"Hesitation Blues" is a popular song adapted from a traditional tune. One version was published by Billy Smythe, Scott Middleton, and Art Gillham. Another was published by W.C. Handy as "Hesitating Blues." Because the tune is traditional, many artists have taken credit as writer, frequently adapting the lyrics of one of the two published versions. Adaptations of the lyrics vary widely, though typically the refrain is consistent with the original. The song is a jug band standard and is also played as blues and sometimes as Western swing.
Read more about Hesitation Blues: Smythe, Middleton and Gillham Version, W.C. Handy Version, Use By Langston Hughes in The Poem Ask Your Mama, Sammy Price's Version, Artists
Famous quotes containing the words hesitation and/or blues:
“I have no hesitation in saying that although the American woman never leaves her domestic sphere and is in some respects very dependent within it, nowhere does she enjoy a higher station. And ... if anyone asks me what I think the chief cause of the extraordinary prosperity and growing power of this nation, I should answer that it is due to the superiority of their women.”
—Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)
“As one delves deeper and deeper into Etiquette, disquieting thoughts come. That old Is- It-Worth-It Blues starts up again softly, perhaps, but plainly. Those who have mastered etiquette, who are entirely, impeccably right, would seem to arrive at a point of exquisite dullness. The letters and the conversations of the correct, as quoted by Mrs. Post, seem scarcely worth the striving for. The rules for finding topics of conversation fall damply on the spirit.”
—Dorothy Parker (1893–1967)