Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave

Subject: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Karen Myers
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 02:42 PM

Just wanted to mention an article I wrote analyzing some elements of interest in Little Musgrave, using Nic Jones's performance as the example.

http://www.rationaldelight.com/2008/03/little-musgrave.html

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 03:37 PM

Brian Peters does an amazing Danish ballad Ravengaard og Memering which he calls Sir Aldingar. Child actually classifies this as #59 but there are similarities, as there are also with Gil Morice, #83, (which Child classifies two after Little Musgrave (#81).

This one has absolutely everything in it (except the curtains got in the sale last week). Sometimes I think these ballads need a good sort out, but usually I don't.They're just allegories of people doing what they do and you can shuffle the scripts but nothing actually changes, people still do appalling things.

I'm actually much more interested in the tunes nowadays, but I'm still looking forward to Brian Peters' Child Project CD due out soonish.
.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Vulgar Boatman
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 04:19 PM

Gosh Diane, ÿ æåëàþ ÿ áûëî óõèùðåíí êàê âû. Ìîãó ÿ óïàñòü íà âàøè íîãè?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Nerd
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 12:11 AM

Hi Karen,

I am in my regular life a folklore professor, and a full-time professional writer, among other things. I commend you on taking the time to write about the ballad, and Nic's version of it. I like your post, but think you could develop it much more. If I were to offer constructive criticism for turning it from a blog posting into an article it would be on a few points

(1) you don't clearly articulate what it is you intend to demonstrate in the article--it has no obvious thesis or direction for a good while. You start by describing the ballad in general and then Child's versions, etc., before settling on Nic Jones's version to write about formally. Readers (especially people already familiar with the ballad, who after all are the ones most likely to read it) will want to know where you're going with this before so many paragraphs go by.

(2) you seem to be mostly concerned with proving that Nic's version is the best of all possible versions. But you don't show that it is so, you merely assert or suggest. For example, you say that Lord Barnard's regret over killing his wife and his friend is "extraneous." Why? Just because Nic Jones chose to leave those verses out?

I find the expression of regret to be one of the most poignant and touching parts of the ballad, and one of the most realistic too: even the baddies aren't monsters. In the Arthurian stories, Arthur's internal conflict over whether to kill or pardon Lancelot and Guinivere is often made into the dramatic crux of whole novels. Here, we have the same conflict, after it's too late. Personally, I wish Nic had left those verses in. So I'd say that, while it's possible to argue that such things ARE extraneous, you haven't really done so.

I'd like to see you expand on this, and maybe think of ways in which Nic's version is NOT ideal. That's what usually differentiates "fans-only" writing from publishable writing.

(3) A minor one: there was no "folk process," just Nic deciding which verses to sing. No argument based on the tendencies of the folk process can really apply to this version of this song.

Karen, I hope you'll take this in the spirit in which it's intended. You have a lot of good ideas, and you're thinking hard about some works of art that I think are very important. Keep up the good work!

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: pavane
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 02:55 AM

I am sure that you should remark on the (blindingly) obvious fact that according to all laws and traditions, Musgrave was totally in the wrong, committing 'fornication' at the minimum, and Lord Barnard had 'right' on his side, killing in a crime of passion, after finding his wife not only in bed with another man, but a commoner at that.

And yet Musgrave is always the hero, all our sympathies are with him, Lord Barnard is painted as a cruel and wicked man, and his faithful servant as a vile spy!

This is surely a remarkable feat of storytelling.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,PMB
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 03:49 AM

A minor one: there was no "folk process," just Nic deciding which verses to sing.

Now I'm no folk academic, but I thought every singer chose how to sing any song, and that the "folk process" is not just the choice made by the singer, but how that choice is received by the listeners, who of course include other singers.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 03:59 AM

Just wondering who's collecting the royalties from plays of the audio clip.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Anglo
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 04:03 AM

As far as folk process is concerned, I think the assumption is made that "traditionally" changes are made unconsciously, by lapses of memory in learning the song, or over time; whereas Nic looked at a number of extant texts, chose the bits that he liked, and collated his own version.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: mattkeen
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 04:49 AM

If thats the case then all the good tunes and songs are received by "accident".

