Advice Please? - use of offensive words in songs

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Snuffy
Date: 08 Jan 01 - 08:13 AM

Could it be a tape as well?

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: chordstrangler
Date: 07 Jan 01 - 08:34 PM

I remember a few years back when I recorded a concert in Belfast that was to be transmitted by the BBC. I sang a song I had written about Enid Blyton. When the programme was transmitted the song was omitted. I got a letter from the producer saying that the song had managed to offend children, the coloured community, gays and lesbians, the British Army, people with mental handicap, alcoholics, animal lovers, South Africans, transvestites,and the population in general. I honestly thought that the song was harmless. Could this be a record?

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Bill D
Date: 07 Jan 01 - 05:37 PM

words themselves are innocent....but when people who hate and discriminate choose words to use against those they are trying to denigrate, THOSE words become 'charged', even if the subjects use the words themselves. Some words have been taken over and ruined..like 'queer', others were mostly created in order to be offensive.

It can be delicate, but most sane people can tell when the words are being used AT someone, and when they are just being quoted, as in most songs. I am thoroughly fed up with those who wish to 'clean up' all historical songs and literature (Huck Finn) in order to be PC.....if you want to know how I mean a term, I'll tell you!....

as to Joe's problem with ladies & whaling songs....issue them little ear plugs!! Where will history BE in 500 years if we don't remember what really WAS?

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: GUEST,Mark. West Sussex. UK
Date: 07 Jan 01 - 01:59 PM

The reference is undoubtedly to a Spanish Sailor. Remember, they sent the Armada, they colonised a lot of the New World by sea. The Italians, as a Mediterranean Coastal Nation never really had a Ocean Navy for the British Sailors to have to fight. Sailors from shanty times were a hardbitten, rough old lot. Many of the references to "Niggers" stem from the Plantation Owners habit of signing slave labour onto merchant ships out of planting and harvest season. Quite a number of great shantymen came out of these black crews and many of the songs referring to "Niggers" were innocently authored by black seamen themselves. The fact is that Shanties are just about the most politically incorrect art form on the planet. If you sing enough of them you will probably end up offending pretty well every nation in the world. You either adapt them or leave them well alone. I just use my common sense. References to "Brown" or "Darky" girls easily translate to "young" or "pretty" and "Dego" or "Dago" fiddler can become simply "shanty" fiddler. Unless there is some historical provenance that specifically connects the shanty to some inter-nation event or conflict I cannot see the problem. As long as the original is preserved and recorded for the serious musicologist to note attitudes and prejudices historically reflected in the words, you can do what you like with them. In Britain we've been changing words for thousands of years. Its called the "tradition". The Americans have been adapting our songs for at least two centuries, and when Dylan does it they call it "genius".

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: StillyRiverSage (inactive)
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 10:56 PM

I've taken time to read the entire thread, and there are some very good answers here. Balancing cultural sensitivity (with or without a political correctness component) against historical accuracy is difficult. Humming the line is one possibility, explaining the context to the audience is another. Educating the audience isn't a bad thing. And the suggestion to just not sing them if you feel compelled to change them is also a good answer. Ours is no longer a culture that will lose songs in one generation if they aren't sung. They're written down and recorded.

Objectifying an entire race or culture by applying a slang name to them is part of the human condition. It wasn't invented by anyone in this generation of humans on the planet, and it won't be discontinued by this generation. Places like Ellis Island were where the rubber hit the road in Euramerican cultural biases. Some very powerful Social Darwinists influenced immigration legislation in the few decades after the turn of the last century. If anyone really wants to examine this end of the question, look at Donna Haraway's essay "Teddybear Patriarchy" in _Primate Visions_. Bigotry knows no boundaries, this is just one example. My family dropped the "O" in O'Dwyer around the mid-1800's when a general cultural attitude was "no Irish need apply."

Enough preaching to the choir. In public, if you can't sing it comfortably, if you are a purist but don't feel you have the moral authority to sing it without modification, then leave it to someone else. If you feel comfortable being part of the folk process, and changing meets your needs, then sing it. Either way, someone will be unhappy.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: sophocleese
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 10:35 PM

Butch, I like that introduction.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: StillyRiverSage (inactive)
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 09:59 PM

Bob, I wasn't a "docent," I was a ranger...

