In my message of earlier today, I offered links to four renditions of "Sleepy Eyed
Joe", including this one from Foghorn's out-of-print _Weiser Sunrise_ album:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2RI8FlwvQg
Foghorn Stringband
~134 BPM
Thanks to Meg Dedolph for an off-list message pointing out that the aforesaid video has
been diasbled since I first posted a link to it in 2015 and for calling my attention to a
video on the Westport Folk & Bluegrass Festival's channel of a live performance by
Foghorn at Matt Molloy's Pub, Bridge Street, Westport, County Mayo, Ireland in 2016:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sd_q8vaQuI0
Foghorn Stringband
~137-138 BPM
I've also found that the version from the _Weiser Sunrise_ album is currently
available here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sd_q8vaQuI0
The title and description of the Westport video attribute the tune to Norman Blake, but as
I said in the postscript to my earlier message, notes accompanying one of Blake's CDs
attribute the tune to one Ellis Hall. I haven't heard Hall's 1952 78 RPM
recording of the tune, so I can't say how it compares to any of the others I've
mentioned. Using Google Advanced Book Search, I found a 1952 copyright catalog with a
listing attributing "Sleepy Eyed Joe" to Ellis John Hall. Whether Hall was
claiming authorship of the tune itself or just of his performance/arrangement is more than
I can say for certain, but I didn't find any older references to "Sleepy Eyed
Joe" as a tune name.
--Jim