Sorry but I do not believe that the great music and song I know has come down through a sort of "leave a monkey with a type writer and it will eventually write Shakespeare....". To me the more likely process is that talented singers and musicians rework and invent tunes that others on hearing them are inspired to play.... pretty much what still happens in fact today

Having said that I am sure misheard lyrics, part remembered tunes etc.. all play a part in the passing on.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Brian Peters
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 04:50 AM

I'm not sure that's necessarily the case, Anglo. Gordon Hall is an obvious example of a recent 'traditional' singer who collated texts to come up with his 'best' version, and I'm sure Jim Carroll mentioned on one thread here that Walter Pardon did too. Other accounts have spoken of traditional singers using broadsides or books to fill out their lyrics. Maybe most singers throughout history simply sang what they'd themselves heard, as accurately as memory would allow, but I'd bet that a few have always tried deliberately to improve either text or tune, or both.

On a more speculative level, I've always been fascinated by the conversion of the maidservant accomplice in British Isles versions of 'Young Hunting' to a manservant in Frank Proffitt's 'Love Henery' a change which (as the wonderful and sadly late Tom Gibney used to mention in his introduction to the ballad) allows the murderess the opportunity for a seduction attempt. Was this change a matter of memory lapse, or a deliberate attempt - presumably before the song reached Proffitt - to spice up the story with a bit of sex?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: HipflaskAndy
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 04:54 AM

Folk process ????

I too am looking forward to Brian Peters' Child CD.
I wonder how 'true' to existing text he'll be on it?
(Are you around BP?)
I'm told he sings an 'extra' verse to (Child 210) 'Bonny George Campbell' for instance.
One written not that long ago, if I understand correctly.
At Alcester mini-fest about two weeks back, in my preamble to that song I happened to mention the 'story' was incomplete (as archived) - where was he going? - what happened? - who did it? etc etc
As I came offstage, a lady was waiting for me, she'd taken the time to write down (for me) an 'extra' verse - said Gordon Tyrall/Brian Peters sang this extra verse that filled in the detail.
Now I'm sure there's a thread on here somewhere (haven't time to trawl for it) where a chap 'fesses up to writing that verse - bless!

Nic, of course, (like many others) sang versions as and how they came to him on the day - having researched, he then edited extensively, re-wrote at will, and sang from (a constantly evolving, and occasionally lapse-prone) memory!

Difficult to know what's-really-what, out there, innit! ;0)
It's a great thing, the tradition, I love it.
- HFA (Duncan McFarlane)

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Brian Peters
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 05:08 AM

>> Are you around BP? <<

Yes Duncan, I'm around all right, in fact I just beat you to the draw! The 'extra' verse to 'Bonny George Campbell' was written out on a beermat for me (actually the whole song was) by Anne Alderson at the legendary Collingwood Folk Club - the Wilsons' former home patch - in 1981. It didn't occur to me at the time that one verse might not be traditional, although I could probably spot it if the same thing were to happen now. And then the same thing goes and happens to you - the Beermat Tradition may be new phenomenon worthy of learned discussion. Having said that, I now wonder whether the ballad works better without the 'explanation' - the sparseness of the storyline just adds to the mystery.

As to my own versions of Child Ballads, I do anything and everything from taking a source singer's text verbatim, to inserting occassional 'missing' verses from alternative texts, to recasting the whole thing with traditional verses where possible and made-up ones if not - see 'Sir Aldingar' - to writing a whole new set of verses ('Six Nights Drunk'). The master plan is to set out some of the assembly instructions on my website alongside the lyrics, so anyone can see the processes laid bare.

And, like you and Nic, I do sometimes make unconscious changes as well. Don't we all?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 05:08 AM

See, that's the problem I have with folklore, songs, in particular, as a discipline. There is no nebulous mass called the 'folk' which suddenly gets the idea into it's collective mind that such and such a verse should read like this..
The mysterious 'folk-process' is SINGERS, individuals, making a choice about what they will sing. We don't always know their names, but they are individuals, much like Nic Jones.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: HipflaskAndy
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 05:17 AM

Cheers for the promt reply Brian - when do we see the CD then? - Dunc

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Brian Peters
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 05:28 AM

Just off to do the final mixes today! Before the end of the month, I hope.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,doc.tom
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 10:12 AM

