| "It's Not My Cross to Bear" | |
|---|---|
| Song by The Allman Brothers Band | |
| from the album The Allman Brothers Band | |
| Released | November 4, 1969 |
| Recorded | 1969 |
| Genre | |
| Length | 5:04 |
| Label | Capricorn |
| Songwriter(s) | Gregg Allman |
| Producer(s) | Adrian Barber |
"It's Not My Cross to Bear" is a song by the Allman Brothers Band, written by Gregg Allman, that was released on their 1969 debut album. The song was written about a former lover. It was also one of the first songs Allman introduced to the group. In 1986, Allman recorded an arrangement for his record, I'm No Angel.
Blues resemblance
The song conveys the feel and tone of a blues song, but does not follow any of the usual eight-bar blues or twelve-bar blues progressions. The song has harmonic resemblance to Howlin' Wolf's recordings of "Sitting on Top of the World" in its inclusion of a minor IV chord in the fourth measure of the progression, while also harmonically resembling "Trouble in Mind", a blues standard. The eight-bar blues progression in "It's Not My Cross to Bear" is played using B major as the tonic chord:
| I | I | IV | iv |
| I VI | II V | I | V |
References
- Freeman, Scott (1996). Midnight Riders: The Story of the Allman Brothers Band. Little, Brown and Company. p. 60. ISBN 978-0316294522.
- Browne, David (27 May 2017). "Gregg Allman: 20 Essential Songs". Rolling Stone. Retrieved 21 August 2018.
- ^ Christopher M. Reali (2018). "The Allman Brothers Band: Conveying the Blues Idea". Rock Music Studies. 5 (2): 109–110. doi:10.1080/19401159.2017.1416448. S2CID 195007040.
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