There are a lot of stories attributed to Ellis Island but I haven't seen the documentation to prove or disprove them. This one makes more sense than some of the jokes spun off of the slang. Maggie

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Deckman
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 09:45 PM

... about the term "WOP." There was a period of time, at Ellis Island, when they ran into a lot of immegrants from Italy, by chance, that arrived without the proper paperwork. The immegration workers, to save time, would pin a label on their clothing saying W.O.P. (without papers). This allowed them to be sifted easily. Maggie Dwyer, of the "John Dwyer - song and stories" thread was a National Parks Docent at Ellis Island. I'll bet she could add to this story. CHEERS

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 06:38 PM

I don't have Landlocked - I have a CD from a group called Pinch O' Salt. The whole CD consists of Fox Smith (whoops - no hyphen) poems set to music by Alan Fitzsimmons, one of the group's members. I believe the tune people know for Lee Fore Brace is his. Website here.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 06:27 PM

For the record, I don't believe Cicely Fox-Smith wrote Home, Lads, Home. From the DT notes: "The original words to "Home Lands Home" were written by a Hampshire soldier during the First World War. Sarah [Morgan] found them in a magazine, edited them, and wrote a tune."

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 06:12 PM

How we laugh today at the Bowdlerisation of classic works including Shakespeare......

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Bernard
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 02:57 PM

Never let a Dago by...

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Ribbit
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 09:17 AM

Joe, it's a good thing you didn't sing "Squid jigging ground". They would have probably been up in arms! *bg*Thom

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: John Routledge
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 08:52 AM

If I had given myself ten minutes to calm down before posting it would have allowed Butch to set out my feelings better than I did myself! John

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: John Routledge
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 08:43 AM

What please are my rights as someone who is incensed by the adulteration of old songs to satisfy what may or may not be considered acceptable in 2001.

Please leave these songs alone - don't sing them - and the unacceptable elements will cause offence to no-one.

Yours Traditionally John

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Butch
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 08:38 AM

I have to deal with this subject myself. I build and play early 19th century banjos and do shows on the history of the instrument. Many terms that are today considered VERY insulting are sprinkled through the lyrics. My answer is to just say up front:" In the attempt to be honest about this music, I do not change the words. You will be uneasy with these lyrics, but if I changed them, you would loose the spirit of the historical context. If you are not at all uneasy, then you may need to look deep inside yourself and find out why. "

With this as an introduction, I have never had a problem. It does however lead to some great debates on racism, and as I see it, that is a good thing.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: mkebenn
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 07:39 AM

Is it just my W.A.S.P. senesibility that does not find mick, polack, kraut, tommy, etc offensive, but finds nigger, kike, spick, chink extremly so? Maybe just me, but I call one of my friends " dumb Canuck" all the time, and he responds in kind. These words seem almost playfull to me as opposed the hate implied in the latter.. Mike

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Michael in Swansea
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 06:53 AM

Since starting this thread I've sung Lee Fore Brace only twice in pubic, once in my local pub, not known for singarounds, and the second time was in the Tap and Spile in Whitby on the Sunday evening of the Captain Scott festival. Both times I sung the "double Dago" no one objected. In the Tap I explained before starting, in my local pub no-one gives a toss.

Joe, I wouldn't have said Greenland Whale Fisheries was a whale killing song, more like a whale killer killing song. Let's hear it for the big fellow.

Mike

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Night Owl
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 03:55 AM

Joe.....do you think giving a brief history of the songs as Gypsy suggested would have helped make them "acceptable"???

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 03:42 AM

Well, I gotta vent. I got rudely interrupted in a song circle this evening while singing "Blow Ye Winds in the Morning." I had also sung Greenland Whale Fisheries," and the ladies thought whale-killing songs were offensive.
Grrr.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Gypsy
Date: 05 Jan 01 - 09:09 PM

Still cannot believe that something this old, cannot be sung without offense. BUT, if you truly want to avoid offense...pull out that thesauras, and start inserting what will fit rythmically. Good old song has about the same syllables, and you could the mans name one with 3 syllables. Or, conversely, you could state that this is a traditional song, tell the story, then sing it.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: GUEST,John McGovern
Date: 05 Jan 01 - 08:43 PM

I see this as a celebration of internationalism at sea, the singer/writer is obviously lammenting the loss of three good friends and workmates/colleagues. It does seem slightly criminal to change the words of old songs to suit a now more pc audience.

I'd suggest, like others, the substitution of the derogitory word (as its now seen), to Spanish, only because it does not take anything from the lyric, or, use the word, but, explain its hitorical context (i'd personally choose the latter!)

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: GUEST,John McGovern
Date: 05 Jan 01 - 08:18 PM

I see this as a celebration of internationalism at sea, the singer/writer is obviously lammenting the loss of three good friends and workmates/colleagues. It does seem slightly criminal to change the words of old songs to suit a now more pc audience.

