Round-up in the Sky

Bob Nolan
Original copyright: March 16, 1936

Farewell, old range, my work is thru,
There’s a Round-up in the sky.
I give my pony back to you,
There’s a Round-up in the sky.
I’m gonna burn my brand on the silv’ry hide
Of a shootin’ star and take a ride
To a land beyond the Great Divide ,
To the Round-up in the sky.

Refrain:
Git along, dogie, up the trail, high-tail,
Git along, dogie, there’s a Round-up in the sky.

I see them gathered ‘round the moon,
There’s a Round-up in the sky.
I guess they know I’ll be there soon,
There’s a Round-up in the sky.
You know I hate to leave, old pal, but still
I just can’t wait for the night until
I’ll be herdin’ stars with Buff’lo Bill,
There’s a Round-up in the sky.

“Any man who’s spent a lonesome night alone on a western prairie with a blanket of stars above him is bound to pick up some of that inspiration we’ve been talking about. It’s you and the stars. And, if you watch them long enough, they’ll just about lift you up in the sky right where they are. Some people call it heaven. Now, maybe a cowboy doesn’t use just that word, but when he’s looked at the stars long enough, he knows just what it means.
—Bob's introduction to the song on the Teleways Radio Productions transcriptions No. 11

The cowboy songs and movies of Bob's day sang of a "cowboy heaven" or a "roundup in the sky" and he often wrote in this vein although he was totally against organized religion. His personal beliefs were very different and he tried to describe them in his song, "Relative Man".

One of Bob's very first songs, "Roundup in the Sky" was included in the Sons of the Pioneers' Standard Radio Transcriptions in 1934. An interesting note: the first page of "Roundup in the Sky" is pictured on the rear cover of the 1934 Sunset Music Co.'s sheet music of "Tumbling Tumble Weeds". This may have meant that Sunset had already published the sheet music although the song itself was not registered for copyright until March 16, 1936.

The Sons of the Pioneers recorded the song commercially for Decca on March 7, 1935. It may have been in the original uncut version of The Old Homestead but it was definitely included in the 1938 Columbia picture, South of Arizona. Although we found it in all the other radio transcriptions, it was not included in the 1940 Orthacoustic Symphonies of the Sage.

It was included in the Sons of the Pioneers' first songbook, The Sons of the Pioneers Song Folio No. 1 in 1936 by Cross & Winge.

Round-up In the Sky (American Music, Inc.)

SONS OF THE PIONEERS COMMERCIAL RECORDINGS

10-2-4 Ranch radio show, No. (#169-02) (Dick Foran & Martha Mears) (February 15, 1943)

NBC Thesaurus transcriptions, side B G7-MM-4673-H (1965)

Teleways Radio Productions transcriptions, Nos. 6, 41, and 235 (c. 1947-48)

Lucky U Ranch radio shows (courtesy of Larry Hopper)
- Transcriptions disc TR-107, 108 (November 21, 1951)
- Transcriptions disc TR-111, 112 (November 22, 1951)
- Transcriptions disc TR-168, 169 (December 28, 1951)
- Transcriptions disc TR-333, 334 (April 21, 1952)
- Transcriptions disc TR-595, 596 (December 9, 1952)
- Transcriptions disc TR-692, 693 (February 13, 1953)

Smokey the Bear radio show, episode No. 7 (1952)