TOTW 01/10/2025 Judge Parker
I’ve chosen Judge Parker from Oklahoma fiddler Dick Hutchison (1897-1986) for this installment of TOTW. Hutchison was born in Missouri but his family soon moved to Oklahoma where he grew into adulthood. He was a popular fiddler for local dances and credited his father, Jefferson Davis Hutchinson (1864-1934), and neighbors Ned Swift, Tom Brannon, and Warren Trosper as the sources of his tunes.
The tune’s title refers to US District Judge Isaac Charles Parker (1838-1896) of Fort Smith Arkansas, whose jurisdiction included the Oklahoma Territory. During his tenure on the bench Parker sentenced 164 men to death and became known as the “Hanging Judge”. Parker’s reputation survived well into the twentieth century and was featured in innumerable Hollywood productions, such as the 1969 film True Grit where, John Wayne, as Marshal Rooster Cogburn, delivered the line “I mean to kill you in one minute, Ned. Or see you hanged in Fort Smith at Judge Parker's convenience. Which will you have?”
The tune has a strong internet presence and I’ve linked some of my favorites below.
Hutchison recorded the tune in 1969 here: https://www.slippery-hill.com/content/judge-parker-take-these-shackles-me
Here’s a 1977 recording by Bob Kay: https://www.slippery-hill.com/content/judge-parker
Here’s a string band with Jack Laskey on Banjo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONxOP4E99Ms
Here’s a version with Candy Goldman on banjo: http://www.stringband.mossyroof.com/JudgeParker.mp3
Here’s a version by John Dee Kennedy: https://fieldrecorder.bandcamp.com/track/judge-parker
Here’s a string band version with Tom Sauber on banjo: https://alicegerrard.bandcamp.com/track/judge-parker-2
Here’s a string band version about two minutes into the recording with Cameron DeWhitt on banjo: https://getupinthecool.fireside.fm/50
A tab of the tune is here: http://stringband.mossyroof.com/Judge_Parker.png
And here is a transcription in standard notation:
Readers are encouraged to post observations, opinions, performances, and tabs contributing to this thread.
Edited by - Mtngoat on 01/10/2025 03:37:29
This is such a great pick, one of my favorite "Ozark" tunes I haven't played in years, thanks for reminding me to dust it off!
RG, I was introduced to the tune twenty years ago in a workshop jam session featuring Brad Leftwich. Somehow it came to mind as I was searching for a subject for this TOTW.
Thanks for contributing to the thread.
A tune with real history is rare and this history is memorable -- a actual "hanging judge." There's a Judge Parker in our area who I know, and he's tough, though doesn't face such horrendous crimes as to evoke a hanging.
Most of the modern recordings are crooked in the B part, plus the A part is played twice and the B part played only once. Dick Hutchison, Bob Kay, and the New Hoosier Broadcasters weren't crooked, so I wonder where that crookedness was picked up in the other recordings. The Spencer and Rains version with Cameron DeWhitt is a fun listen.
Using the Hutchison recording on Slippery Hill, I got a Galax lick to fit in one part in the sixth measure, and then added a similar 5th string thumb on the downbeat after a pull-off in the next measure.
Janet, thanks for the recording and tab.
I generally straighten everything out myself and hardly ever play a crooked tune unless I'm forced to do so in a jam setting.
