I Used to Wear My Aprons Low

I Used to Wear My Aprons Low

Folk songs

This is a recording of Mae Phillips (Maw Maw Phillips) singing the song "I Used to Wear My Aprons Low" (Roud 422). Bobby McMillon recorded the tape this is from and introduces the songs there: "[This] was recorded late in 1968 and in the spring of 1969 at Lower Creek, Lenoir, North Carolina, at the home of my uncle Goldman McMillon. Mrs. Walters Phillips, my uncle’s mother-in-law, from Maryville, Tennessee, is singing old songs that she learned as she grew up in the Cosby section of Cocke County, Tennessee. My father’s people were raised there, and that’s where my uncle met Mrs. Phillips’ daughter. Mrs. Phillips is singing love songs and old-timey ballads that she learned when she was a child from different people in the Cosby, Hartford, Tennessee area and the Mount Sterling and Crestmont area of North Carolina."

Bobby McMillon

Bobby McMillon Collection, Southern Appalachian Archives, Mars Hill University

Southern Appalachian Archives, Liston B. Ramsey Center for Appalachian Studies, Mars Hill University

1968-1969

This item may be viewed, downloaded, and printed for personal and educational use, but any commercial use is prohibited without permission from the Southern Appalachian Archives, Mars Hill University. Questions may be directed to the Archivist at (828) 689-1262 or archives@mhu.edu.

mp3

English

Music

Cassette

1 minute, 2 seconds

I used to wear my aprons low
I used to wear my aprons low
I used to wear my aprons low
My love followed me through the frost and snow

[Phillips recites the rest of the song]

But now my apron’s to my chin
But now my apron’s to my chin
But now my apron’s to my chin
My love’s outside and he won’t come in

He goes down to yonders town
He goes down to yonders town
He goes down to yonders town
Takes him a chair and he sits down

He takes that other girl on his knee
He takes that other girl on his knee
He takes that other girl on his knee
Tell her the things that he once told me

I wish to the Lord that my baby was born
I wish to the Lord that my baby was born
I wish to the Lord that my baby was born
Sitting on its papa’s knee

And me poor girl was dead and gone
And me poor girl was dead and gone
And me poor girl was dead and gone
And the green grass growing over me