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User Name Thread Name Subject Posted
Steve Gardham Origins: Burlesque Lining Out Songs (15) Origins: Burlesque Lining Out Songs 01 Jan 25


Interested in which folksongs have been sung using the 'lining out' religious practice with burlesque and nonsense songs.

For those who don't know 'lining out' is a hymn-singing practice dating back to the 17th century in which the Precentor spoke each line of a hymn or psalm and then exhorted the congregation to sing that line.

The practice was burlesqued in a mock-precentor style using secular material.

I have examples from America 1860s using the burlesque version of Two Old Crows
and in 1880s Britain using the nonsense song Bohunkus aka Adolphus John (There was a man who had two sons and both of them were brothers).

I am interested in obtaining further examples of other songs being used in this way. (dating and place are helpful)

Also related closely, but not songs, are burlesque Bible stories delivered in the same dead-pan style using Biblical phraseology such as 'And it came to pass..... Are any of these in print anywhere?

Both of these things were a staple of the Sods' Operas in WWII and probably earlier wars. The material was often sexist, racist and/or bawdy.


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