CINDY - Traditional
The Appalachian folk melody was a favorite of mountain fiddlers and banjo players known as “The Gospel Train (Get on Board)”. “Cindy”, also known as “Get Along Home, Cindy”, using the tune from “The Gospel Train”, first appears as a North Carolina folk song in a book of collected folk tales by Anne Virginia Culbertson, published in 1904, called “At the Big House - where Aunt Nancy and Aunt ‘Phrony Held Forth on the Animal Folks”. The original first verse bore reference to the Civil War: “I’se gwine down ter Richmond Fer ter try an’ end dis war. An’-a you good-by, Cindy, Cindy”. Over the years, the song gained new verses and variations, eventually resulting in the one we learned as a folk-song from an elementary school songbook. We have also often played it as part of a medley for a Virginia Reel.