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Date: Thu, 24 Apr 97 22:22:08 MDT
From: ah827@rgfn.epcc.Edu (Gene L. Graham)
Subject: ODE TO BILLY JOE


"Ode to Billy Joe"

Key of F, Common Time "With a beat"

Words and music by Bobbie Gentry
            F7
It was the third of June,
         Cm7                    F7
Another sleepy, dusty,
      F7
I was out choppin' cotton
        Cm7                   F7
And my brother was bailin' hay
        Bb7
And at dinner time we stopped and walked back to the house to eat
          F7
And Mama hollered at the back door,
         Cm7                       F7
"Y'all remember to wipe your feet."
            Bb7
Then she said,

"I got some news this mornin' from Choctaw Ridge
       F7
Today Billy Joe McAllister
       Eb7                        F
Jumped off the Tallahatchee Bridge."

Michael shaw
shaw95@wharton.upenn.edu
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Papa said to Mama, as he passed around the black-eyed peas
"Well, Billy Joe never had a lick o'sense, pass the biscuits please
There's five more acres in the lower forty I've go to plow."
And Mama said it was a shame about Billy Joe anyhow
Seems like nothin' ever comes to no good up on Choctaw Ridge
And now Billy Joe McAllister's jumped off the Tallahatchee Bridge.

Brother said he recollected when he and Tom and Billy Joe
Put a frog down my back at the Carrol Country picture show
And wasn't I talkin' to him after church last Sunday night
I'll have another piece of apple pie, you know, it don't seem right
I saw him at the sawmill yesterday on Choctaw Ridge
And now you tell me Billy Joe jumped off the Tallahatchee Bridge.

Mama said to me, "Child, what's happened to your appetite?
I been cookin' all mornin' and you haven't touched a single bite
That nice young preacher Brother Taylor dropped by today
Said he'd be pleased to have dinner on Sunday, Oh, by the way
He said he saw a girl that looked a lot like you up on Choctaw Ridge
And she an' Billy Joe was throwin' somethin' off the Tallahatchee Bridge."

A year has come and gone since we heard the news 'bout Billy Joe
Brother married Becky Thompson, they bought a store in Tupelo
There was a virus goin' 'round, Papa caught it and died last spring
And now Mama doesn't seem to want to do much of anything
And me I spend a lot of time pickin' flowers up on Choctaw Ridge
And drop them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchee Bridge.

ABOVE ADDITIONAL LYRICS SUBMITTED BY:
ah827@rgfn.epcc.edu (Gene L. Graham)