What did your Dad used to sing?

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Charley Noble
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 08:42 PM

Father really loved folksongs but the only one I remember him leading was Leadbelly's "Yellar Gal" which he did with gusto. When he died a few years ago at the age of 98 we had friends sing some of his favorite songs:

When You and I were Young, Maggie
Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out
New Wood (Gone, Gonna Rise Again)
Lonesome Dove

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: The Sandman
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 07:08 PM

The Bold Fenian Men.Joe Hill.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Gulliver
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 06:57 PM

He couldn't really sing but played the piano--loved the boogy-woogy of Winifred Atwell, and when the Beatles became popular he did stride versions of their early songs. His favourite slow piece was "The Spinning-Wheel".

He died when we were kids. I think his favourite songs were "Goodbye (I'll Join the Legion...)" (his family were military men), "Making Whoopee", a couple of humorous Irish songs like "Reilly's Daughter" and "Maginty's Goat", "Frankie and Johnny", "Kevin Barry" (after he'd had a Guinness or two), some Nat King Cole songs (also my mother's favourite).

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,Jay
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 01:04 PM

When I was a child, dad used to sing me to sleep with little gems like: The Pub with no Beer, Tom Dooley, and (my favourite) Hang on the Bell, Nellie!

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 03:20 AM

My dad is a little guy, five-foot-six tall; and about as nice an gentle a person as you'd ever hope to meet - and at the age of 88, he still has a strong, clear singing voice. Somehow, he ended up getting drafted into the Marines during WWII, and he was commissioned an officer just before the war ended. He sure was proud of having been a Marine, and the one song of his I remember above all was The Marine Hymn. I also remember him singing "Adeste Fideles" at Christmas, and suspecting he thought it had something to do with Semper Fidelis.*
A good man, that dad of mine - even if he WAS a Marine.

-Joe-

(*the motto of the U.S. Marine Corps)

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Barbara
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 09:46 PM

My dad was born in 1917 and is still alive.
He sang us to sleep, he and Mom together often; and that was usually Toora Loora Loora
or Goodnight Irene (only the chorus)
or Tavern in the Town.
He also sings many hymns. He loves Let the Lower Lights be Burning,
and Come to the Church IN the Wildwood
South of the Border, Down Mexico Way
Wiffenpoof song
Miss Otis Regrets (yaas?)
The whole town's talking about the Brown Boys (he's a Brown)
the Cannibal King (his father sang it)
Polly Wolly Doodle (")
Froggy went a Courting (")
Don't send My boy to Harvard
I've got Sixpence
Oh What a loverly Bunch of Coconuts
Camptown Races
Tenting tonight
Whispering Hope (duet with Mom)
He walks With Me and He Talks with Me (")
And the Engine in the Ford Made the Wheels go Round

I'm sure there are more.
We sang in the car and we sang in the evenings at the lake. Mom played the pump organ and sang harmony; Grandpa played the one string fiddle he'd made. We sang in canoes and while hanging out the wash.

They still sing. I visited them a couple weeks ago in assisted living in Michigan. They've been married 63 years.

Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Snuffy
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 07:15 PM

Suegorgeous,

That's the WHIFFENPOOF SONG. When I was little (pre-school) it always made me cry for the poor lost lambs.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: AllanW
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 03:44 PM

My dad was actually in the audience when Lonnie Donegan recorded "My Old Man's A Dustman" at Doncaster's Gaumont Theatre, so I'm told. So I guess he sang that. Unless of course Donegan was like Christy Moore and didn't allow people to sing along!

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Rog Peek
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 03:43 PM

Land of Hope and Glory.

Umberella Man.

The Little Boy Who Santa Clause Forgot.

Sadly he's gone now.

Rog

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Suegorgeous
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 02:44 PM

Que sera, sera

Something about "...poor little lambs have lost their way(?), sheep(?)..." - anyone recognise this??!!

Cigarettes and whisky and wild wild women (tee hee!!)

