Paul Dessau (19 December 1894 – 28 June 1979) was a German composer and conductor.
Dessau was born in Hamburg into a musical family. His grandfather, Moses Berend Dessau, was a cantor in the Hamburg synagogue (Hennenberg 2001); his uncle, Professor Bernhard Dessau, was Konzertmeister (English: leader, lead violinist, or concertmaster) at the Royal Opera House, Unter den Linden ; his cousin, Max Winterfeld, became generally known under the name Jean Gilbert as a composer of operettas (Hennenberg 2001); and his second cousin, Robert Gerson Muller-Hartmann, was a composer and collaborator with Vaughan Williams.
From 1909 he majored in violin, studying under Florian Zajic at the Klindworth-Scharwenka Conservatory in Berlin. In 1912 he became répétiteur at the City Theatre (Stadttheater) in Hamburg. There he studied the work of the conductors Felix Weingartner and Arthur Nikisch and took classes in composition from Max Julius Loewengard. He was second Kapellmeister at the Tivoli Theatre in Bremen in 1914 before being drafted for military service in 1915 (Hennenberg 2001).
Oh, when I left old East Virginia,
North Carolina I did roam.
There I courted a fair young lady.
What was her name I did not know.
Her hair it was all a-dark brown curly.
Her cheeks they were a rosie red.
Upon on her breast she wore a ribbon.
Oh, don't I wish that I was dead.
Her poppa said that we might marry.
Her momma said it would not do.
Oh, come here dear and I will tell you.
I will tell you what I'll do.
Some dark night we'll take a ramble.
I will run away with you.
For I'd rather be in some dark holler,
Where the sun refused to shine,
As for you to be some other man's woman.