Chords for The Real Story Behind the Song: Mr. Bojangles

The inspiration for the song Mr Bojangles actually came about by chance.
The song was a top 10 hit in 1970 for the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.
But it was originally written by country singer Jerry Jeff Walker in 1968.
He actually got the idea while he was locked up in jail.
So why did he write the song?
And who was Mr Bojangles?
The answer just might surprise you.
So let's explore the real story behind the song, Mr Bojangles.
_ _ Songs are like time stamps.
[F] Through your journey in life, [Am] they can remind you of exactly where you were,
[F] what you were doing, [C] and who you were with.
The good [F] times that you want to remember.
_ [Am] And the bad ones you'd rather forget.
[F] _ But every song has its own [C] unique story that inspired the songwriter.
[F] And moved them to share their experience with us.
[Am] In this video, we will follow [F] the songwriters on their journey.
And [C] discover the real story behind the song.
_ [F] _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _ _
_ [F] _ Mr Bojangles was written in 1968 by country [C] music singer Jerry Jeff Walker.
Walker released it as a single from his album with the same name.
It was his first single to make Billboard's Hot 100, climbing as high as number 77.
Singer-songwriter Nina Simone recorded a very mellow version on her 1971 album,
Here Comes the Sun.
The song was also covered by many other artists.
But the best-known version was released by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band who made it a top 10 hit
in 1970.
It became their biggest hit.
They still perform it over 50 years later.
Sammy Davis Jr.
then took the song to another level with his performance at the White House
in 1973.
Davis added an interpretive dance routine that later became a regular part of his shows.
But what was the real story behind the song, Mr Bojangles?
Contrary to popular belief, the song is not a story about the legendary African-American actor
and dancer Bill Robinson.
The confusion arose because Robinson was also commonly known as Mr
Bojangles in his day.
He was so famous for his dancing in the early 1900s that he even performed
his routines with child star Shirley Temple in some of her films.
And just as the man Bojangles
in the song, Bill Bojangles Robinson's life also took a sad turn later in life.
He went from being a millionaire to dying broke, back in 1949.
Add to that the fact that Sammy
Davis Jr.
would play the role of Mr Bojangles while singing the song and it's easy to see how
people would assume it was about Bill Bojangles Robinson.
But the similarities end there.
The real story to this song begins in a jail cell back in the mid-60s in what's known as the French
Quarter of New Orleans.
As Walker writes in the song, he was down and out at the time.
He was
basically a drifter who would hitchhike his way around the South while collecting ideas for that
one big song.
One night in New Orleans, the local police made a sweeping arrest while looking for a
murder suspect.
Walker, who just happened to be in the area was arrested with a group of other men.
Based on various sources, he may have also been drunk at the time as well.
One of them was an old man who was a street performer.
Sometimes Walker described him as
a homeless black man, but other times he said the man was white.
The latter would seem to make more
sense as the jails in New Orleans were segregated in the 60s.
So he would not have been in the same
cell with a homeless black man.
Oddly, Walker would change the description of the old man in
different interviews.
We will go into more details to why he did this later in the video.
The old man only referred to himself as Mr.
Bojangles.
Perhaps he was inspired by the real
Bill Bojangles Robinson.
It also allowed him to hide his real name while in jail.
Walker felt
uneasy around his tough-looking cellmates.
So he quickly gravitated toward the harmless-looking
old man.
The men started sharing stories over the next few days.
Walker was especially moved by
Bojangles' story.
He was always fascinated by these street performers and it's said that he
planned to write a song about them, but needed more material.
Bojangles said that he and his dog
traveled for 15 years.
During that time, he performed at minstrel shows and county fairs
in the South.
He said that his dog had died some 20 years ago.
From the tears in his eyes,
it was obvious that he was still hurting from the loss.
He shook his head in self-pity and
revealed that now he just dances for drinks and tips at cheap bars.
He was basically just a
drunk.
Walker recalls that the old man's sorrow was felt throughout the jail cell.
To lighten the mood, someone asked Bojangles to give them a little dance.
According to Walker, the old man replied,
Yes, hell yes.
He jumped up and started clapping a rhythm and performed a tap dance.
A few years later, Walker wrote the song Mr.
Bojangles.
He also retold the experience in his
book, Gypsy Song Man.
As Walker recalls, On a night when the rest of the country was listening
to the Beatles, I was writing a 6 8ths waltz about an old man and hope.
Apparently Walker
had also been listening to the Beatles as well, because he said the music for Mr.
Bojangles was
inspired by a 1966 Beatles song from their Revolver album called, For No One.
If you
compare Mr.
Bojangles and the Beatles song with any 6 8ths waltz recording on YouTube,
you'll hear the similarities.
While it's clear he was inspired by the story of the old man in jail,
as mentioned earlier, Walker was never really consistent in his description of Mr.
Bojangles.
He sometimes referred to him as an old black man.
Other times he said he was white.
But there was a
reason for the inconsistency.
Walker said that Mr.
Bojangles is a composite of many people.
This becomes clear when you listen to the words.
The character in the song jumped up,
clicked his heels and lightly touched down.
That doesn't sound like an old man in a jail cell.
So Mr.
Bojangles appears to be a mixture of the many street performers, both black and white,
that he met in life.
That's not unusual as songwriters tend to incorporate the personalities
of different people into one character.
When you take the story of the old man in jail and add the
lively dance routine of various street performers you've seen over the years, you come away with a
song.
That's basically how Walker himself described it.
He said,
Bojangles was a little bit of several people I met for only moments of a passing life.
He's all those I met once and will never see again and will never forget.
The Real Story Behind the Song series is a growing collection of behind the scenes
stories on some of the biggest selling songs from the past and present.
Our other series is called,
Stupid Crime Stories You Just Won't Believe.
It is a collection of some of the craziest crimes
committed by the dumbest criminals.
You can find them all on our channel page or you can click the
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