| Share page | Visit Us On FB |
|
A Tale of Two Border Cities 75
consider that Murphy joined the company of singers managed by Nelson Kneass in May18 and was still in Pittsburgh in September19 when "Oh! Susanna," was included in the Kneass program.
However the song was transmitted we may reach a pretty definite conclusion as to its origin. We have the positive statement of his brother Morrison, who was always Stephen's confidant; who, knowing and listing Stephen's earlier songs, has set down:20 "While in Cincinnati he wrote 'Oh! Susanna/"
3-
These facts as to where "Oh! Susanna" was composed and where first sung have interest because it soon became and remains today a universal song. Within a decade it was "sung all over the civilized world, the seacoast cities of China not excepted." Bayard Taylor, travelling in India, reported hearing it sung at Delhi.21
How translators caught its spirited swing in French, German, Italian, Spanish, modern Greek, Chinese and Latin is shown in a Foster Hall Bulletin.'12 Specimen opening lines read as follows:
FRENCH
Oui, j'arrive d'Alabam'
Mon banjo sur les genoux. . . . |
||