“Red Rocking Chair”—Dive into Appalachian Music for Ukulele with this Haunting Modal Tune

BY MARCY MARXER | FROM THE SPRING 2026 ISSUE OF UKULELE MAGAZINE

“Red Rocking Chair” is a modal tune—meaning it is shaped more by a steady tonal center than by chord changes—with roots in the British Child Ballads of 1829. Banjo player Dock Boggs recorded it as “Sugar Baby” in 1927, and it has since been taken up by Hobart Smith, Doc Watson, and Billy Strings. One of the most affecting versions was recorded in 1968 by Lily May Ledford (1917–1985) of the Coon Creek Girls, whose solo banjo-and-vocal performance serves as the basis for this arrangement.

The Coon Creek Girls were formed in 1937 for the WLS Barn Dance radio show. Though originally billed as a novelty, they quickly won over audiences with their strong, hard-driving sound. “Then it was our time,” Ledford recalled during a 1980 performance at Berea College, in Kentucky. “We startled the audience by being all girls—our sound was drowned out by the uproar of applause and yelling.” That sense of drive and directness carries through Ledford’s later solo recording, which favors momentum and tone over harmonic variety.

This arrangement of “Red Rocking Chair” works equally well under the vocal or as a solo instrumental. Repeated patterns and sustained harmony keep the focus on tone and resonance, in line with an older Appalachian approach where variation comes from feel rather than chord changes.

The music here uses the alternate tuning G–C–F–Bb, with strings 1 and 2 tuned up a half step. The piece centers on C minor, but much of its character comes from the lack of harmonic movement. Long stretches sit on a C7sus4 sound, creating an open, unresolved feel. The tuning allows open strings to ring against that harmony, reinforcing the tune’s droning, banjo-based origins. High-G tuning emphasizes the drone, though a low G works just as well.

In measure 1, the melody appears on the first string; striking all four strings lets the instrument ring right away. Measures 2 and 3 introduce a fingerpicking pattern that returns in measures 5 and 6, as well as 9 and 10. The opening notes of measures 5 and 9 shift slightly to follow the melody. Beat 3 of measures 4 and 8 features a pull-off, played by pulling the fretting finger toward the palm, as demonstrated in the video. Taken together, these elements keep the focus on sound and feel rather than motion, letting the tune unfold at its own pace.