"MILK COW BLUES"

HERE IS A LITTLE MILK COW BLUES FROM MY BROTHER, FRED....

MILK COW BLUES

by Fred M. Allen

A few months ago my wife, Joy, and I were walking across the parking lot after attending the worship service at Richland Hills Baptist Church near Fort Worth, when we stopped to chat with a man carrying a guitar. He was a member of the praise band which had led our music that day. I mentioned that my older Brother, Bob, used to play a guitar which he called his “grunt box.” I mentioned that, in 1952, our family was having a jam session and recorded on a reel-to-reel tape recorder many of our favorite songs that day, one of which was Milk Cow Blues which I sang as Bob accompanied me on his grunt box. My friend was almost shocked to learn that I knew that song since he knew I had spent a career in church music. He said, “I can’t believe you know that old song;” then he added, “Let me show you something.” He went to his car and showed me a copy of Milk Cow Blues which he had recently copied from the Internet for, he said, ”I have been singing this song lately and it is one of my favorite old song.” What a strange coincidence.

Then I went home and did a research on the Internet to learn more about Milk Cow Blues and found that several artists have recorded it. However, in every case that sang it in an exaggerated blues style which robbed it of its nice melody and the words were difficult to understand. Bob Wills had a page on the Internet with the full lyrics, and a rather recent recording by Ricky Skaggs was there.

This song really has no significance to me except that I learned it at an early age and still remember most of the words. My elder brother, John, worked at KPLT at that time and he had access to quality recording equipment which he brought home for our jam session. Years later as we were serving in Zambia as missionaries, he transferred the recording of that jam session onto an audio cassette and mailed it to us. I was so happy to receive it and listened to it over and over again. I still have that copy and listen to it often. In addition to my singing “Milk Cow Blues,” that jam session featured John singing, ‘Cincinatti Lou,” Bob singing,”Divorce Me COD,” my sister, Nelda, singing, “I Wanna Be a Cowboy’s Sweetheart,” by young brother, Duane, at age 11, singing, “My God Is Real,” and then we sang other songs together. Later John sent to us recordings of my parents singing, my sister, Martha, singing ”Silent Night” in a trio with Nelda and Duane’s wife, Norah Lee, and my sister, Nelda, singing “O Holy Night” accompanied by the orchestra of First Baptist Church, Austin, TX. Those recordings are real keepsakes.

It’s interesting to me how some particular songs remain in my memory for all these years. Some of them, particularly the religious songs, have helped to influence my life in the right direction. I have been thinking lately of such songs as “:Kneel at the Cross,” an old hymn which never made it to our large hymnbooks, but which reminds me of the night during a summer revival at Union Church in Taylortown, I was 13 years old and was near to making a decision to accept Christ into my heart but was shy and was holding tightly to the pew in front of me when, from across the way, Sister Ruby Smith sensed that I needed encouragement, so she came to me and said, “Little Fred, I want to go with you to the altar and turn this over to the Lord.” I went with her immediately and God gloriously saved me. Now, every time I think of this hymn, I think of that important time in my life and especially of my dear neighbor, Sister Ruby, whom God used to change my life that night. In 1962 I was minister of music in Handley Baptist Church in Fort Worth and had just organized a men’s choir. The first song I wanted to teach them was ‘Kneel at the Cross.” I could not find a copy of it and couldn’t remember all the words, so I called my sister, Martha, and together we remembered all the words. I arranged it for men’s voices and through the years I used that song with men’s choirs. Yes, songs can have a great influence on our lives.