“Chicken Don't Roost Too High for Me”

Description

Singer tells chicken not to roost too high, but to come down out of his tree. Sometimes there are other verses about chasing a chicken to kill and eat, but mostly this is a fiddle tune with incidental verses

Notes

This barely makes it into the collection, but it's common enough to make it worth listing, if only to differentiate it from the other chicken and chicken-stealing songs. - PJS

Cross references

• cf. "There's a Lock on the Chicken House Door" (subject)
• cf. "Chicken" (subject)

Recordings

• Uncle Tom Collins, "Chicken, You Can't Roost Too High for Me" (OKeh 45140, 1927)
• Dixie String Band, "Chicken Don't Roost Too High for Me" (Puritan 9160, n.d. but prob. c. 1926)
• Georgia Potlickers, "Chicken, Don't Roost Too High" (Brunswick 595, 1932; rec. 1930; on StuffDreams1)
• Earl Johnson & his Clodhoppers, "They Don't Roost Too High for Me" (OKeh 45223, 1928; on Cornshuckers2)
• Riley Puckett, "Chicken Don't Roost Too High for Me" (Columbia 150-D, 1924)
• Uncle Tom Collins, "Chicken Can't Roost Too High for Me" (OKeh 45140, 1927)
• Henry Whitter, "Chicken Don't Roost Too High for Me" (OKeh 40077, 1924)