Fishing songs II
Back from a family vacation in Colorado and after pouring through hundreds of emails I had received (I don’t check emails on vacation), I discovered that the outdoors page two weeks ago of my top 10 fishing songs struck a chord with some readers (pun intended).
A few people emailed with me with songs that I had missed. Larry N. Boyington, aka Larry Neal, former curator of the Wax Museum on the big 1520 KOMA, came up with this list:
1. The Fish–Bobby Rydell–1961 (it was a dance)
2. The Fish Ain’t Bitin’–Lamont Dozier–1974
3. The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh–Thom Bell–1979
4. The Fish Walk–Johnny Carlo–1960 (it was a dance)
5. Fishin’ On The Mississippi–Bob Morris–1967
6. Three Little Fishes–Buzz Clifford–1961
7. Houdini–Walter Brennan–1962( a song about a catfish named Houdini that everyone was trying to catch)
“I don’t know how old you are Mr. Godfrey, but I think I am safe in saying that you have never heard of any of these,” Boyington wrote in the email.
You are correct, Mr. Boyington. I have never heard of any of them. But the Fish That Saved Pittsburgh sounds familiar.
Chuck Edwards, the radio voice of the past 31 years for Weatherford High School football and baseball and Southwestern Oklahoma State University, nominated an old song called “Catfish Bates.”
“Somewhere in my vast collection of 45 records, I have an old country fishing song called ‘Catfish Bates,”’Edwards wrote. “Don’t remember who recorded it and I have my records organized by author rather than title so can’t relate any of the lyrics to you, but I remember it being a good fishing song.”
Shane from Cushing suggested that Jimmy Houston’s theme song (“Just a chuckin and a windin, hoping I’m a findin’ an old Big mouth, waitin by a hollow log..”) should be at the top of my list.
A reader from Norman mentioned a song from the ’40s called “The Fishing Song” by The Five Scamps.
“Starts out Momma won’t let me go fishing with my boyfriend,” emailed M. Maddux of Norman. ” I remember this was a little risque for the disk jockeys in the ’40′s, as the end was daddy saying ‘momma and papa went fishing on Rio Grande , didn’t catch any fish but here I am.’”
And a colleague of mine at The Oklahoman, staff writer Robert Medley, emailed me a You Tube video of a song called “Catfish Boogie” performed by The Collins Kids of Oklahoma. It’s an old Tennessee Ernie Ford song.
“I think you missed one,” Robert said.
After watching the video and hearing the song for the first time, I think Robert is right. I would put this song at No. 10.
Check out the song and video: http://youtube.com/watch?v=nmrX17TxnLI
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Have you ever heard “I’m a going catfish fishing”? That may not be the Title but it’s definitly in the lyrics. Was searching for it and saw your blog, thought you may have heard it since you were talking about fishing songs. I was trying to find out who sings it.