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Fred Maslan
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 02:27 PM

Mostly my dad loved to listen to us sing. Tho on Friday nights and for "shaloshudos" or the third sabbath meal he would join in singing "zemirot" (sabbath songs). Occasionaly songs from his youth in Manchester England would pop up.

Rings on her fingers, bells on her toes
I'm 'enery the eighth I am
The Walloping window blind
etc.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Janie
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 01:36 PM

Snippets of "May the Bird of Paradise Fly Up your Nose" was his favorite for many years.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Desdemona
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 01:01 PM

"Stone Cold Dead in the Market!"

http://www.rhapsody.com/louisjordan/letthegoodtimesrolltheanthology19381953/stonecolddeadinthemarket/lyrics.html

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Harmonium Hero
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 12:52 PM

My parents both sang odd snatches of songs; I don't think I ever heard either of them come out with a complete song. In my mother's case, these were mostly poular songs of various eras, and some Irish songs, often learned from her mother or her aunt, who came from Clonmell. My father would come out with bits of operatic songs, often in parody form; bits of G&S: or army songs. Often these would be only one or two lines, sometimes with odd 'missing' or substituted words, which were obviously cleaned up for the sake of us children. One such was another version of 'Horsey, Keep Your Tail Up' (mentioned above by Jim Dixon). It had a different tune, which I can't identify. It ran:
All the monkeys in the zoo
Have their noses* painted blue;
Horsey, keep your tail up
Or I'll do the same to you
* I realised in later life that this was an example of the 'cleaning up' mentioned above, and that this word should have been... well, use your imagination.
Another was :
Do ye ken John Peel? Yes, I ken him very weel.
This one never went any further, and I always assumed it was just a silly rhyme. However, a serious stroke in 1998 (when he was in his 89th year) left him with vascular dementia - a form of dementia caued by brain damage after a stroke - which, among other things, altered some of his behaviour, including his sense of propriety. I looked after him until he died at 93, and it was only during this period that I waas treated to the full version, which went:
Do ye ken John Peel? Yes I ken him very weel.
Though he lies with his wife, but he canna get a feel,
'Cos she lies on her side, so he canna get a ride
And he rises with the horn in the morning.
He then turned to me and said: "That's a folk song - you should sing that!" (Vulgar Boatman please note!)
John Kelly.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,Bob Coltman
Date: 31 Jan 08 - 04:22 PM

Let the Rest of the World Go By (his very favorite)
Shine On Harvest Moon
Quartermaster's Corps
Smile Awhile
Tavern in the Town
I've Got Sixpence
His primary occasions were on ski trips, when friend Harrison Taylor played guitar, and even better in his opinion was when his friend Jeff Herbert was playing our upright piano -- then he proved to have a big memory for 20s and 30s popular songs and would harmonize on them better than I ever could: When the Blue of the Night Meets the Gold of the Day, Lazybones, Old Man River, oh anything.
I think he was a bit surprised when I turned out to be a folkie, but rallied finely, and finding that what I wanted to do more than anything was go on song collecting trips in the south, he took me there two years running. Best memory I have of him.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,Joseph de Culver City
Date: 31 Jan 08 - 02:06 PM

My granddad used to sing:

'Hallelujah, I'm a Bum'
'East Side, West Side'
'Casey Jones'
'Mary'

My dad used to sing:

'Sixteen Tons'
'Shenandoah'
'Just a Gigolo'

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST
Date: 31 Jan 08 - 02:03 PM

That's Proud Walkers, surely?

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,andy valentine
Date: 31 Jan 08 - 01:49 PM

Mary of Argyle and The Old Rustic Bridge

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: bubblyrat
Date: 31 Jan 08 - 10:25 AM

"Green Grow the Rushes o ", but substituting " Brown Hatters " for "Brown Walkers "   ---I still do today--can't help it !!
also "The Lord's My Shepherd " ( we were both choristers, and sang in Chichester cathedral sometimes )


and ,after too much Friary Meux ( or other brews) , " There once was a monk of great renown, who shagged all the women in London town ".