I'd suggest, like others, the substitution of the derogitory word (as its now seen), to Spanish, only because it does not take anything from the lyric, or, use the word, but, explain its hitorical context (i'd personally choose the latter!)

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: LR Mole
Date: 05 Jan 01 - 10:15 AM

Ah, but is it you singing or are you being the character singing the song in the piece of theatre the song is?? Were I a lawyer I'd copyright all ethnic or possibly ethnic terms and sue everyone who felt gypped, or welshed on a bet, or mentioned a paddy wagon, or acted waspish. My motto would be ENFORCED HUMMING OF ALL POTENTIALLY OFFENSIVE LYRICS. Poo.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From:
Date: 05 Jan 01 - 06:15 AM

What a stupid question to ask !

If we reject (or even worse, change) all the songs which aren't strictly PC, what would we be left with ?

The prejudices (or lack of) which are displayed in our heritage material are one of the important clues to the the way that people felt about issues in the past - surely one of the the reasons for singing/researching the stuff in the first place. After all why don't we change the song to make it refer to a modern turbine ship, if we want to modernise it ? If we remove the colour (in more ways than one in this case) from songs we lose those little things which give them their raison d'etre.

Also in this poem/song the word 'dago' is used affectionately rather than maliciously - rather as the insults are in Kipling's 'Gunga Dinn' - I see no malice in its use.

After all that, of course, Cicely Fox-Smith was relatively modern - she only died in 1954 I think, but like Kipling (whose style hers often resembles) she likes to use a linguistic style that she feels would correspond to that of the person narrating it.

If you want a Fox-Smith song which isn't contentious look up 'Home Lads, Home'. Its under 'Where there's rest for Horse and Man' on Digitrad - although 'India' in the first line should be 'Flanders' and 'Munn' later on should be 'Mons'. Sarah Morgan has made a wonderful song out of it.

Finally, although I live in England (and sing sea songs and shanties) I don't know of the 'Landlocked' recording - How does the tune go - I'd like to sing it.

Dave Bryant

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: MMario
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 02:31 PM

like many terms, who knows what the derivation of "WOP" actually is, but I know that during the early part of the 1900's when my grandparents came to this country it was used a a derogatory term implying illegal entry. "without papers" was the implication if not the derivation. It was a trigger word for my grandfather (they still talk about a few of the bar fights he was involved with due to someone using the term in regards to him) According to some of the older italians around while I was growing up, it also had the added implication that a "wop" was lower class, had no breeding/culture/couth. Seems logical in a twisted sort of way.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Gern
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 02:08 PM

Why are people so quickly to raise an outraged flag of political correctness when asked to show some sensitivity? If friends don't mind ethnic kidding, that's fine. But an audience of strangers will include some who are offended, who don't listen to any disclaimer about historical accuracy, and who have a right to their feelings even if no harm was intended. As an old-time banjo player, I perform a number of minstrel-era songs, and feel free to exponge any terms liable to offend. If history is somehow violated, so be it. Attitudes change over time, and gratefully a lot of once widespread slurs are no longer acceptable. Words like "dago" and n-words and f-words etc. really hurt and really inspire belittling and hatred. I try not to judge those who are offended -- instead, I make an effort not to offend them. It doesn't cost me much.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Jim the Bart
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 01:51 PM

Tough question. My dad, that crusty old Polak, still calls red Italian table wine "Dago Red" and doesn't understand why he can't find that section in the liquor store. To him, there is no offense intended - that's just what it's called.

The immigrant generation often used terms like that when talking about other immigrant groups. Later on, when the groups mixed, the terms would still be used, BUT (and it's a big but) you wouldn't use that term in the presence of a friend or acquaintance who was part of that group. The implication in that is that there is that it's not nice to use the term. There is implied derogation in the term.

However, (and it's a big however) to sanitize a song by removing all these terms seems somewhat false. It's like in ther movies where rough, tough teamsters say "shucks"; it just don't work. My suggestion is the common DISCLAIMER. Explain, in introducing songs that have these terms, that you are including them for historical purposes. State that you don't support the term, that you are a skilled professional and they should not use this kind of language at home, etc. Keep it light, but make it clear that like an actor using vernacular language (Out darn spot! - I don't think so) you're just singing it like it was wrote, 'er writed, 'er scribbled.

