Gathering Flowers From The Hillside

Hi everyone,
The song of the week is 'Gathering Flowers From The Hillside' in the key of G.

Recordings
Earl Taylor & Jim McCall - key of G
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmzbEGefFBc

Wilma Lee & Stoney Cooper - key of A (starts at 2:55)
Sing The Carter Family's Greatest Hits [1977] - Wilma Lee & Stoney Cooper - YouTube

Hylo Brown -  key of F
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YK1Sv9oft4

Jason Homey & The Snake River Boys - key of G (starts at 3:48)
Jason Homey and the Snake River boys, IBA Open Mic, 10_22_19 - YouTube


Jam Videos
Here are three youtube jam videos I have made for Gathering Flowers From The Hillside. I recommend starting with the one listed first. In that one, I am on guitar.
Jason’s YouTube Links – Alphabetical Listing – Parisology (cyberplasm.com)


Jam-Friendly Songs
'Gathering Flowers' is just one of thousands of simple and straightforward bluegrass songs that, for that very reason, tend to work well at almost any bluegrass jam, irrespective of how many people at the jam have ever played or even heard the song before. Keep your ears open for these types of songs if you are looking for ways to more rapidly increase your repertoire of songs to introduce into the jams you play at. 

See if you can identify the chord progression for 'Gathering Flowers' by listening to the versions given in the links below, before you take a look at the melody sheets in the files section at the end of this song of the week write-up. What other songs do you know, or recall playing at the jam, that use either the same chord progression or a closely related chord progression? How much of the melody can you figure out by ear before looking at the attached melody sheets? Do you recognize certain parts of the melody as being the same, or almost the same, as parts of the melodies to other songs that you are more familiar with than this one?  


Lyrics
The lyrics I use for the chorus are as follows:

I've been gathering flowers from the hillside,
To wreath around your brow;
But you kept me waiting so long dear,
That the flowers have all withered now.

The words in italics are the ones that I find people sometimes deviating from when singing harmony along with me on the chorus.


Harmony
Just like in Foggy Mountain Top, a previous song of the week, each musical line of the melody for Gathering Flowers starts with the same note: a D note when in the key of G, which is the highest note in the melody. The syllable that coincides with the beginning of each musical line of the chorus is shown in bold type below. On these syllables, the tenor harmony note is a G note when in the key of G, and the baritone harmony note is a B note when in the key of G.

I've been gathering flowers from the hillside,
To wreath around your brow;
But you kept me waiting so long dear,
That the flowers have all withered now.


Endings
For songs like Gathering Flowers From The Hillside that use a progression that ends with two measures of the 1 chord, and in which the last syllable is sung at the beginning of the first of these two measures (which includes the overwhelming majority of the non-instrumental songs on the current main list and additional songs list), it is common for a two-measure ending lick to be played on the instruments during the last two measures of the progression when the song is going to end. In most cases, this means the last two measures of the final chorus (or, for songs that don't have a chorus, the final verse) of the song. 

In the files at the bottom of this write-up, I have included a chart of simple two-measure endings in the key of G for fiddle, mandolin, guitar, banjo, and bass that will work for all of the songs that fit into this category, except for the ones played in 3/4 time.

Notice that the last note played in each of the endings coincides with the beginning of the second half of the last measure. (For 3/4 time songs, appropriate ending licks would have their last note coincide with the beginning of the last measure.)


Progression
The chord progression for 'Gathering Flowers' is:

1111
1155
1111
1511
(Prog. V1 on the Basic Chord Progressions handout)

In the key of G: 1 = G; 5 = D. The G chord consists of the notes G, B, and D. The D chord consists of the notes D, F#, and A.

Notice the relation between the progression for 'Gathering Flowers' (V1) and the progressions used to play 'Mama Don't Allow' (V2), 'Foggy Mountain Top (V6), and 'Bury Me Beneath The Willow' (V7). V1 simply stays on the '1' chord in all the spots where these other progressions have a '4' chord. In all four of these progressions, the locations of the '5' chords are the same (measures 3 and 4 of line 2, and measure 2 of line 4), and in all these progressions, measures 1 and 2 of lines 1, 2, and 3, and measures 1, 3, and 4 of line 4 have the '1' chord.


Melody 
The melody of Gathering Flowers shares a lot in common with the melody of Foggy Mountain Top. The only places where the two melodies significantly deviate from each other are from the second half of measure 2 through to the first half of measure 4 in lines 1 and 3. Refer back to the melody sheets in the attachments in the song of the week write-up for Foggy Mountain Top:
https://www.idahobluegrassassociation.org/jasons-beginner-jam-blog-2019---2020/category/foggy-mountain-top  (scroll down to the bottom of the page)
'

Breaks  
Remember, the melody sheets provided here in the attachments are just that and nothing more. They do not show you how to play bluegrass-style breaks on your instrument. So, why do I include the melody sheets in the song of the week emails? Because, to a significant extent, creating a break that sounds like it belongs in the song (and this is especially true of intro breaks, i.e., the break that is played before the singing starts and which identifies what song is being played even before the singing starts, or in the case of an instrumental, just simply the first break) involves surrounding the melody notes in the song with appropriate choices of other notes: and, in order to do this, one needs to have a fairly clear idea of what the melody of the song is. 

