“Suzanne” was written by Harley Allen, a singer, guitarist and mandolin player born in Dayton, Ohio, in 1956, the son of the bluegrass singer Red Allen. It was first recorded by the Allen Brothers, Harley and his brothers, for their Rounder LP Clara’s Boys (Rounder 0154, 1982), with Harley on guitar and mandolin and singing lead and tenor alongside Greg Allen on banjo and Ronnie Allen on bass.
The singer spends a Friday night with a song and a little beer, wishing Suzanne were there. She has gone on down the road, and every morning he remembers that she once was his; she used to tell him to watch his step, and that sad songs would get to him every time.
Allen recorded it again in February 1984 at Jewel Studios in Cincinnati, with the banjo player Mike Lilly, and it became the opening and title track of their Folkways LP Suzanne (FTS 31049, 1985). Allen sang lead and played guitar, with Lilly and Scott Adams on harmony, Adams on mandolin, David Moore Jr. on fiddle and Larry Nager on electric bass. Smithsonian Folkways later included that recording on Classic Bluegrass from Smithsonian Folkways (2002), and in 2021 Mo Pitney sang it with Merle Monroe on the label’s Industrial Strength Bluegrass, with Tim Raybon singing harmony.
Allen went on to write for country singers: his songs were recorded by Alan Jackson (“Between the Devil and Me”) and Blake Shelton (“The Baby”), among many others, and his background vocals on “I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow” from the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack earned him two Grammy Awards in 2002. He died in Brentwood, Tennessee, in 2011.