The role of Miss Manners is being played today by
Bart

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Jim Krause
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 12:32 PM

I've rasseled with this question, too. I used to sing Henry C. Work's Kingdom Coming. My feeling is that in the case of your song, and the Work song, it draws attention to itself if you censor your performance, and thus the song becomes worse for it. If you decide to keep the song in your performance repertoire, you might wish to select your audience carefully. I finally did that with Kingdom Coming. I sing it only for Civil War enthusiasts, or Victorian living history events. They seem to understand a little better the usages of the 19th century, and excuse them. You may wish to do the same with Lee Fore Brace.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: catspaw49
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 12:09 PM

Dago was used a lot in the banter of friends, but it could be and often was used as a very derogatory term by outsiders/non-Italians.

WOP on the other hand was very derogatory. I understood the term to come from "Without Papers" but I could well be wrong. Where did you find that Ted?

Spaw

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: mousethief
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 11:51 AM

Ginzo? Aren't those the Japanese knives they sell on late-night TV?

Alex
O..O
=o=

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: M.Ted
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 11:49 AM

Naming that thing a "Dago sandwich" sounds like an insult to Italians everywhere--though given the fact that the Midwest is the land of meatloaf, perhaps it is an attempt to be inclusive;-)

Dago does seem to be derived from Diego--Southern Italy,centered particularly in Naples and Sicily, has always had close ties with Spain, the rulers have often been Spanish(the Borgias, for instance) and the Italians, particularly from the North, have tended to regard the Spanish as dirty and uncivilized--

"Wop" seems to come from the word "guappo" which is a slightly derogatory term for a dandy--

Italian-Americans don't seem to mind hearing the word "Dago" as long as it is not aimed at them in malice(believe me, I've got a lot of family in Hoboken)--They don't use that word much, or "Wop" for that matter, but they do use "ginzo" a lot, and it has a very specific meaning--

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: SINSULL
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 10:25 AM

Wasn't the chaplin in M.A.S.H. ( the movie, not the TV show) called Dago Red? I remember Dago red referring to cheap, red, jug wine. Anyway, in the song, I do not interpret it at a slur. But unlike the Rex, I wouldn't use it to address a friend... even if I liked Italians. Not to imply I don't but... I hate these threads. No matter what you say, it still comes out "Some of my best friends are..."

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: GUEST,Michael in Swansea
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 08:59 AM

Radriano, what I meant was I like what you thought it was "A good old fiddlers tune". I've only heard one of Landlocked sing it, that was at a party after the Swansea Maritme festival last July and there was a definite double "Dago" then.
Alan Fitzsimmons of The Keelers did write the tune that "we" sing, he used to be in a trio "Pinch of Salt" and they released a tape of Cicely Fox-Smith poems put to mucsic - Alan composing all tunes. It's from this tape that I picked it up.
About feeling uncomfortable singing the song it would of course depend on the company I'm in at the time. I've been in some circles, as no doubt has everyone here, where anything goes. Reckon it's a case of sizing up the situation before opening mouth.
You're a great bunch, glad I found you

Mike

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Peter Kasin
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 02:18 AM

What is striking is how sailors had nicknames for sailors of many nationalities, all meant in the spirit of both comradeship and a feeling of superiority, many being or developing into slurs on shore. English speaking sailors used "Johnny Crapoo" (A Frenchman), "Yankee," (for you-know who), "Dutchie," and "Squarehead," which seem pretty mild. I would not, and do not, use words which hitorically and currently very offensive, and today universally used as epithets, such as "nigger," even though in sea songs it too usually wasn't meant in a spirit of hatred. Just judge for yourself which terms conjure up strong feelings, are used today as racist terms, and are offensive. As radriano said, even the great authority and chanteyman Stan Hugill had his line he didn't want to cross - sexually explicit lyrics- (even though he collected songs with the word "nigger"). The point being, if Hugill can edit out what he was uncomfortable with and still capture the spirit of the song with other authentic lyrics, so can you. One last point: chanteys were often made up on the spot, and what we have written are chanteys as presented to the collectors by particular singers. Some sang some very crude stuff, others were more poetic and romantic in their lyrics. "Different ships - different long splices," as the sailors said.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Les B
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 01:37 AM

I heard somewhere that Dago was a slightly derogatory term used between the northern and southern Italians, but can't remember which direction it went.

It seems to me the words aren't that bad as is, but if you feel uncomfortable singing them there are perhaps more acceptable two syllable words to substitute -- "Irish fiddler's tune" - "gypsy fiddler's tune" "Irish Mike" "gypsy dave" etc.

Another ethical problem comes with changing a modern songwriter's words -- of course, one could argue, that's the folk process.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 01:16 AM

Buy=boy. And BOY, I still love Germans!

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 01:15 AM

Eeegh! Lemme guess, Spaw... Piano wire???

