The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #25527   Message #303818
Posted By: John Moulden
23-Sep-00 - 11:26 AM
Thread Name: Little Jimmy Murphy
Subject: RE: Little Jimmy Murphy
Known to me are versions in Henry Belden: Ballads and Songs collected ... Missouri (P 291); one sound recording made by Peter Kennedy from Harry Scott of Eaton Bray, Bedforshire (BBC 26071); three in Cecil Sharp's Mss - Somerset (words and tune), Cumberland and Cornwall (these two apparently words only.

I have access only to the first and it adds nothing to the understanding of what we have - an even more confused chorus than the Irish version. The BBC recording can probably be listened to at Cecil Sharp House and certainly at the National Sound Archive of the British Library - I don't know whether Kennedy has issued it on one of his Folktrax cassettes but doubt it. It is possible that the Sharp versions may be in Maud Karpeles' edition of the Cecil Sharp collection but I doubt that also.

There is a strong likelihood that texts will be on ballad sheets in the Irish collections at National Library of Ireland and elsewhere, but I have not noted it. Have you asked the Irish Traditional Music Archive - they have copied fair numbers of such things - and !they have them indexed!