(Since the Coons Have Learned To Do), a song from 1896.
Words and music by Lew Sully.
The sheet music:
The Hootchee-Kootchee Dance – Sheet Music
Lyrics
1. Talk about your “pigeon winging”
Mobile “buck” and “serpentine”
Old time jig with banjo ringin’
Was considered “mighty mean”
But these capers are back numbers
And they don’t appear to go
Even here in old St. Louis
Where they say the coons are slow
But there’s a dance that gets ’em movin’
One the Turkish maidens do
It’s the dance that made Chicago
And the Fair in Ninety two
Chorus
All the coons have gone
And lost their heads about it
‘Tis a sight to see then niggers prance
Now, Morgan street has surely
Nothing dead about it
Since the coons have learned to do
The “Hootchee-Kootchee” dance
2. Went down to a colored party
Given by old parson Brown
Colored gals fair, fat and forty
Swellest coons that could be found
Parson rose becan to preachin’
On the colored mans’ advance
Street piano started screechin’
Out the Hootchee Kootchee dance
Ev’ry Nigger seemed to know it
Couldn’t hear what Brow was sayin’
Till he shouted “Children go it
When the Dago played this strain
3. Black man likes the watermelon
When its smiling on the vine
Possom, hoe cake and molasses
There’s a dinner mighty fine
Sweet potatoes dipp’d in gravy
Makes a hungry nigger whoop
Then the white man must take warning
And lock up his chicken “coop”
“Policy” is where you catch him
“Craps” soon put him in a trance
But if back to life you’d fetch him
Play the Hootchee Kootchee dance
4. Ev’ry nation has its music
Irish love “St. Patricks day”
“Fatherland” is for the German
“La Paloma” Spain so gay
Poland Paderewski’s music
Played in almost ev’ry land
Italy for “Garibaldi”
“Kerry Patch” the “Land League Band”
Britons love their “Rule Britannie”
“Marseilles” adored by France
Nigger yells for “Yankee Doodle”
And the Hootchee Kootchee dance