The 'folk process' is not just "individuals, making a choice about what they will sing" - it is ALSO the audience response. When a behaviour (in this case a song rendition) is 'rewarded' (recieves approbation) by an audience, then the likelihood of its being repeated is increased. If the reverse, the likelihood is decreased. This is the way in which the text becomes 'honed'. This is the (only)way in which the community (en masse) 'creates' the song. This is, I would think, going to hold true whether within the (no longer existing) traditional communities from which the songs were collected - or from within the modern communities of interest (although nowadays, of course, we have promotion, publicity and hype to tell us what we should approve of.) Then, just to complicate things further, many of the ballads we're talking about here were not (but I won't say never) performed FOR an audience - more often within a domestic, even solitary, situation. It is the folk revival that has created a'new' context of performance.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 01:22 PM

Umm, that factor is part of the choice.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Karen Myers (the author)
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 06:44 PM

From the author....

The term "folk process" is shorthand for all the singers of all the versions who have altered the song over time to their taste/to their memory's limitations/to the spur of the moment. No assumption of indefensible historical process, no reason to jump down anyone's throat, just two words instead of 40. You have a better term for that process, please feel free to suggest it.

This new blog, where the article resides, is a series of "appreciations" of various cultural items. Not all readers will be familiar with Child ballads, any more than all will be familiar with Greek epic or Scandinavian fiddle music or the field sports. I'm sure the experienced folks here can overlook the necessity to provide some context for civilian visitors. I find this specific version particularly nice, for the reasons I outlined, and wanted to share why it works for me. I mentioned the article here in this forum because I though it might be of some interest, but it's intended for a more general audience.

I will be doing articles about other ballads from time to time, to illustrate other points (e.g., Creeping Jane and her "lily-white hoof" as a comic version of an oral-formulaic line).

For the person who inquired about the audio clip, I own the LP and I believe this falls under "fair use", just like quoting a poem. If it were in print, I would point readers to a place to buy it.

By the way, Musgrave is not necessarily of a different social class. He has lands, a horse, and (especially significant) a hawk, so he is almost certainly gentry.

One interesting item I didn't write about is the persistence of the look from Lady Barnard "as bright as the summer's sun". It makes me wonder what the rhetoric was for this in Marie de France, for example, in similar circumstances; is this a cliched phrase from a couple of hundred years prior to the ballads? I don't have my Arthurian and Courtly Love books to hand to look it up.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Nerd
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 08:06 PM

I think Karen's right: Musgrave is a knight, a member of the gentry, and the same social class as Lord and Lady Barnard, but at a lower position within that class. This is more obvious in some of the verses Nic leaves out, in which Musgrave is described as a knight.

Interestingly, here we have an example where Nic's editorial interventions have caused some ambiguity. It is possible to think that Musgrave is a commoner in this version, and some people do think that, as is obvious from this thread. That is one of the ways in which Nic has affected the meaning of the song. But you can't tell that without doing some comparative analysis.

As for the Folk Process comment, let me explain a bit. I think it's true, as Karen says, that the sum total of all changes made by individual singers is what's important. But in this case, the only individual singer we know of who has made any change is Nic. The versions published in Child, some of them anyway, are printed texts that were over 300 years old when Nic consulted them. There is no evidence that they are the result of a any kind of folk process--just re-printings of a lost original. Given this, Nic has taken a literary work, and selected some verses, left others out, and changed others. I would call Nic's changes a single person's personal preference, rather than a "folk process," which is usually used to mean the sum total of many people's changes.

Because of this, the people above who mention the audience response are also right. What we commonly mean by "the folk process" is some trajectory over time--singers make choices, some are retained by other singers, others are not. If you look at versions of this song obviously influenced by Nic, clearly some of them didn't agree with him on the question of whether Barnard's regret was extraneous. Christy Moore, who uses Nic's tune, returned those verses to the song. So you can use this to look at a certain kind of process, but again, not if you concentrate only on Nic's version.

Finally, most of the time "the folk process" refers to an oral process, rather than sitting down with a bunch of books, or a bunch of texts in one book, and selecting verses from them. That's more of an editorial process. But I grant that there are no hard-and-fast lines between literate and oral versions of this process.

Interesting discussion!

