I have chosen Fred Cockeham’s version of Pretty Little Girl as this weeks TOTW.  Pretty Little Girl (or sometimes Pretty Little Miss) is a typical Old-Time tune:

1. The same melody occurs in songs with other names.
2. Songs with this name occurs with several different melodies.

I will show examples of both in the following but the focus is on Fred Cockerham.

My personal experience of the tune

I first became interested in the tune because of a tab in Art Rosenbaum’s first book Old Time Mountain Banjo from 1970 – where it is named “Pretty Little Miss”. I decided to try to learn clawhammer in the beginning of the 1980’s , and I had Pete Seeger’s book, Art Rosenbaum’s and some tabs from SingOut! Magazine to start with, and Pretty Little Miss was one of the first more advanced songs i tried. I did not have any recording of Pretty Litlte Girl, but I manage to learn from the tab. I knew about the County Clawhammer Banjo records, but I could not find them here in Sweden at that time. Then I took a 20-year break from banjo playing with wife, children, house building, carrier, and travels, but finally I took down the banjo from the wall and dusted it off a rainy summer day in 2006. Then I discovered that on Internet was a lot of music available, and I soon downloaded the County Clawhammer Banjo volumes. When listening to the recording of Fred Cockerham’s Pretty Little Girl I discovered that I played it wrong, and the tab in Art Rosenbaum was incorrect! There were some timing errors which gave the tab another flavor than the recording.

Fred Cockerham’s version

Fred’s recording can be heard on the County album Clawhammer Banjo Volume 1: https://youtu.be/N3QrHr-pcoA  . He played it as a five-part tune on a fretless banjo.  He has a very personal style with a lot of open string pull-offs, drop-thumb, double thumbing (“riding the fifth”) and special “mini-slides”. He also uses the fretless to play notes outside the conventional diatonic scale. For example, in Part C I sometimes think the D note (second string fret 1) is played more like a D# (second string 2^nd fret). He played with index finger with his hand in an open position – just like holding an invisible tennis ball in his hand.

In this video you can watch how he plays.

Tom Collins has made several videos demonstrating techniques used in the Round Peak Style, and some of them are focused on Fred Cockerham for example this and this.

I have tried to capture some of his style in the attached tab, see below.

Here is a fiddle version of Pretty Little Girl by Fred (also here), and here is a string band version by Camp Creek Boys (with Fred). Both of these versions have four parts without the fifth part that the banjo version has.

Related songs with the same melody

Fred Cockerham’s version are very similar, or more or less identical, to other well-known tunes such as John Brown’s Dream (Brown’s Dream, Brownlow’s Dream, Harve Browns Dream etc.), Jimmy Johnson, Devil’s Dream and Little Rabbit. They are all very similar, but what is unique for Fred’s banjo version is the fifth part which I haven’t heard anywhere else. However, on his fiddle version (see above) he does not play the fifth part.

John Brown’s Dream

According to Traditional Tune Archive :” Brad Leftwich explains that mid-20th century Galax area musicians Ben Jarrell and Charlie Lowe's John Brown’s Dream is actually a development of "Pretty Little Girl/Gal," with some substantial differences. However, Fred Cockerham and others believe the tunes to be the same, and in general practice the name "John Brown's Dream" is often used as an alternate for Pretty Little Girl."

Here is the first (?) recording of John Brown Dream with Ca Costa Woltz Southern Broadcasters with Ben Jarrell. It has four parts which are very close to the first four parts of Fred’s Pretty Little Miss.

At about 5:00 in this video Tommy Jarrell and Fred Cockerham are playing  together Pretty Little Girl and John Brown’s Dream.

Franklin George called the tune Brown’s Dream

Here is an earlier TOTW with John Brown’s Dream:

Jimmy Johnson – Dwight Diller

Dwight Diller has said that the West Virginia tune "Jimmy Johnson" (AKA "Jimmy Johnson bring the Jug around the Hill") was the musical precursor to "John Brown's Dream," and opined that "Jimmy Johnson" was the far superior melody (Source Tradional Tune Archive) .Here is Dwight’s banjo version , and here is his fiddle version fiddle version.

Also read this  TOTW from 2018 about Jimmy Johnson.

Little Rabbit

Little Rabbit Little Rabbit Where’s Your Mommy are two different tunes that have been merged. Most modern versions are based on the Crockett Mountaineers' recording of "Little Rabbit," which is actually a pastiche of two or more tunes, including "Little Rabbit" (similar to versions of the "John Brown's Dream" tune family) {'A', 'B' and 'C' parts} and  and "Rabbit Where's Your Mammy" {'D' and 'E' parts}.

 Here is a TOTW about Little Rabbit.

Devil’s Dream – Hobart Smith

Hobart Smith named the tune Devil’s Dream.

Other recordings with the title Pretty Little Girl:

There are several recordings named Pretty Little Girl or Pretty Little Miss which has some similarities with Fred’s banjo or fiddle versions.

• Sweet Brothers from 1928 I'm Gonna Marry That Pretty Little Girl . It has three parts and two of the parts are very similar to Pretty Little Girl or John Brown Dreams.
• Norm Edmonds (1889-1976) played a two part tune Pretty Little Girl which are very close to Pretty Little Miss and John Brown’s Dream (the high part is a little different but still related).
• Freighthoppers
• Benton Flippen
• Goodbye Girls  (Swedish fiddler Lena Jonsson with Alison de Groot and Molly Tuttle. The bass player Brittany Karlsson also with Swedish origin).
• Burton Stoneman1941 : ,

Tab

I have put a tab in the BHO tab archive (both TablEdit and pdf):

https://www.banjohangout.org/tab/browse.asp?m=detail&v=29603

There are also tabs for John Brown’s Dream, Jimmy Johnson and Little Rabbit in the TOTWs I linked to.

Pretty Little Girl - Fred Cockerham

 

Edited by - janolov on 10/02/2026 23:24:08