449. Shortnin' Bread (Clement Wood, Jacques Wolfe)

Shortening bread is a kind of corn bread with strips of bacon, "shortening" referring to any fat used in baking, such as butter, lard, oil and margarine. In fact it was used to describe just about any bread or biscuit containing fat and flour.

The lyrics of "Mammy's L'il Baby Loves Shortnin' Bread" is were written, probably in 1928 by Clement Wood, and set to music by Jacques Wolfe, a Romanian immigrant to New York who developed an interest in African-American music. This was written for blackface vaudeville and became popular with general audiences when it was recorded by Lawrence Tibbett (1896 -1960), one of the pioneers of American radio. It was later revived by Nelson Eddy, who sang it in the MGM movie "Maytime" (1937), directed by Robert Z. Leonard. In 1938 it was a big hit for The Andrews Sisters.

I first heard the song sung by Burl Ives. Other artists who recorded it are Fats Waller (1941), Paul Robeson, The Beach Boys (1979), The Tractors (1998), Lew Dite and a great blues version by Neal Pattman, which you can find on YouTube.

Wikipedia also mentions performances by Donald Duck (in "Three For Breakfast", 1948), Captain Harris in "Police Academy 4" and Ethel Mertz in "I Love Lucy" (Season 4).

A playlist of my children's songs is here: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=9A4DBB328B5832A5

For lyrics and chords of my songs, please see my website: http://www.raymondcrooke.com

Category:

Music

Tags:

• folk
• song
• african
• american
• jail
• lawrence
• tibbet
• nelson
• eddy
• burl
• ives
• paul
• robeson
• politically
• incorrect

[GrannyTenderstone]

I got this song in my head this evening and have been playing every possible rendition I can find, even The Cramps punk band LOL. Good job as always Raymond.

[raymondcrooke]

@GrannyTenderstone Thanks for watching. It's a catchy song.

[stevesedberry]

According to the World Book encyclopedia Clement Wood wrote the lyrics to Short'nin' Bread.

[raymondcrooke]

@stevesedberry Yes, you are right. Jacques Wolfe set it to music. Thanks for the information. I've added it to the information panel above.

[angelbunz]

Thank you so much for posting this. We had cornbread with dinner tonight. My dad started talking about a "Cornbread" song. I googled "cornbread songs" and even tried it here on YouTube. The more I hummed the tune in my head the more I realized it was "shortening bread" I should look up. Well, after almost 3 hours of looking, I finally found the song for my dad. I was going nuts looking for this song. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I showed this to my dad and we enjoyed your video. :)

[raymondcrooke]

@angelbunz Thanks for your comment. I'm glad you enjoyed the song.

[Moshikashitenai]

Where have I been all these years?!

[ctibbet]

Lawrence Tibbett was my 3rd cousin. I never met him though.

[thehuntercreed]

@raymondcrooke I didnt, but I did about 4 hours of cleaning up and had this stuck in my head for the whole time, so great!

[raymondcrooke]

@thehuntercreed I hope you danced to it too!