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 12:55 AM

"fair use"

Is the recording licensed for public performanc?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: pavane
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 02:35 AM

I think knight could in some contexts just be a young man (its original meaning). I don't think there is anything in this version, for example, to indicate that he is of the gentry. It certainly has some similarities to Nic's version (Some came down in red velvet, and some came down in Pale)

Musgrove c1690

The whole song might have been better received in many places if the Lord was made out to be the villain, and the commoner the hero.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 05:19 AM

That would've just made the song a lot more scandalous and the lord's killing a lot more justified.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Saro
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 05:50 AM

Just one thought about the a comment further back in the thread about how we see the faithful servant as "a vile spy". I'm not at all sure about that - I'e come across at least one version where lady B and Musgrave plan to bribe the pae about their dalliance, but he refuses to be silenced as he is is "Lord barnard's man".
Saro

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:13 AM

I thought knights were supposed to be, you know, tough or something. Musgrave keels over rather quickly for my liking.

I've always been fascinated by the fact that there's a village in Cumbria called Little Musgrave, not a million miles from Barnard Castle. Coincidence?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: pavane
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:24 AM

That is another reason. Musgrave doesn't have a sword, possibly he isn't an expert in its use.

'You have two long beaten swords, and I but a pocket knife'

So it was a very one-sided contest.

If Lady B and Musgrave try to bribe the page, and he refuses, why did
Musgrave still hang around?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,PMB
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:27 AM

I doubt if it's a coincidence. It probably influenced the choice of names in a version of the ballad that was influential. Just don't make any assumptions about "original location" or factuality of events.

As for class, it's difficult to know how the relationships have been used over the years. The action seems to be in a mediaeval setting (castles, hunting horns, swords), but the earliest extant versions are from the (English) Civil War period. My guess is that the ambiguity leaves scope for interpretations to suit the times, the singer and the audience, and that flexibility of appeal helped its survival.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Santa
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:33 AM

So, regarding the two swords, "you shall have the better of them, and I shall have the worse" isn't in the Nic Jones version, or isn't in the original?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:43 AM

You'll find all three, castles, horns, swords, in use during the ECW!!

Little Musgrave seems to be the original peacock or poodle-faker.
The ballads sympathies do not seem to lie with Little Musgrave, who, though at church, is not attending to any Christian duties, but is checking out girls.
Also, I'm not sure we need to take 'pocket-knife' at face value. It could be that were LM carrying a beretta he'd say to LB "all I've got is this little peashooter, but you have two assault rifles!"

Lord Barnard, out attending to duty, is the injured party. Even in a rage he won't do something as low as kill an unarmed man (which I think is what is ment by naked), but gives him a fighting chance.

The servant, at risk to his life, is loyal to his master and helps preserve his honour.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:49 AM

or sometimes little Matty Groves.Dick Miles

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Brian Peters
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:58 AM

>> Interestingly, here we have an example where Nic's editorial interventions have caused some ambiguity. It is possible to think that Musgrave is a commoner in this version, and some people do think that, as is obvious from this thread. <<

Much the same could be said for 'Geordie', depending on whether or not the version includes the line "because he came from royal blood" in the final verse. As I tried to suggest above (regarding collected texts of 'Young Hunting'), this kind of ambiguity, or deliberate alteration - call it what you will - is not confined to the recent folk revival. However, deliberate tweaks like that are significant in the political context of the revival. It isn't hard to see how a little omission that in Nic Jones' 'Musgrave' might give the protagonist added status as Working Class Hero. Just as A. L. Lloyd, when assembling his version of 'Handweaver and the Factory Maid' omitted the line "The factory maid is like a queen, with handloom weavers she'll not be seen" - instead choosing to depict the factory worker as of lower status.

And didn't somebody change the 'Greenland Whale Fishery' so that the captain grieved more for his lost whale than for the dead crewmen? As a singer I don't actually think there's much wrong with subtly adapting a song to suit your audience and the current context - it's just when someone else comes along and draws sociological conclusions about past history from a version subject to clandestine modern alterations that we start to get into tricky territory - as some of Nerd's own research illustrates very well.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: pavane
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 07:42 AM

Sorry, getting confused over versions. I used to sing at least three different ones (Just to myself, to keep awake in long drives).

Martin Carthy (bower in Bucklesford Bury version), Nic's and Fairport's. The pocket knife was in Fairport's Matty Groves.

Nic has
'I have two swords in one scabbard, full dear they cost my purse
And you shall have the better of them, and I shall have the worst'

As you saw, my link was to a 300 year old version which does not imply that Musgrove was one of the gentry. So not a new tweak.