There are countless ways to play a break for any given song, and how one plays a break for a song depends upon several factors, including stylistic preference, level of technical ability on one's instrument, and even things of the nature of what tempo the song is being played at. But, once one is past the very beginner stages of learning to play 'lead' parts, attempts should be made - with the help of a teacher if need be - to play in a way that involves more than just copying on one's instrument the melody of the song as sung. 

Disclaimer: Even at the most advanced levels, being a bluegrass musician or jammer does not always involve being able to play breaks. There are many top-notch bluegrass guitar players, for instance, who only play rhythm (backup). Becoming a great bluegrass rhythm guitar player can be just as challenging as - or possibly even more challenging than - becoming a great flatpicker.  


Fill-ins
There are four dead spaces in the melody of each verse and chorus of Gathering Flowers that are long enough for a fill-in lick to be used to fill up these spaces.
These occur at the end of every musical line, starting in measure 3 of the line and ending in measure 4 of the line, which is the same location within a line that a fill-in fits into the progressions for all the previous songs of the week that I have discussed the use of fill-ins in connection with.  Here is a summary of most of the songs of the week so far in which fill-ins fit into one or more of their lines:
                                                                                          line 1        line 2       line 3        line 4
My Home's Across The Blue Ridge Mountains        no fill        no fill        no fill       fillin (1)
& Beautiful Brown Eyes chorus

Nine Pound Hammer, Little Birdie, I'll Fly Away        no fill         fillin (1)     no fill    fillin (1)
& Way Down Town

Beautiful Brown Eyes  verses,                                       no fill         fillin (5)     no fill     fillin (1)
Bury Me Beneath The Willow, 
All The Good Times Are Past And Gone  
& Foggy Mountain Top                                                                            
 
New River Train  & Mama Don't Allow                           fillin (1)        fillin (5)     no fill     fillin (1) 

Gathering Flowers From The Hillside                            fillin (1)       fillin (5)     fillin (1)   fillin (1)

The numbers in parentheses refer to the chord that is called for at the time of the dead space in which the fillin lick is played.

Gathering Flowers provides more opportunity than any of the other songs for practicing fillins, and since there is room to fit three fillins on the 1 chord in each verse and chorus, it also provides a good opportunity for practicing varying your choice of fillins, if you know how to play more than one fillin for the 1 chord.

For G and D fillins (the 1 and 5 chords when in the key of G), refer back to the attachments in the song of the week write ups for Bury Me Beneath The Willow and I'll Fly Away:
Beginner Bluegrass Jam Songs - Idaho Bluegrass Association (scroll down to the bottom of the page)
Beginner Bluegrass Jam Songs - Idaho Bluegrass Association (scroll down to the bottom of the page)


Pickup Notes
Concerning Pickup Notes into a break for Gathering Flowers. Instead of playing only the 2 pickup notes (B and C) that are sung in the vocal melody (see the attached melody sheets) to lead into the first complete measure of your break, it is often more effective at jams to add a 3rd quarter note, a C#, after these two notes, especially if you the one kicking off the song with an intro break. The chromatically ascending sequence of pickup notes: B, C, C# to lead to a D note on a G chord is commonplace on good Bluegrass records (good examples of this are at the beginning of the banjo intro break and at the beginning of the fiddle break on the first youtube link given here for Gathering Flowers). Three-quarters of a measure, rather than just half a measure, worth of pickup notes gives everyone at the jam a better sense of what the tempo of the song will be, so that they can all start playing backup confidently behind the person playing the intro break at the beginning of the first complete measure of the break. This is a good case in point illustrating how it is sometimes better to make modifications to the melody as sung, rather than to follow the melody slavishly, when creating melody-based breaks. 

Note: Many melodies do not have any built-in pickup notes leading into their first complete measure; in these cases one needs to create a pick-up measure to have an effective intro break for the song. This can be done by borrowing pickup phrases from other songs in which the first full measure of the song starts with the same note and same chord as the song in question, or one can learn common generic pickup phrases used on Bluegrass records for each specific situation: e.g., a generic pickup phrase leading to a B note on a G chord, a generic pickup phrase leading to a C note on a C chord, etc.


Song List
17 songs were played at last night's jam: 12 from the main list, 4 from the additional songs list, and 1 that is on neither list:

All The Good Times Are Past And Gone - A
Angeline The Baker - D
Beautiful Brown Eyes - G
Blue Ridge Cabin Home - A
Boil The Cabbage Down - A
Gathering Flowers From The Hillside - G
Long Journey Home - A
Mama Don't Allow - A
My Home's Across The Blue Ridge Mountains - G
Old Joe Clark - A
Soldier's Joy - D
Will The Circle Be Unbroken - G
Bury Me Beneath The Willow - A
I'll Fly Away - G
Liberty - D
Worried Man Blues - A
Columbus Stockade Blues - G


Happy Pickin',
Jason


Gathering Flowers From The Hillside - banjo tab
Download File

Gathering Flowers From The Hillside - guitar tab
Download File

Gathering Flowers From The Hillside - mandolin tab
Download File

Gathering Flowers From The Hillside - melody in G
Download File

Endings for most songs in G
Download File