Writer's Room - October 2026

Haunting Melodies . . . Spooky Songs for Halloween

“It may seem a little spooky but it’s all right. Don’t you worry now, it’s just the night.”

That song by the Del McCoury Band never mentions Halloween, but it sure sets the scene. There’s dread in every line, from “trees that look like creatures in shadows on the wall” to “you could wind up a victim in some kind of evil spell.”

For the evening of October 31, “It’s Just the Night” to put together a “BooGrass” playlist of haunting melodies and terrifying tales. We’ve got a lot to choose from—ghostly hitchhikers and phantom trains . . . mysterious mountain lights and rattling chains . . . and crimes of passion, told in high-pitched harmonies and gory stories.

Many of these eerie songs were brought to America from England, Scotland and Ireland. Hard life in a new land led Appalachian settlers to put their own local twists on some already twisted lyrics. 

A “Who’s Who” of Murder Ballads

Even if we limit the list to best-known murder ballads, there’s not enough space in this column to mention them all. Here's a brief “Who’s Who” (or “Who Was Who”) of some of the victims immortalized in song—along with a modern imagining of their ghostly revenge.

Let’s start with “The Knoxville Girl,” although my local Chamber of Commerce probably would be just as happy to skip it. The song has its roots in the British Isles, where the title is “The Wexford Girl or “The Oxford Girl.” 

Our unnamed heroine goes for a Sunday stroll with a boy called Willie—who for no apparent reason, “picked a stick up off the ground and knocked that fair girl down.” After the beatdown, he grabs her golden curls and throws her “into the river that flows through Knoxville town.” Like I said, not exactly a tourism jingle aimed at attracting bachelorette parties.

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“Banks of the Ohio” heads north for an almost identical story that includes a few more details. During a walk by the river, this young woman turns down a marriage proposal, and her suitor commits a knife-assisted drowning. Oh, in some versions the murderer is named “Willie.”

There’s no crime scene specified in “Pretty Polly,” but the murder has a similar m.o. This time the victim is led into the mountains.  Pretty Polly discovers her fate too late when she spies “a newly dug grave and a spade lying by.” The psycho perp again is identified as “Willie,” so maybe some of these songs should be called “serial killer ballads.” 

After another riverside walk, a pregnant “Omie Wise” confronts her lover about whether he intends to do the right thing and marry her. But the guy, “John Lewis,” (apparently by now, Willie is using an alias) “hugged her and he kissed her and turned her around and threw her in deep water where he knew that she would drown.”

It’s not as clear what happened to “Darlin’ Corey.” We’re told she ran a “stillhouse” raided by revenue officers and was known to drink “that sweet liquor with a low-down gambling man.” It’s up to the narrator (possibly a jealous lover?) to “dig a hole in the meadow to lay Darlin’ Corey down.”

“Little Sadie” spends little time on details of the murder. All we know is that the singer “went out one night to make a little round, I met Little Sadie and I shot her down.” The rest of the song tells of the killer’s unsuccessful getaway attempt and prison sentence of “forty-one years to wear the ball and the stripes.”

Revenge of the Old-Time Angels

Thanks to a contemporary singer/songwriter, the restless spirits of these wronged women finally get their revenge. Jim Lauderdale sings that the “Old-Time Angels” are “up there in those mountains, seeking vengeance for the score.” Watch out, Willie—and any other would-be villain who gets in their way!  The Knoxville Girl wants payback and “Little Maggie’s got her pistol and Pretty Polly’s got her spade.”

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That’s only the beginning. As Lauderdale’s lyrics say, “Darlin’ Corey’s comin’ for you.” And when they’re through, Little Sadie and Omie Wise drive a wagon “for to haul your body away . . . in the Tennessee River, they’ll make you pay.”

You can hear Jim’s original on his 2013 Old-Time Angels album, as well as The Po’ Ramblin’ Boys’ version on their 2022 album, Never Slow Down.

The Ghost of Sis Draper

“The Ghost of Sis Draper” is a more modern tale told through the concept album that Shawn Camp released last year. The spirit of the late singer/songwriter Guy Clark also is very much a presence in the many songs co-written by Clark and Camp.

“Sis Draper” blends myth and memories, the saga of a fiddle-playing woman in Arkansas who’s a musical celebrity around Camp’s hometown. Her beehive hairdo and fast fiddle tunes captivate the men and spark jealousy among the women. (“I think Grandpa used to date her/Grandma says she still hates her/All the fellas stand up straighter/In the presence of Sis Draper.”)

When Sis moves on to New Mexico, the fiddling femme fatale becomes a female fatality in the Santa Fe police blotter. “The Death of Sis Draper” tells how a jealous waitress suspects Sis of stealing her man and poisons the performer’s whiskey. 

But as the album title implies, that’s not the end of the story. On a foggy Arkansas night, “you can hear her fiddle crying.” They say that the Ghost of Sis Draper is “the Will-o’-the Wisp in a cotton dress,” always moving through the music.

This also is a good occasion to toast Shawn Camp on his recent selection to the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame—joining co-writer Clark, who was inducted in 2004. And remember to raise a goblet of witches’ brew to the other members of the Hall of Fame’s Class of 2026—Bruce Channel, Lyle Lovett, Lee Thomas Miller and Taylor Swift.)

Finally, as they might say down at the Hallmark store, “Happy Halloween to all . . . and to all a Good Fright!”