BTW One of the copies in the Bodliean library has a note written by the collector, that 'The protagonists were alive in 1543'. I wonder where he got THAT from! No indication of the date that note was added.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 08:14 AM

Ok, I'm wrong about the nakedness, in Pavanne's link it clearly does mean undressed.

Anyway, I can't see where it says anywhere that he WAS common. Class distinction was a lot sharper back then! I think that his being refered to as the Little Musgrave (a branch of a Border family) is telling.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 08:45 AM

Thomas Percy's version includes the lines (spoken by Lord Barnard):

"For I have slaine the fairest sir knighte,
That ever rode on a steede;"

That at least seems pretty unambiguous.

Percy also states that the ballad:

"is ancient, and has been popular; we find it quoted in many old
plays. See Beaum. and Fletcher's ' Knight of the Burning Pestle,' 4to. 1613"

which places it earlier than the ECW.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 08:54 AM

The quote from the above-mentioned play Knight of the Burning Pestle (first performed 1607, published 1613) is:

"OLD MERRYTHOUGHT
(sings)
And some they whistled, and some they sung,
Hey, down, down!
And some did loudly say,
Ever as the Lord Barnet's horn blew,
Away, Musgrave, away!"

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 10:41 AM

Sminky/PMB I heard Peggy Seeger on numerous occasions introducing "Matty Groves" by mentioning the locations of "Little Musgrave", "Great Musgrave" and "Barnard Castle" although I would agree with her that they are more South Durham/North Yorkshire than Cumbria. I heard Martin Simpson sing the version similar to Nic's a couple of weeks ago and he introduced it as being from the North East.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 12:31 PM

Point of order!

The villages of Great and Little Musgrave are in the pretty Eden Valley in what was (and still is for many people) the county of Westmorland - now 'officially' Cumbria.

I have been to both places, indeed I have ancestors from there.

Little Musgrave

Barnard Castle is over the border in County Durham.

Barnard Castle.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 12:54 PM

Musgrave used to be a halt on the Eden Valley railway between Brough and Appleby.
It was in Westmorland then, before that county was abolished.

There is a version of the ballad entitled Lord Darlington & Little Musgrave which may (or not) be where Fairport got Lord Darlen from.

[Just been waiting almost two hours while Virgin idiots dug up the road to restore my broadband in order to post almost the same as Sminky].

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 01:07 PM

This website has more info (though you can ignore the hogwash about how the village got its name - Musgrave means 'grove of the mice').

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: DannyC
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 03:24 PM

If Menelaus had been able to quickly get at Paris and brush away all those tedious little details involving Hector, Achilles and that bunch, we might end up with this tight little story. On another nopte, the ballad nearly perfectly lends itself to a Gravesian interpretation - as an upside-down ritual murder of some year-and-a-day sun king with Musgrave serving as the older man's surrogate.   

Much like Menelaus, Lord Bernard seems compelled to pursue his actions. The regret that Bernard expresses is the most moving portion of the piece (for me).

Perhaps Musgrave becomes a self-selected victim by bringing his imperfect intentions into church on the first day of the year. His selection is sealed when she casts her eye on him "as bright as the summer sun". Moons are as likely to be dressed "in velvet red, and some in velvet pale" as are court women. Why does the footpage need to encounter the broken bridge? Does swimming thru the river purify him as a messanger? The hinge/passage images are abundant:

Buckle
Ford
Broken Bridge
Red Moon/Pale Moon
First day of the year

When I sing it, I have the foot page address Bernard: "Me Lord Bernard, Me Lord Bernard, You are a man of light."   (It doesn't really matter what I sing, as our late night versions here in Kentucky have little reach into the world at large.)

At any rate, the ballad works on several levels for me - in fact - you need only to pick up the paper here in Kentucky on just about any given Sunday morning to read of another chilling version of the story being brutally enacted in situations ranging from some Bourbon County ascendancy mansion to an isolated trailer up a hollar. I suppose that's part of what makes for a 'classic' tale.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 03:40 PM

Musgrave: tickets / timetables . . . and how the station became a des res

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 04:20 PM

Not only a fascinating thread on a great ballad but an improvement to my geography too! Sorry, it was the Barnard Castle/Cumbria connection that threw me. I have driven from The Lakes to Barnard Castle but I don't have much recollection of the county borders that time but more recently driving from Keswick to Brampton via Alston I crossed from Cumbria into Northumberland and back a few times!

