Front porches can ‘carry a tune’

It’s a fact that “some of the most popular songs in country music are about the simple life.”

 “Fans love songs about rocking on the front porch, screen doors slamming, corn stalks growing and faded jeans,” commented music historian Barbie Craft. 

“It doesn’t matter if it is just a small country town or the farm, down south or out west, we love to hear these songs,” she said. 

Zoom in on her reference to the “front porch.” In the Down East neighborhoods of Carteret County, N.C., a porch is a “pizer.” 

Pizer is a shortened form of the Italian word “piazza.” Down Easters often truncate words, change vowel sounds and sometimes add “r” after vowels. Such is the case in the formation of the word “pizer.” 

Every pizer also needs a swing.

 

In 1984, Tracy Lawrence recorded “If The World Had A Front Porch.” Here’s how we might “edit” the lyrics: 

It was where my mama sat on that old swing with her crochet.

It was where granddaddy taught me how to cuss and how to pray.

It was where we made our own ice cream those sultry summer nights,

Where the bulldog had her puppies, and us brothers had our fights.

 

If the world had a pizer like we did back then,

We’d still have our problems but we’d all be friends.

Treating your neighbor like he’s your next of kin…

Wouldn’t be gone with the wind.

 

An all-time favorite is “Swingin,’” released by John Anderson in 1983. It goes like this:

There’s a little girl, in our neighborhood,

Her name is Charlotte Johnson, and she’s really lookin’ good.

I walked over to her house, and this was goin’ on:

 

Her brother was on the sofa eatin’ chocolate pie;

Her momma was in the kitchen cuttin’ chicken up to fry;

Her daddy was in the back yard rollin’ up a garden hose;

I was on the pizer with Charlotte feelin’ love down to my toes

And we were swingin’….

 

Little Charlotte she’s as pretty as the angels when they sing,

I can’t believe I’m out here on the pizer swing.

 

Tony Jackson tugged at a lot of heart strings with his 2017 hit “Old Porch Swing” that starts like this:

 Mamma used to love to reminisce.

She sat out on the pizer on nights like this.

She’d tell me about her favorite things in life.

Like honeysuckles, rain and fireflies.

 

Out on that old pizer swing,

I learned everything.

How to laugh, and how to love,

Who I am and who’s up above.

Everything in between.

Out on that pizer swing.

 

The group Little Big Town released “Front Porch Thing” in 2012. The quartet sang: 

Good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise,

My baby’s got a song to sing.

While the crickets and the train whistle harmonize:

Doing that pizer thing.

 

Muscadine Bloodline had success in 2016 with “Porch Swing Angel.” It begins:

Don’t you put on that make up,

We ain’t going nowhere.

Let’s just sit on this pizer swing;

We can take it from there.

 

It’s the sound of the chain links

As we rock till it’s night,

And we can watch as the sun sets

In hopes of holding you tight.

 

And be my pizer swing angel.

 

Is that good?