Stagger Lee Saturdays - Lonnie Donegan and Chas McDevitt

It's skiffle week on Stagger Lee Saturdays! Skiffle is a genre of British jazz-rock-folk-blues, with a lot of instruments like washboard percussion and washtub basses. The King of Skiffle, Lonnie Donegan (official wiki AMG) recorded his version for the Pye label in 1956, and labelmate Chas McDevitt (official wiki AMG) laid his version down the next year.

Donegan's version is a slow, lazy rambling blues take (lyrically similar to Woody Guthrie's), with a few improvisations along the way. McDevitt's version is a rockin' version which, sadly, removes Billy from the story and changes Stag from a murderer into a simple hat thief. With that noted, McDevitt's version is peppy and upbeat -- I love just about any upbeat version of Stag.

I have a third skiffle version around here somewhere, but I'll save it for later. Next week is our final week of double-Stag posts for this month -- we'll be looking at the story of Stack A Dollar.

Lonnie Donegan - Stackalee
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Chas McDevitt - Badman Stackolee
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