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Bert
Date: 31 Jan 08 - 09:35 AM

Patsy Fagan & Phil the Fluter's Ball. WOW I haven't heard those since my Dad sang them.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Snuffy
Date: 31 Jan 08 - 08:57 AM

Lots of Bing Crosby and Irish stuff mostly - Mountains of Mourne, Galway Bay, Dear Old Donegal, Hey Patsy Fagan, Isle of Inisfree, Phil the Fluter's Ball, etc, etc.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: TIA
Date: 30 Jan 08 - 10:24 PM

He sang nearly everything in "Songs of Man" - the one by Norman Luboff and Win Stracke (and painted or embroidered copies of the Paul Freeman illustrations onto various pieces of apparel). Gave me a copy when I left home in the 70's. I sang 'em all to our wee ones, and now he just gave copies to all three of the girls. Where the heck did he find 'em?

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: kytrad (Jean Ritchie)
Date: 30 Jan 08 - 07:22 PM

Joe Bowers-

My name is Joseph Bowers; I have a brother Ike
I come from old Missouri- all the way from Pike.....a long 18th Century ballad. He knew and sang many more, too many to name here. The song he used to rock me to sleep with, was, The Uncloudy Day, a fairly modern hymn, but he knew and joined in all the Old Regular Paptist songs that were "lined out" at The Little Zion Church.

He always said he wasn't much of a singer, so he hardly ever sang solo, but would always join in if he knew the going song. He loved to play his dulcimer and would often play every verse of a long ballad (e.g. Barbry Ellen), never singing but thinking the words until the story (inside his head) was finished. Most singing, by one person, or family group in that time and place was unaccompanied. It seemed to take us a long time to put the two together.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,Guest, (Percy)
Date: 30 Jan 08 - 05:53 PM

I called on my sweetheart Elizabeth Brown
She was having a bath and she wouldn't come down
I said slip something on and come down for a while
She slipped on the soap and came wearing a smile

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 30 Jan 08 - 07:36 AM

Thank you, ClaireBear, for the reminder of 'Jeannie with the Light

Brown Hair', which was another one me owl' feller used to sing.

Probably an age thing - it was the best part of 60 years ago :-)

The Old Girl's favourite song was 'The Flower of Sweet Strabane'.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE OLD SOW
From: GUEST,Edthefolkie
Date: 30 Jan 08 - 06:58 AM

About the only thing I remember my Dad (b. 1910) singing was

There was an old man and he had an old sow
    (snort) sow (whistle) sow (raspberry) Hi diddley dow,
There was an old man and he had an old sow,
    (repeat sound effects)
    Oh, Susanna's a funniful man
    (repeat sound effects)
    Susanna's a funniful man.

This old sow had three little pigs (etc).
They tried to get over the garden wall (etc).
They couldn't get over the garden wall (etc).

When I was little he used to reduce me to hysteria with this. I always thought he'd made it up...but it turns out it's a pukka (music hall?) song which is even on the Interweb. However my Dad seems to have learned a slightly corrupted Bourne, Lincs version.

He knew about Plough Monday too! I do wish he'd met Bob Copper - he'd have got on with him like a house on fire.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Jan 08 - 04:54 AM

Lady P - I think it was your answer to 'the worlds shortest folk songs' like 'Now listen as I sing of the Good ship Araldite, stuck fast in Plymouth Sound', or 'D'ye ken John Peel? No.'

But it might have been on the bus back from a gianting gig, to take our minds off the noise of your drunken sot of a brother hoiking up into a carrier bag hung over his ears.

LTS

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,Jay
Date: 30 Jan 08 - 03:43 AM

My Dad had a great baritone voice but sang nothing but Gilbert and Sullivan. He used to play all the comedy parts in the local operatic society. I remember bringing home an LP (long time ago now) of Ella Fitzgerald and in the interests of good taste I can't possibly tell you what he said! There was never any folk music in our house so I don't know where I got the bug. Perhaps from my mother singing pseudo folk songs with the W.I.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Irish sergeant
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 08:21 PM

This thread got me thinking about some of the songs that Dad sang. I mentioned some above but I remember my Uncle LArry who like Dad has gone to the jam sessionin the sky and he sang a song
"Oh you'll neveer get to heaven in a PBY because the Godamn thing won't fly that high" That and "MAry-ann McCarthy" A lot of Army Air Corps songs Regards Neil

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Betsy
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 05:55 PM

I have a slight variation but similarity to Sooz , for some reason or other, after a pint or two ,my Dad used to sing "I'll take you home again Kathleen" but my mother would go crazy with him - My mum was called Annie.
I suppose it made things a lot easier when he resorted to playing the paper and comb. !!!

