Micro studio: St James Infirmary

An early jazz folk song with a gloriously vague and cloudy past. As best as anyone can figure its origins started with The Buck's Elegy somewhere around the 1780s, transformed in The Unfortunate Lad (aka The Unfortunate Rake) in the next century, crossed the Atlantic and became Streets of Laredo, then became The Gambler's Blues, shifted into St James Infirmary somewhere around the time Irving Mills got his hands on it, and wound up in the minor-key chords we know now through either Mills or Don Redman in time for Louis Armstrong to do his magic.
Possibly about a leprosy hospital knocked down in the 1530s, possibly about a St James Workhouse in Piccadilly, or possibly someone just made it up 'cos it sounded good. Folkies never make stuff up though, and all the stories are entirely truthful and fully based on fact, especially the ones about the Big Rock Candy Mountain. So who knows.
Gear: Epiphone Gibson AJ-200SCE, Boss RC-1.