"Just Awearyin' for You" is a parlor song, one of that genre's all-time hits.
History The lyrics were written by Frank Lebby Stanton and published in his Songs of the Soil (1894). The tune was composed by Carrie Jacobs-Bond and published as part of Seven Songs as Unpretentious as the Wild Rose in 1901. Harry T. Burleigh also composed a tune (copyrighted in 1906),See Professor De Lerma's essay Henry "Harry" T. Burleigh (1866-1949): African American Composer, Arranger & Baritone" which notes the tune for "Just Awearyin' for You" by African-American composer Harry T. Burleigh: Just a-wearying for you, for medium voice and piano. New York: William Maxwell, 1906. 6p. Text: Frank L. Stanton. Library: Library of Congress. but it never approached the popularity of the Jacobs-Bond tune. Although Stanton originally wrote the lyrics in dialect ("Jes' a-wearyin' fer you") for a column in the Atlanta Constitution, the song has generally circulated with the more mainstreamed diction of the Jacobs-Bond version.
Sentimental yet artful,The sentimentality of the lyrics has occasionally become an interest of analogists and parodists, as in Mark Steyn's 2007 May 9 commentary on Barack Obama titled "Just a-wearyin' for you" in National Review and . In a more serious direction Arthur and Rosalind Eedle have undertaken to revise the lyrics to cause "Just Awearyin' for You" to become a hymn welcoming Jesus Christ ("Just a Wearyin' for You" in Prophetic Telegraph, No. 99 [June 1997]). "Just Awearyin' for You" has been recorded by numerous performers, including Elizabeth Spencer, Evan Williams, Anna Case, (accessed 2010 February 11), distinguished by Case's special attention to trilling the "r"s. Sophie Braslau, (recorded by Columbia Records in 1928 June). Eleanor Steber, (accessed 2010 February 11). Gladys Swarthout,Swarthout rendition removed from YouTube. Thomas Allen and Malcolm Martineau (piano),Allen and Martineau rendition (accessed 2010 February 11). See also Hyperion version with commentary by Andrew Lamb (writer) (accessed 2010 February 17). Johnny Hartman, (accessed 2010 February 11). John Arwyn Davies, (accessed 2010 February 11). Jane Morgan,Jane Morgan rendition. Peggy Balensuela (mezzo soprano) and William Hughes (piano),Songs my grandmother taught me: Songs of Carrie Jacobs-Bond (Albany, NY: Albany Records, 2001), ASIN B000QWU5PW. Bing Crosby (1934 and 1945) and Paul Robeson. (accessed 2010 February 11). In 1934 Jay Wilbur and his band did a foxtrot rendition. (accessed 2011-04-04).Cf. the live [organ rendition and interpretation] (accessed 2011-04-04).
Set to the key of C, "Just Awearyin' for You" appears in Mel Bay's Modern Guitar Method Grade 6.
Along with "I Love You Truly" and "A Perfect Day", "Just Awearyin' for You" forms the triumvirate of works for which Jacobs-Bond is remembered. A dedicatory phrase "To F. B." atop the musical score (on p. 3 of the sheet music) refers to her second husband, Frederic Bond.For further information see the article on Carrie Jacobs-Bond.
Prior to publication with her tune, Jacobs-Bond was unaware that the lyrics were written by Stanton; she thought them anonymous as indicated in the Chicago newspaper from which she took them. Once the oversight became apparent, Jacobs-Bond resolved the situation amicably with D. Appleton & Company, which had published Stanton's Songs of the Soil, thus providing Stanton with a royalty stream that by his own admission brought him more revenue than everything else in Songs of the Soil combined.Max Morath, I Love You Truly: A Biographical Novel Based on the Life of Carrie Jacobs-Bond (New York: iUniverse, 2008), , pp. 14-17. Stanton's name is absent from the frontispiece of the first edition (inset), but was later added above the score on page 3 of the sheet music. "Linger Not" and "Until God's Day" are two other songs on which Stanton and Jacobs-Bond collaborated.
References