roan” (1915)
29. D.J. O’Malley (w), traditional (music) “When the Works All Done This Fall” (1910)
30. Bing Crosby “Empty Saddles in the Old Corral” (1936)

31. Marty Robbins “Ballad of the Alamo” (1960)
32. Tennessee Ernie Ford “Mule Train” (1949)
33. Willie Nelson “My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys” (1979)
34. Bob Dylan “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” (1973)
35. George Strait “Amarillo by Morning” (1983)
36. Gene Pitney “Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” (1962)
37. Mike Blakely “The Last Comanche Moon” (1999)
38. Percy Montrose (writer) “Clementine (aka ‘Oh My Darling Clementine’)” (1884)
39. Johnny Cash “The Rebel (Johnny Yuma)” (1959)
40. Johnny Cash “Ballad of Ira Hayes” (1964)

41. Johnny Horton “North to Alaska” (1960)
42. Dean Martin & Ricky Nelson “My Rifle, My Pony and Me” (1959)
43. Johnny Cash “Don’t Take Your Guns to Town” (1958)
44. Shep Fields with Hal Derwin “South of the Border (Down Mexico Way)” (1939)
45. Jerry Jeff Walker “Desperadoes Waiting for a Train” (1973)
46. Owen Wister (writer) “Get Along, Little Dogies” (1893)
47. Cool White (w) “Buffalo Gals (Will You Come Out Tonight)” (1844)
48. Bing Crosby “I’m an Old Cowhand from the Rio Grande” (1935)
49. Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys “New San Antonio Rose” (1940)
50. Frankie Laine “Gunfight at the OK Corral” (1957)

51. John Denver with Emmylou Harris “Wild Montana Skies” (1983)
52. The Highwaymen “Last Cowboy Song” (1985)
53. Duane Eddy “Ballad of Paladin” (1962)
54. Tom Russell “Tonight We Ride” (2004)
55. Alfred Drake & the Oklahoma Cast “Oklahoma!” (1943)
56. Lou Fishback, Carl Copeland, and Jack Williams (writers) “I’d Like to Be in Texas for the Roundup in the Spring” (1927)
57. Brenn Hill “Call You Cowboy” (2001)
58. Al Caiola & His Orchestra “Bonanza” (1961)
59. Chris LeDoux “Old Double Diamond” (1975)
60. Rev. H.D.L. Webster (w), Joseph Philbrick Webster (m) “Lorena” (1857)

61. Marty Robbins “The Hanging Tree” (1959)
62. The Hotmud Family “Dust Eatin’ Cowboys” (1981)
63. Elton Britt “Cowpoke” (1951)
64. Waylon Jennings “Old Timer” (1975)
65. Willie Nelson “Red Headed Stranger” (1975)
66. Mike Blakely “Last Wild White Buffalo” (2008)
67. unknown (writer) “Jesse James” (1887)
68. Tom T. Hall “Faster Horses” (1975)
69. George Alexander & the Mellomen “El Dorado” (1966)
70. Charley Willis “Goodbye Old Paint” (1921)

71. The Kingston Trio “Tom Dooley” (1958)
72. Patsy Montana & the Prairie Ramblers “I Want to Be a Cowboy’s Sweetheart” (1936)
73. Bill Monroe & His Bluegrass Boys “Wayfaring Stranger” (1958)
74. Mike Blakely “The Old Cantina” (2003)
75. Margaret Larkin & Lynn Riggs (writers) “I Ride an Old Paint” (1927)
76. The Judds “Grandpa (Tell Me ‘Bout the Good Old Days)” (1986)
77. Ian & Sylvia “Someday Soon” (1964)
78. Ian Tyson “Summer Wages” (1987)
79. Johnny Horton “The Battle of New Orleans” (1959)
80. Kay Kyser with Harry Babbitt & Julie Conway “Jingle, Jangle, Jingle” (1942)

81. Roy Rogers & the Sons of the Pioneers “Blue Shadows on the Trail” (1948)
82. Stephen Foster (m/w) “Oh! Susanna” (1847)
83. traditional “Sweet Betsy from Pike” (1851)
84. Carl Sandburg (published) “Colorado Trail” (1927)
85. Bill Barwick “When Roy Rogers Was Around” (2004)
86. Ian Tyson & Tom Russell (writers) “Navajo Rug” (1986)
87. Tex Ritter “Remember the Alamo” (1955)
88. The Sons of the Pioneers “Billy the Kid” (1937)
89. M.E. Abbey (w), Charles Davis Tillman (m) “Life Is Like a Mountain Railway” (1891)
90. traditional “Old Chisholm Trail” (1910)

