The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #130119   Message #3158826
Posted By: GUEST,Dave in Michigan
22-May-11 - 04:19 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Sheriff of Midsomer Norton (The Wurzels)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sheriff of Midsomer Norton (The Wurzels)
Bardford wrote: "I wonder if [Radstock] shows up in any others" ...

I don't know any other scrumpy-and-western songs mentioning it,
but there's this in the Fiddler's Companion [part only, for brevity]:

RADSTOCK JIG, THE. English, Country Dance Tune (cut time). C Major/A Dorian. Standard tuning. AB. The English collector Cecil Sharp noted this tune from one James Higgins (1819-c. 1910), a fiddle player who was living at the time in Shepton Mallett Union, a workhouse. It was originally simply called "Radstock" (the 'jig' in the title denoting not metre but rather simply a tune for dancing). Higgins was a native of the village of Shepton Mallet, Somerset, where he was a clerk in the local Co-operative Society, and Radstock was a nearby mining town. There is some thought, although no evidence, that the tune may have been in the repertoire of the Radstock Band, an old village band. However, the melody appears to be a close relation of the relatively common Irish hornpipe "Poll Ha'penny." Maude Karpeles, another English collector, published the tune in a book of tunes to accompany Northwest morris dances.