The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #135431   Message #3231339
Posted By: Gibb Sahib
29-Sep-11 - 06:19 PM
Thread Name: Earliest Commercial Shanty Recordings
Subject: RE: Earliest Commercial Shanty Recordings
Hurroh for Geo!

***
As a point of interest, I've marked with "**" the songs that JM Carpenter collected (?) from SH King in 1928. As far as I can tell, there are no recordings, just music notations and texts. Did Carpenter take them down from King's lips? Seems kind of funny if he did, because the set corresponds almost exactly to the set of songs in King's book! I would imagine that King standardized his versions pretty much. (Being a man of the church, he may have ensured "clean and wholesome" versions, too.)

**A Long Time Ago
**Blow, Boys, Blow
**Blow the Man Down
**Boney Was A Warrior
**Dead Horse, The
**Hanging Johnnie
**Leave Her, Johnny, Leave Her
**Reuben Ranzo
**Roll The Cotton Down
**Tom's Gone To Ilo
**Whisky For My Johnnie

Short Drag Chanties
**Haul Away, Joe
**Haul the Bowline
**Johnny Boker
**Paddy Doyle

Capstan Chanties
Homeward Bound
Hoodah-Say
**Plains of Mexico, The
**Rio Grande
**Sally Brown
**We're All Bound To Go
**Wide Missouri, The

Pumping Chanties
**One More Day
**Storm-Along

Old Sea Songs
**A-Roving
**Farewell, And Adieu To You
High Barbaree
Rolling Home

In addition to those marked, King also contributed to Carpenter a "haul together" chanty, which might have been "The Fishes." Hard to tell.