Old Black Joe

Stephen C. Foster's granddaughter, Mrs. A. D. Rose, claimed that "Joe" was a real person, a servant in the home of Jane McDowell in the days when Stephen was courting her. Stephen had promised Joe that he would someday put him in a song. This was published in 1860. Background music is in the key of C

  4   5  -5    6
Gone are the days

  6   6  -6    7    -7  -6   6
when my heart was young and gay,

  4   5  -5    6 
Gone are my friends

  6   6  -6   6    -5   5 -4
from the cot-ton fields a-way.

  4    5  -5    6
Gone from the earth

 6 6 -6   7   -7 -6   6
to a bet-ter land I know,

7  -7    7   -8  -7    7  -6   6  -6
I hear their gen-tle voic-es call-ing

 5   -4    4
Old Black Joe

 6   5   6    6   5   6
I'm com-ing, I'm com-ing

 6  6   -6   7  -7  -6   6
for my head is bend-ing low:

7  -7    7   -8  -7    7  -6  6   -6
I hear those gen-tle voic-es call-ing,

 5   -4    4
Old Black Joe.

verse 2
Who do I weep when my heart should feel no pain,
Who do I sigh that my friends come not again,
Grieving for forms now departed long ago?
I hear their gentle voices calling
Old Black Joe.

verse 3
Where are the hearts once so happy and so free,
The children so dear that I held upon my knee?
Gone to the shore where my soul has longed to go.
I hear their gentle voices calling, Old Black Joe.