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: lady penelope
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 05:19 PM

Getting my father to sing the whole of a song was the problem. We get lots of bits of songs. A lot of music hall stuff, some jazz, some really odd songs, show tunes, whatever came into his head. Plus Mad Mcgonagal poems and the like.

The only songs I remember him singing all the way through on a regular basis were the Bluebell song....

Bluebells are bluebells
Bluebells are blue
Bluebells are bluebells
'Cos Bluebells are blue..... Second verse! Bluebells are bluebells.... (you get the idea, I inflictged this song onto my mates at Towersey one year in revenge for someting, I forget what though....)

and a song I think is called The Indian Lullabye.

Down where the river Kiporee (?)
Empties its waters to the sea
Down where the bear in his lair doesn't care
If it rains or snows or shines
An indian squaw sang
To a baby on a straw mat
And she sang as she hummed as she crooned him this lullabye
Oh please don't cry
Go to sleep my little papoose
Go to sleep and slumber deep
Close your eyes, your big brown eyes
And soon you'll grow
For soon you will be hunting buffalo
You'll be a big chief some day
For soon you will be hunting buffalo
You'll be a big chief some day


He's a trumpet player really....

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: PeadarOfPortsmouth
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 12:46 PM

I remember that as a kid, my dad would sing "The Frozen Logger" with severe gusto, and would shake the windows by joining in with any Clancy Brothers chorus that was playing. Heck, I practically have to restrain him now when someone launches into "Holy Ground". ("Fine girl you are!")

Reading through some of the responses above, I'm even more attuned to how lucky I am. Both he and my mum are still around (thank God) and enjoy the fact I'm singing the music they played to us when we were kids.

Peter

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Franz S.
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 12:38 PM

Only thing my dad ever sang to me was Joe Hill, according to him. I don't even remember that. Now he makes me sing it.

Luckily, almost everyone in my mother's family sang.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: ClaireBear
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 12:11 PM

Where to start? It's been 22 years since he died, but I'll never forget. Any time of the day or night, Dad would pick up the mandolin or mandola and start in. I sang harmony, my two sisters came in on piano and melody respectively, and my brother on guitar. We had, erm, a wide range of material. Here are a few of our family favorites, to give you a vague idea of just how eclectic we were:

Twickenham Ferry
Lazybones
Santa Lucia
Jeannie with the Light Brown Hair
The Dying Hobo
La Golondrina
Poor Little Joe
La Marseillaise
Slap 'er Down Again, Paw
Lili Marlene
Green Grows the Ivy
Ymnos eis tin Eleftherian (the Greek national anthem)
Flow Gently Sweet Afton
Long Black Veil
Cancion Mixteca
Do Ye Ken John Peel?
The Whiffenpoof Song
Mean to Me (How Come You're So...)
Ach! du liebe Augustin
Father, Dear Father (Come Home with Me Now)
Lady Be Good
Malagueña Saleroza
Fratelli d'Italia (the Italian national anthem)
Adios Muchachos
Let the Rest of the World Go By

Thanks for helping me relive my misspent youth...
Claire

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Ythanside
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 11:46 AM

My old man sang almost constantly, and his repertoire varied according to how much money he had in his pocket at the time.
When flush he would be all 'Girls Were Made to Love and Kiss', 'Sweet Sixteen', 'Kathleen', 'Just a Little Love, a Little Kiss' and virtually anything optimistic from Richard Tauber or Frans Lehar's Viennese operettas.
Broke, and therefore rather melancholic, he would go through the card from Pagliacci to any other wrist-slitting, blood-and-gore opera that took his jaundiced fancy.

