Teaching in Albq

Add a Comment

2 Comments

Comment by cc on April 6, 2008 at 11:05am

Bayou Seco still remains one of the best sources for great folks songs from many cultures for kids. They have many CD's availble from their website.

Other favorites of mine to teach, especially in Spanish, are 'El Quelite,' and 'Tengo, Tengo, Tengo.' We hired them to come give all school sing along assemblies and teach folk dances to a whole grade level. They would then come back for a performance night where families could all join in.

The Silver City community is now the lucky recipient of their residence, like Albuquerque used to be. Of course, they do answer the call from Summerfest at the Botanical Gardens a bunch, and come back to their old haunting grounds, gathering many an excellent local musician to join them on stage.

Comment by cc on April 6, 2008 at 10:57am

Reading the current Alibi and seeing the concern from folks in the community about the impersonal city moniker of "Q" (I agree with them) made me remember and want to tell about a song Becca and I used to teach our 3rd grade classes: "A-L-B-U-Q-U-E-R-Q-U-E" by Johnny Lee Wills.

It's a fun song to sing with its swing rhythm and refrain, and anyone who learns the song learns to spell Albuquerque!

This of course is a song steeped in Anglo Culcha - Okie to be exact. I just googled Johnny Lee Wills and found out he is Bob Wills's (of Texas Playboys) bro. He stayed in Tulsa and kept the country swing tradition alive there after his bro Bob moved the Playboys to CA in 1940.

Unfortunately, of all the many song lyrics by Johnny available online, this song is not. I had transcribed them for the classroom from the cassette my spouse had gotten from his musician friend Paul Rangell. So I don't know which album it's from.

A-L-B-U-Q-U-E-R-Q-U-E sung by Johnny Lee Wills
Gotta go gotta go back to New Mexico,
where my true love waits for me.
Gotta get on the tracks
cause I'm on my way back
To A-L-B-U-Q-U-E-R-Q-U-E.

refrain
Albuquerque, Albuquerque here I come
on the Chi-LA express.
Gotta letter in my heart for my sweetest gal
and that letter in my heart says yes.

I'm the one, I'm the one, I'm the one she loves best
cause she gotta lotta mail from me
I'm the one guy she knew, who knew how to spell
A-L-B-U-Q-U-E-R-Q-U-E.

I remember one of our students, Curtis, just dearly loving this song. Becca had her own song repertoire she brought to our classroom, which included another song from this vintage, 'Gonna Mail Myself to You,' and the all-time fave amongst the kids of "Going to the State Fair."

I have to pay tribute to my cooperating teachers, here, Patty Evans and Franny Dever who i did my student teaching with at Corrales Elementary in '86. Franny and Patty both had their guitars in the room, but many times just sang acapella folk songs, many of which they had learned from our beloved local band Bayou Seco. My sagging song chart was a hallmark of my teaching - including the stand-by's learned from Franny and Patty (thru Bayou Seco) 'Papa's on the Housetop,' 'Waltzing with Bears,' and 'Daddy, What's a Train.' At the end of a day, gathering to sing in the whole group area was the way to go!