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,PMB
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 03:11 AM

All very interesting DannyC, but different versions of the song don't have those elements, and some have none. The names change, the places change, I dare say that somewhere there's even a version with a happy ending. Tthe Child version (1658) doesn't have it happening on the first holy day, just one of many.

It's all a bit Platonic- what is the substance and what is accident?

And as for place, as I pointed out a long time ago in another thread, the only part of England, Scotland or Wales I've found (after much searching) where there's a group of placenames with the double toponymic formation of "Bucklesfordbery" is a radius of about 5 miles around Hertford (20 miles north of London).

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 03:47 AM

After a vast amount of research (OK, I put "Bucklesfordbury" into a search engine) I found the following:

There appear to be only two surviving placenames with the -fordbury ending (the *ford* bit seems to have been lost from some placenames which originally had it). These are Bayfordbury and Hertingfordbury, both within a few miles of Hertford (Hertfordshire, England). Names which have the Buckle- prefix are also fairly rare, the only three I know are Bucklesbury (a district of Hitchin, Herts) and Upper Bucklebury / Bucklebury in Berkshire.

What relevance this has to Westmorland, still less Kentucky, I have no idea.
There's a very funny bawdy version (not the Kippers) somewhere in one of the other threads which I can't be arsed to look for, but someone could.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: pavane
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 04:33 AM

We can never be sure what the original story was. There are so many known songs where what appears to be the main point has been lost in later versions. Perhaps we need a word to describe this "decay or loss of meaning" (or is there one?

Look at the Crabfish (or Crayfish, or Lobster)

The essence of the story is that the fisherman brought home a fine cran, and wanted to put it somewhere safe for the night. He decided on the chamberpot. In the night, his wife used the pot, and the crab grabbed her in a 'sensitive place'. When he went to investigate, it grabbed his nose with the other claw, leaving the two connected in a rather unusual manner.

"Alas quoth the good man, that euer I came hither
he has ioyned my wiffes tayle & my nose together"

But in later versions (such as Mr Razzledum), the second, more indelicate, part of the joke has been lost, and the fisherman just beats the crab to death.

Another example of this 'decay of meaning' has been seen in a joke called "The origin of the yodel"

This long story concerns a traveller who begs a place to stay on a cold night, and is told that he can sleep in the barn, provided he doesn't touch the farmer's daughter. He evidently doesn't keep his word on this, and in the morning, the daughter complains to her father, who rushes after the traveller, shouting
"Come back, villain, you've f***ed my daughter"

To which he replies "And your old lay–hee-dee"
(say it out loud to get the idea)

Now the point of repeating this is that I have heard the joke told with the punchline changed to "And your old woman too", which some how doesn't quite sound like a yodel.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 05:41 AM

Corrupted?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 06:22 AM

It's interesting to compare the different Child texts. In one version (81C) Barnard 'slue himself' at the end; in another (81E) he was 'hanged on the morrow'. Several versions indicate that Lady Barnard was pregnant. Definitely no happy endings, though!

I remember once visiting Musgrave Church. It was so quiet and peaceful - until a sudden noise made me jump out of my skin. It was a bat scrabbling along the floor.

Thanks for that link Diane, I hadn't come across it before.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 22 May 08 - 07:16 AM

In response to Nerd upthread, I'm in two minds about the omission of the verses about Lord Barnard's remorse. The mood of Nic Jones's version is one of concentrated, fatalistic gloom. Even hearing it without any prior knowledge (as I did fairly recently - the privilege of ignorance!) you feel right from the start that something awful's going to happen. The hammer falls with that hair-raising bedchamber confrontation - "And how do you like my bed, Musgrave?" - and the rest of the song is pretty much tidying up, give or take a bit of heroic but doomed defiance.