One song that I only ever heard him sing at New Year, and have never heard sung by anyone outside of my immediate family, was a rather short WWI number called 'The Bombing Raid'. The words, as I recall them, are as follows.

THE BOMBING RAID

Listen and I'll tell you,
How the Jocks spent their New Year,
They were standing in the trenches,
With the mud right up to here,
And soaking through, and through and through.
Aha, said Fritz, the time is right,
For the Jocks are fu' the noo,
So the plan was made for the bombing raid.
They were up against the men o' marmalade,
But if Fritz had only known,
That that trench held Dundee's own,
He would never, never made that bombing raid.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Charmain
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 10:42 AM

Lots and lots of songs:
Lavenders Blue and Train Whistle Blowing when he's singing a small child to sleep...

Rattlin' Bog and Home, Boys, Home on long car journeys in the days when there was no other music to be had...

Dirty Old Town when he's been reminiscing about his childhood...

Wild Rover when he's had one to many...

Grey Funnel Line when he really should be off to bed now...

But he is most famed for his roaring renditions of O'Reilly's Daughter, Rawtenstall Annual Fair and Brother Sylveste - classics all!!

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: topical tom
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 09:15 AM

Dad almost never sang but the only song I remember was "The Wearin' O' The Green".Ironically enough, my father's ancestors were, for the most part, members of the Orange Lodge!I am not proud of that fact.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: paula t
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 08:45 AM

My Dad used to sing "Scarlet Ribbons" to me. I loved it. He was hugely touched to hear Kathryn playing it on the piano the last time he came to visit.It's sentimental, but that's how Dads songs should be eh?

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Schantieman
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 06:04 AM

My dad was a great singer - he was in a jazz band while he was in the army (1934 - 46) and learned lots of songs, some of which he passed on to me. These included,

It's a Long way to Tipperary
Pack up your Troubles
Take Me Back to Dear Old Blighty
I've Got Sixpence

...all of which were marching songs he learned as a soldier. Then there were the jazz songs, four of which he actually recorded on 78s in the 50s while he was courting my mother. These were

You Gotta Have Heart
The Nearness of You
When I Fall in Love
Out of Town

...and I sing the first three of these now. In fact I'm recording a couple of them on my current CD!

He died a few years ago. I don't miss him - he was a grumpy old bastard but a good singer! Bit like me really.

Steve

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 05:41 AM

What a wonderful thread! I love all of these answers. My Dad loved all those sentimental old Irish songs especially "Rose of Tralee" because my mother's name is Mary, and "Come Back, Paddy Reilly, to Ballyjamesduff" because his mother was born in Ballyjamesduff. He was a sort of one man folk process since he rarely remembered the words of songs and would make up others as he went along. But they would always rhyme and very often were stronger and better than the original. God, how I miss him.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 29 Jan 08 - 04:33 AM

I was fortunate that both my parents sang, me owl' feller usually when he was aled up, althought I was too young to realise it.

He died in 1951, before my 6th birthday, but 57 years on I can still see him and hear him sing

Ho-ro, my Nut-Brown Maiden

Me Nancy Tickled me Fancy, and

Me Father's the King of the Gypsies.

Don't get me started on the Old Girl - from her I learned She Moved thro' the Fair, Kelly from Killane, Oro ! Se do bheatha bhaile, Shall my soul pass thro' Old Ireland, The Little Toy Doggie is covered with rust, Little old Turf Cabin on the Hill, Amhrann na bhFianna, Moonlight in Mayo (vomit !) . . . etc.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: number 6
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 11:34 PM

My father once and a while would bring out his old beat up guitar (probably a Kay) and sing a bunch of Jimmy Rodger songs, yodelling and all. Why Jimmie Rodgers I haven't a clue. He would also get out on occassion his ukulele and sing a completely different tone of songs. The only one of those I recall was 'I Don't Want to Play in Your Yard', the rest were probably old collegiate type songs from the days of his youth. He died when I was quite young so I never really did get to know him. Never did know what happened to that old guitar or ukulele.

