Here's a follow up to the discussion on "Hilo John Brown" that begins up-thread, here:

http://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=119776#2607791

I recently had a look at Whall's text version of this, and gave a shot at singing it.

Stand To Your Ground

And I had some thoughts about it.

In critiquing Whall's printed version, I find that the text must surely have been lifted from the earlier (and earliest known) mention of this chanty, in THE CLIPPER SHIP 'SHEILA' (by Angel, 1877). Whall's text is practically verbatim from that, which means he most likely took it from that or some other common source unknown to me. However, Angel did not give a tune. So where did Whall's tune come from? If he had learned the chanty orally (and got the tune that way), why did he need to lift the precise text of what was surely a highly-varible and largely ad-libbed song?

In the Preface to his original edition, Whall rather proudly states that his chanties derive from what he heard as a captain at sea. However, in the Preface to the 2nd edition, he notes that he expanded the text, and he does not explicitely state where the new songs came from. I am not sure at present if this was a later edition (i.e. thus relieving Whall from suspicion of lying!), but it does seem to owe an influence to Angel regardless of what sort of hanky panky went on with Whall and his ilk.

Speaking of hanky panky, shanty-collector Terry went on to publish this song, but he removed the leading tones/raised fourth degrees (G# in the key of D minor) and made them natural fourths. Because he thought it was probably more right. Hmmm...

Then we have Stan Hugill's version. For his tune, he also notes that he used G naturals, but his text says he did that in bars 2 and 3, which makes no sense. And, his first measure of melody is significantly diff. from this one. It is as if the first notes have been misplaced, one line lower on the staff than they should be. Now, that could be the way it was actually sung, but judging by Hugill's notation track record, it could very easily have been transcribed wrong, too. We are worse off in that, to my knowledge, Hugill never recorded his version (?). More frustrating still, he does not say whom he learned it from (something he usually does with most of his chanties), only that it is his version. And he says "Terry and Whall give a tune similar to mine..."

Now, people can talk all they want about "the folk process," but I think it likely that one or the other of these tunes is "more correct." I don't mean to prescribe a tune, I only mean that I suspect an unintentional error happened in one or the other that has to do with transcription, not with natural variation during oral transmission. And if I had to bet, I'd lay down my money on Whall's tune -- based on the fact that I think it makes more musical sense. But where is Whall's tune from? His stealing text from Angel raises suspicion on its authenticity.

Ewan MacColl was first to record this on an album in 1962. I've not heard that version. Note however, that it comes after the publication of Hugill (1961), so all the collectors' texts (Angel, Whall, Terry, Hugill) would have been available to him. In any case, his was followed by a recording of his protoge, Louis KIllen in 1974. Killen has clearly referenced Hugill. His lyrics derive from it *and* he uses the idiosyncratic opening melodic phrase of Hugill. However, the last phrase is incorrect when compared to Hugill.

The other "error" in these revival recordings is that they have misread the text to include an "Oh" in the chorus as in "Way hey Sally-Oh." In reality, the "oh" was a completely incidental pick-up phrase to the soloist's line in one of the verses; it does not belong in the chorus.

When this is usually performed nowadays, what we seem to have then is a version based in Hugill's unsubstantiated version. It includes what I believe may have been Hugill's transcription error in the first measure, and adds to that errors in reading the notation, so that the last measure's melody is off and the chorus includes an off-time, superfluous "Oh."

*Outstanding questions/issues:

-Rhythm error in Whalls notation of the chorus
-Angel's version mentions a grand chorus
-Haven't heard MacColl's recording
-Don't know what edition of Whall this first appeared in