Old Dan Tucker - Lyrics

Lyrics

"Old Dan Tucker" as originally published exemplifies the masculine boasting songs that predominated in early minstrelsy. Modern analysts emphasize the song's rawness, racism, and disdain for social taboos. In ersatz Black Vernacular English, the song uses short, active words such as runnin and cryin, to portray Dan Tucker as a rough-and-ready black man in the mold of Jim Crow, Gumbo Chaff, and ultimately the tall tale frontiersman:

I come to town de udder night,

I hear de noise an saw de fight,

De watchman was a runnin roun,

Cryin Old Dan Tucker's come to town.

Gran' Chorus.

So get out de way! Get out de way!

Get out de way! Old Dan Tucker.

You're too late to come to supper.

Tucker is an animalistic character, driven by sex, violence, and strong drink. He is ugly, unrefined, and unintelligent, even infantilized. As a stranger in town, his devil-may-care actions show his problems with or ambivalence to adapting to local mores. More broadly, Tucker's disdain for social norms allows the song to send up respectable middle class American society, as evidenced by the final verse:

Tucker was a hardened sinner,

He nebber said his grace at dinner;

De ole sow squeel, de pigs did squall

He 'hole hog wid de tail and all.

Other verses are simply nonsense that do not go along with the main narrative. Their lines seem to serve no other purpose than to make a rhyme or extend the patter scheme. The third verse is one example:

Here's my razor in good order

Magnum bonum -- jis hab bought 'er;

Sheep shell oats, Tucker shell de corn,

I'll shabe you soon as de water get warm.

Dan Tucker is both the teller and subject of the story. Verses 1, 3, and 5 of the 1843 edition are in the first person, whereas verses 2, 4, and 7 are in the third. This reflects the song's intended performance by an entire minstrel troupe. The lead minstrel played Tucker and began the song, but backup singers took over at times to allow Tucker to act out the scenario, dance, and do another comedy bit. There was probably an element of competition to the various dance and music solos. The third-person verses also allowed for commentary to suggest to the audience how they were to judge the character and his antics.

Individual companies probably selectively performed verses from the song or added new ones. For example, the Virginia Serenaders added verses about the Irish, Dutch, and French. At least four versions of the song were published with different lyrics during the 19th century. A parody called "Clar de Track" appears in some playbills and songsters.