biLL

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,Norval
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 10:08 PM

Bert, someone had a similar thought about Dad way back in 1921. The Baldwin Piano Company issued a small music folio "The Tunes Dad Whistled". Today we could substitute GrandDad for Dad in the title.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: iancarterb
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 09:55 PM

It's fun to read the whole thread and theorize on whose parents are/were what age. Many posts reminded me "Oh, yes, that too." The Captain and the Mermaid, The Pope, Eddystone Light, various Harry Lauder, Coney Island Baby, much Gilbert and Sullivan, Bless 'em All, A Capital Ship. My mother and father grew up on Cohan and Irving Berlin, but they learned a lot of songs from the Brit and Aussie and New Zealander sailors whom they hosted on Long Island on liberties during WWII, and long after Dad had died and she could barely remember who my sister and I were she still sang the chorus to Roll Me Over In the Clover to herself walking down the hallway. I always hope that, as is often said, the songs really ARE the last thing to go.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,Seonaid
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 09:43 PM

Dad comes from a very musical family, but never sang much. In WWI he was part of his "fleet orchestra," a bunch of guys with ukuleles and one clarinet -- they billed themselves as "Ike Eisely and the 99 Nasty Nose-Pickers, singing 'Oh, You Booger'"! Wonder what that was like? He never has given up the secret. Years later, after seeing "The Ballad of Cat Ballou," he would occasionally break into a growly rendition of the theme song's opening line.
My mother, on the other, hand, is mostly tone-deaf, but always sang around the house. She was pretty much famous for drifting from one song into another one with a similar musical phrase; one of the best of these unplanned medleys was probably "Goldfinger... wider than a mile..."

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 07:04 PM

My father wasn't very musical. I only remember a couple of snatches:

"The cuckoo, she's a pretty bird. She sings as she flies.
She brings us good tidings and tells us no lies."

He sang it to the tune I now know as "My Horses Ain't Hungry."

Also:

"Horsy, hold your tail up, hold your tail up, hold your tail up.
Oh, horsy, hold your tail up. Keep the sun out o' my eyes."

He sang that to the tune of "Ach Du Lieber Augustine."

In each case, I think he only ever sang one verse. I wasn't very interested in those days. I wish I had asked him if he knew more.

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: astro
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 06:32 PM

I don't have memories of my dad, but as a dad I've made it my mission
to sing everything I could so long as a silly dance could be included.

It made me a happy man when I saw my daughter do a silly clog across the
floor to pinch my cheek...the traditions do go on...

astro in LA

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: GUEST,lyndie
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 06:20 PM

When we were driving in the car my parents used to harmonize to:

When You Wore a Tulip
Tell Me Why
and Lyndie (Sweet As The Sugar Cane)

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Rapparee
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 05:43 PM

Thinking on it, he also sang

Turkey in the straw
Peanut sat on a railroad track
Hallejulia I'm a bum
Stardust (usually whistled)
Red River Valley

Subject: RE: What did your Dad used to sing?
From: Tootler
Date: 28 Jan 08 - 05:43 PM

Here's some words for Katie Bairdie. It's a children's song and there are other verses out there. I will be happy to get more.

Katie Bairdie
Trad
Tune "Shirramuir"

Katie Bairdie hid a coo',
Black and white aboot the moo'
Wisna that a dainty coo'?
Dance Katie Bairdie.

Katie Bairdie hid a cat,
She could catch baith moose and rat;
Wisna that a dainty cat?
Dance Katie Bairdie.

Katie Bairdie hid a hen,
She could lay baith but an' ben;
Wisna that a dainty hen?
Dance Katie Bairdie.

Katie Bairdie hid a wife,
She could use baith fork an' knife;
Wisna that a dainty wife?
Dance Katie Bairdie.

Katie Bairdie hid a bairn,
Widna play when it cam' on rain;
Wisna that a dainty bairn?
Dance Katie Bairdie.

(Source. 101 Scottish Songs ed. Norman Buchan)

Geoff