Cluck Old Hen

Cluck Old Hen is a well-known Appalachian tune thought to date from the mid-1800s.¹ This tune most likely has African American roots along the same vein as the Uncle Remus/Br’er Rabbit stories with similar rhymes/lyrics found in Negro Folk Rhymes; Wise and Otherwise by Thomas W. Talley (New York, 1922).² Cluck Old Hen may have started as a banjo tune but has found a welcome home among Fiddlers often adding left-hand pizzicatos in the B part imitating a hen clucking (this can be heard in the Fiddlin’ Cowan Powers & Family recording).

My old hen’s a good old hen,
She lays eggs for the railroad men.
Sometimes one, sometimes two,
Sometimes enough for the whole damn crew.

Cluck old hen, cackle and sing,
You ain’t laid an egg since way last spring.
Cluck old hen, cackle and squall,
You ain’t laid an egg since way last fall.

First time she cackled, she cackled in the lot,
Next time she cackled she cackled in the pot.
Cluck Old Hen, cluck and squall,
Ain’t laid an egg since late last fall.

Had a little hen, she had a wooden leg,
Best darn hen that ever laid an egg.
Laid more eggs than any hen around the barn,
Another little drink wouldn’t do ya any harm.

Cluck old hen, cluck for your corn,
Cluck old hen, your winter’s all gone.
Cluck old hen, cackle and squall,
You ain’t laid an egg since way last fall.³

—Kitty Steetle

Vivian Williams and Phil Williams

Fiddlin’ Cowan Powers & Family

Alison Krauss & Union Station

The Hillbillies

Rhiannon Giddens and David Holt

Paul Ely Smith
https://palouserivermusic.com/album/1849315/american-akonting

Ann Elliot-Goldschmid playing David A. Jaffe’s Cluck Old Hen Variations (classical genre)
https://www.davidajaffe.com/music/cluck-old-hen-variations

Whiskey Shivers (metal bluegrass genre)

John Ashby version