91. The Statler Brothers “Whatever Happened to Randolph Scott” (1974)
92. The Kingston Trio “Desert Pete” (1963)
93. John Denver “Rocky Mountain High” (1972)
94. The Sons of the Pioneers “Theme from the Searchers” (1956)
95. Everett Marshall “Wagon Wheels” (1934)
96. Les Paul & Mary Ford “Vaya Con Dios (May God Be with You)” (1953)
97. Gene Autry “Ridin’ Down the Canyon” (1942)
98. Vivian Clark Gilbert & Mary Margaret Hadler (writers) “Shifting, Whispering Sands” (1955)
99. Woody Guthrie “Oklahoma Hills” (1945)
100. Marty Robbins “Master’s Call” (1959)

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First posted 12/3/2025.

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Thursday, September 11, 1997

On This Day in Music (1847): “Oh! Susanna” first performed

Oh! Susanna

Stephen Foster (words & music)

Writer(s): Stephen Foster (see lyrics here)

First Performed: September 11, 1847

Published: February 25, 1848

First Charted: July 19, 1924 (Wendell Hall & the Shannon Four)

Peak: 8 PM (Hall) (Click for codes to charts.)

Sales (in millions): --

Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 19.48 video, 16.63 streaming

Awards:

Click on award for more details.

About the Song:

Stephen Foster is often referred to as “the Father of American Music.” BA The Pennsylvania-born songwriter wrote over 200 songs during his short 37 years. BA He was 18 when he published his first song, “Open They Lattice, Love” MF and 21 when he composed “Oh! Susanna,” which has been called “the first huge hit song in American popular music” BA and “one of the most famous American songs ever written.” WW It became the theme for the Forty-Niners during the California Gold Rush. TR Author William Studwell called it “the prospector’s and pioneer’s most pleasurable traveling companion.” WS

Foster wrote the song in Cincinnati, Ohio, after moving there to work as a bookkeeper for his brother’s steamship company. WW The song was first performed by a local quintet at a concert in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, at Andrews’ Eagle Ice Cream Saloon on September 11, 1847. WW It was first published in Cincinnati in 1848 by W.C. Peters & Co., WW a local music store. SA It was copyrighted by C. Holt Jr. on February 25, 1848. JF

The song gained popularity through performances by the Christy Minstrels in Manhattan, becoming the first minstrel song to infiltrate the middle-class market. SA Within three years, more than 20 editions of the sheet music – mostly illegal – had spread throughout the United States, making it difficult to say just how successful the song was. MF However, the original publisher still made $10,000 MF and Foster said the $100 he received for the song “had the effect of starting me on my present vocation as a songwriter.” BA Firth, Pond & Company then hired him at a royalty rate of two cents per copy of sheet music sold, making him America’s first professional songwriter. WW

The song “became emblematic of Westward expansion,” BA having been embraced by ‘49s during the California gold rush and others who headed west during the mid-19th century. BA The name “Susannah” may come from Foster’s sister Charlotte, who died, but had the middle name “Susannah.” WW The chorus of the song bears similarities to “Rose of Alabama” and both songs tell stories about lovers traveling from one state in the South to another, looking for his sweetheart and carting a banjo around along the way. WW

Foster’s works were inspired by and often mistaken for Negro spirituals “with their smoother and more accessible melodies than the intricate, opera-inspired tunes of the time.” MF He only visited the South once, but many of his songs portrayed black people and slave life. They were often performed by minstrel singers in blackface. BA

“Oh! Susanna” was written in the dialect of blacks who worked on plantations. While common at the time, today’s standards deem such lyrics “extremely racially offensive.” BA Foster even became aware of this when white, middle-class Americans grew more sympathetic to those suffering in slavery as the country moved towards Civil War. Foster later worked to replace the dialect in his earlier songs with verses in standard English. BA

The song has only charted once. Wendell Hall & the Shannon Four reached #8 with their cover in 1924. It has been covered by The Byrds, Bing Crosby, Vernon Dalhart, Connie Francis, Jewel, Al Jolson, Taj Mahal, Mitch Miller, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Pete Seeger, Nat Shilkret, Dinah Shore, Carly Simon, James Taylor, Fats Waller, and Neil Young.

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First posted 8/30/2023; last updated 12/18/2025.

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