Kaw-Liga by Hank Williams Piano Solo - Digital Sheet Music

SKU: A0.1482091

Kaw-Liga is a country music song written by Hank Williams and Fred Rose. Hank Williams was from Alabama, and would vacation on Lake Martin. The Lake Martin-area was once the home of Kowaliga, a former unincorporated town and a historically African-American community that was active from roughly 1890 until the mid-1920s. When the song was written it was originally Kowaliga, but Fred Rose changed the spelling to "Kaw Liga" in order to focus on the storyline. In 1953, "Kowaliga Day" was proclaimed by Alexander City Mayor Joe Robinson. "Kaw-Liga" is one of just a handful of songs that Williams wrote with Fred Rose, who produced his records and published his songs through his company Acuff-Rose. Rose often "doctored" the songs Williams composed, making suggestions and revisions, with biographer Roger M. Williams (no known relation) noting that Rose's contribution to Williams' songs was probably craftsmanship, whereas Williams' was genius. Roy Acuff later recalled: Hank would come up with the ideas, and Fred would say, "Well, write it down and let me look at it." Hank'd bring it to Fred, and Fred would sit at the piano and compliment Hank and say, "Maybe you can express this a little differently, let's change it a little bit," but Fred never changed Hank's thinking. The song tells the story of a wooden Indian, Kaw-Liga, who falls in love with an "Indian maid over in the antique store" but does not tell her so, being, as the lyrics say: Too stubborn to ever show a sign, Because his heart was made of knotty pine. The Indian maid waits for Kaw-Liga to signal his affection for her, but he either refuses or is physically/emotionally unable (interpretations vary) to talk. Some interpret Kaw-Liga as a stoical Native American stereotype; however, the subject of masculine pride and emotional hardness is a popular one in country music, and the then-common "dime-store Indians" (which were the store's way of advertising that they sold tobacco) being made of unmoving wood was a perfect symbol of an aversion to expression of emotion. Because of his stubbornness, Kaw-Liga's love continues to be unrequited, with Hank Williams, the narrator/singer of the song lamenting, Poor ol Kaw-liga, he never got a kiss, Poor ol Kaw-liga, he don't know what he missed, Is it any wonder that his face is red? Kaw-liga, that poor ol' wooden head. The song ends with the Indian maid being bought and taken away from the antique store by a buyer, leaving Kaw-Liga alone, and he ...stands thar As lonely as can be, And wishes he was still an ol' pine tree.