This month's tab offering is a 3-part arrangement of a "Tin Pan Alley" era tune appropriate for Valentine's Day entitled "Come Take A Trip In My Airship", written in 1904.  The early 1900's were known as the "Golden Age" of the airship, also known as dirigibles ("steerable balloons"), or blimps.  Having been around in concept and working models since the late 1700's, the launch of Count von Zeppelin's LZ1 craft in July 1900 captured the interest and imagination of people everywhere, including the songwriting team of George Evans (music), and Ren Shields (lyrics).  George had been working on a new waltz melody, trying to re-create the success the two had just had with "In the Good Old Summertime"  (1902).  Ren was reading a newspaper article about the new Zeppelin airships, and came up with the romanticized notion of "taking one out for a spin".   The song had modest success, but suffered a bit in later years when a number of airship disasters underscored how dangerous the "new technology" could be.  Evans and Shields went on to further success with tunes such as "In the Merry Month of May", "You'll Have to Wait Until My Ship Comes In", and "Waltzing with the One you Love".

"Come Take A Trip in My Airship" had pretty much fallen into obscurity until it enjoyed a resurgence in popularity in the early 1930's when it was recorded by Charlie Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers.   The song has survived in the folk-music world through subsequent recordings by the Lost World String Band, Fred Pendleton, Johnny Cash, and Natalie Merchant.  I first heard the tune on a recording by Sally Rogers and Claudia Schmidt entitled "Closing the Distance".:

This arrangement is presented in 3 parts.  The "verse" and "chorus" are nearly identical, so I arranged them in 2 different octaves, and they can be played in unison.  The backup part adds a few additional "color chords" that can be used to fill out either of the other 2 parts.

Happy Valentine's Day (and Happy Groundhog Day) to all!

In music and friendship,

--Tull

Here are the complete set of lyrics:

VERSE 1:

I once loved a sailor.
Once, a sailor loved me.
He was not a sailor,
who sailed o’er the wide foaming sea.
He owned an airship;
Sailed like a bird on the wing;
And every evening at sunset,
he’d fly to my window and sing:

CHORUS:

Come take a Trip in my Airship,
come sail away to the stars!
Come take a trip out to Venus,
Come take a spin around Mars
No one will see while we're kissing
No one will know when we spoon.
Come take a Trip in my Airship,
and we'll visit the Man in the Moon!

VERSE 2: 

One night while sailing away from the crowds,
we passed through the Milky White Way.
While idly drifting and watching the clouds,
he asked me if I'd name the day!
Just by the Dipper, I gave him my heart,
the sun shone on our honeymoon.
We swore to each other, we never would part,
and we'd teach all the babies this tune.