Did I mention that my grandfather's grandma was a Krau... er, German type person? Buy, I do love dem German types! :D

---Lepus Rex

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Gypsy
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 09:27 PM

Sigh....in a society where I am expected to laugh at "dumb blonde" jokes, and "helpless women" jokes....and am told what a bad sport i am for not laughing. How far must we take political correctness? Are we going to get so cleansed that we truly have a "person person taking the person to the person box"?

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 07:34 PM

Could you send me your address Lepus? Are you generally home evenings?

Spaw

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 07:27 PM

Jim, just a note: Lots of places in MN still sell dago sandwiches.

I wouldn't say the use of 'dago' in this song is offensive. I affectionately call my friends 'stupid Kraut,' 'Limey bastard,' 'goddamned reindeer-jockey Finnlander,' and 'McAsshole,' but they don't take it personally, because they know I mean it in a NICE way. :) I don't use ethnic slurs against people who are still descriminated against, however. It's only a matter of time before someone kills me, isn't it?

---Lepus Rex

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: radriano
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 07:16 PM

By the way, Mike, according to Landlocked, the melody used for this song was composed by A. Fitzsimmons.

I did post the song earlier this year as a "Lyric Add" but it hasn't gotten into Digitrad yet.

Regards,
Radriano

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: radriano
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 11:12 AM

Hi Mike,

"A good old fiddler's tune" is what I thought Landlocked was singing. I forget what they said they actually sang - it might well have been "a Dago fiddler's tune." I've also noticed that in the process of learning a song I sometimes change phrases inadvertently. In this case I preferred my phrase to the one in the original poem. In a way, I guess it's the folk process at work.

Regards,
Radriano

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 09:15 AM

McGrath, in the US at least, Dago refers to mainly Italians and paddymac has it right. I grew up in strongly Italian immigrant little town and the second generation men especially would use the term in banter with each other, along with some other colorful language.

Also, Jim Dixon.......My wife is from St. Louis and her family now only says "The Hill" which has now got some real "class" but still great food. Although I grew up with a strong Italian heritage in the community, it was the first place I had encountered toasted ravioli. Kinda' different.........

I think the changes that occur over the years to these epithets and how/where they are acceptable is always interesting. In WWI there was a patriotic type song in the US, "When Tony goes over the top, keep your eyes on, that fighting Wop."

Spaw

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: GUEST,Michael in Swansea
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 08:41 AM

Well thanks everyone.
Radriano - I know Landlocked very well they're personal friends of mine, "A good old fiddlers tune" I didn't know they'd recorded it. Pete I shall have to think about.

Mike

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Sep 00 - 08:17 PM

I've never heard Dago as referring to Italians. Except when it's being used as a general term for everyone on the other side of what the English call the English Channel.

But I can't imagine being offended by this song, if I was Spanish or whatever, any more than I would if it had been Paddy or Mick. That's because the song is conveying a message about a fellowship of the sea which transcends these differences.

There are contexts where I might seriously object to Paddy or Mick, when they are attached to a contemptuous stereotype. It's "horses for courses" - I don't think general rules apply.

That includes general rules like Naemanson's "If you are going to use "dago" in a song to be historically accurate then you should be willing to use the other terms as well and stand ready to take the flak." It's not a question of taking the flak, it's recognsing whether in any particular case it's going to be hurtful to people who don't deserve to be hurt.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 25 Sep 00 - 06:17 PM

I understand "dago" is a corruption of the name "Diego" which could be either Spanish or Italian.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 25 Sep 00 - 06:15 PM

Dave O: You win the prize: one serving of toasted ravioli, at the McDonald's on the levee.

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 25 Sep 00 - 04:55 PM

AL-oh-ISH-us

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Help: Advice Please?
From: radriano
Date: 25 Sep 00 - 04:46 PM

Hi Mike:

I sing this song as well. For the second line of the third verse I sing "for a good old fiddler's tune."

When I transcribed the song originally (from a CD by the English shanty group Landlocked) this is what I thought they were singing. There were some other phrases I was not sure of and when I received a copy of the original poem from one of Landlocked's members I was a little put off by the "Dago" references. However, I do sing "Dago Pete" in the seventh verse because that seems more like someone's nickname and somehow less offensive.

I think it's okay to change words when performing a song in public if those words might be offensive to someone. In fact, I've been known to delete entire verses if it's doesn't detract from the song too much. In other cases, I might only sing a song in certain situations because of content.

Of course, the late great Stan Hugill almost never performed the original verses to most of the shanties he sang because of content. In fact, many of the shanties in his book Shanties of the Seven Seas did not contain the original verses he learned.


Radriano