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I Wish I Was a Mole In the Ground is a traditional American folk song. It was most famously recorded by Bascom Lamar Lunsford in 1928 for Brunswick Records in Ashland, Kentucky. Harry Smith included "Mole" on his ''Anthology of American Folk Music'' released by Folkways Records in 1952. The notes for Smith's ''Anthology'' state that Lunsford learnt this song from Fred Moody, a North Carolina neighbor in 1901. ==Song== Lunsford said of this song: The title of this mountain banjo song is "I Wish I Was A Mole In The Ground." I've known it since 1901 when I heard Fred Moody, then a high school boy, sing it down in Burke County. Fred lives in Haywood County, North Carolina, and the footnote to the song is that the "bend" referred to is the bend of the Pigeon River in Haywood County, North Carolina. I played it as a request of my mother back in 1902. It was the last request she ever made of me. I was teaching that time at Doggett's Gap at public school in Madison County, and returned to my school on Sunday evening. She was interested in my picking the banjo, and she asked me to get the five-string banjo down and play "I Wish I Was A Mole In The Ground." I went away, and she grew sick and passed away and that was the last request she ever made of me. In his notes for "Mole", supplied with the ''Anthology'' in 1952, Smith disagrees about the meaning of "The Bend" when he wrote: The narrator's wish to be a mole in the ground and a lizzard () in the spring are quite surrealistic in their symbolism. "The Bend" ("pen" in some other versions) probably refers to the Big Bend penitentiary. In an earlier version of this song (Okeh, 1925) the banjo is even more remarkable in its halting rhythms, and the singer decided he would "rather be a lizzard ()..." Lunsford, a lawyer of Asheville, North Carolina, writes that this song is a typical product of the Pigeon River Valley. Lunsford considered himself an archivist and never took credit for this song or any songs he recorded. He traveled the western mountains of North Carolina and learned this song from the "locals" as it was his goal and passion to archive songs that he heard growing up for historical reference. The song has been recorded by other performers.〔Folk Music - An Index to Recorded Resources (Mole In the Ground )〕 The song is sometimes known by one of its verses, "Tempie let your hair roll down", and is the basis for the campfire song "I Wish I Was a Little Bar of Soap". Bob Dylan, who listened to Smith's ''Anthology'', echoed a line from this song; "'Cause a railroad man they'll kill you when he can/ And drink up your blood like wine," as recorded in Lunsford's "I Wish I Was a Mole In the Ground" is echoed by Dylan's verse "Mona tried to tell me/ To stay away from the train line/ She said that all the railroad men/ Just drink up your blood like wine" on his song "Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again" on the album ''Blonde on Blonde'', recorded in 1966. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「I Wish I Was a Mole in the Ground」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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