It's a horror story, effectively, and it works because Lord Barnard's a monster and Musgrave's a blank (albeit a young and pretty blank). It's a bit one-dimensional, arguably a bit adolescent, certainly a bit hammy, but by God it's effective.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 22 May 08 - 07:30 AM

I wonder, would people pick over an episode of East Enders in such a way? For sure the same emotional charge empowers both, but the response to such dramatic narrative is just as immediate & gut-felt without the need to subject it to any level of analysis beyond our innate appreciation of the complexity of human behaviour and why that should be. The guy's just found his wife fucking someone else for Christ's sake - how would any of us react in such a situation? Lord Barnard's no monster, certainly no more than Phil Mitchell anyway, who in no way is so one-dimensional as to make things so simple. Fact is, the song deals with a circumstance transcending the rights and wrongs of sexual morality, as such circumstances invariably do; the tragedy is all the more appalling because there is no one to blame here.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 22 May 08 - 08:35 AM

I wonder, would people pick over an episode of East Enders in such a way?

I'm sure some people would! Some people just like picking over minutiae. I don't think it means those people don't have the gut response going on as well.

My comment wasn't about the fictional (mythical?) story of Musgrave and Lady Barnard - which is pretty powerful & direct in whatever version - but about the (minor) changes that are introduced by differences between one version and another. In Nic Jones's version Musgrave doesn't get a blow in against Barnard before he's killed, and Barnard doesn't regret killing him; it goes to make Musgrave that much more helpless, & Barnard that much more monstrous, than in versions where Musgrave puts up some resistance & Barnard mourns for him.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 May 08 - 10:46 AM

I never watch any soaps,if I was in charge of the world, I would ban all soap programmes on television .Dick Miles

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 22 May 08 - 10:59 AM

Soaps are the ballads of today, Dick - they embody all the mythic & morphological archetypes essential to traditional narrative which is why they're so compelling, and cathartic, and, at their best, which East Enders can be, transcendent!

Often, in the middle of Willie's Lady or Earl Brand I'll drop in the East Enders theme just to underline this soapy heritage...

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 22 May 08 - 11:10 AM

"As a singer I don't actually think there's much wrong with subtly adapting a song to suit your audience and the current context - it's just when someone else comes along and draws sociological conclusions about past history from a version subject to clandestine modern alterations that we start to get into tricky territory - as some of Nerd's own research illustrates very well."

I couldn't agree more, Brian - perhaps these thoughts should be referenced the next time someone starts a "Why do we need to research folk songs - can't we just sing them?" thread.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 May 08 - 12:54 PM

sorry, soaps are rubbish ,stereotyped characters,often poor acting,sensational plots.
I find it pathetic,that some families only get togerther to watch Home and away,before the advent of television people used to sit together in the evening play cards,cribbage,chess,play the piano,make their own amusements.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 May 08 - 12:56 PM

Often, in the middle of Willie's Lady or Earl Brand I'll drop in the East Enders theme just to underline this soapy heritage... with the greatest respect have you lost your marbles,too much talking to Walkabout verse.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Sedayne (Astray)
Date: 22 May 08 - 02:27 PM

with the greatest respect have you lost your marbles,too much talking to Walkabout verse.

Quite possible, Dick, although WAV is known to me personally & quite the personable chap he is too despite his somewhat cranky Mudcat persona!

Seriously though, in my professional work as a storyteller I'm constantly researching & evaluating the morphology and dynamic of traditional narrative & the elements therein that determine the effectiveness thereof. This is pretty much a constant actually, something that will out as it were, be it in The Tain, Buile Suibhne, or the over-arcing sagas of modern day soap-operas - stereotyped characters, sensational plots and all!

Otherwise, I couldn't agree with you more about television & it's impact on more traditional pastimes & culture as a whole, but being born in 1961 I'm afraid I was raised on it! Times I've done without it quite nicely though, and no doubt will do again, but right now with our 50% operative digibox I'm happy enough.

Love the YouTube stuff by the way - slowly working my way through it...

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Steve Gardham
Date: 22 May 08 - 04:45 PM

Dick,

Cards, cribbage & chess, mere fiddling about with numbers! In watching human relationships unfold their minds are dealing with something much more complex, albeit in a physically passive way.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Steve Gardham
Date: 22 May 08 - 04:58 PM

Several contributors to this thread have referred to episodes within this ballad as though they belong to this ballad alone. The majority of the older ballads of the 16th/17th centuries are riddled with commonplaces, i.e., motifs that are common to several ballads. 'little penknives' are numerous. The footpage who runs with the message is one of the commonest. Even the choice of swords occurs in other ballads (likely originated in C81).

As I've said on a previous thread somewhere on this ballad the nobility at all levels by intermarriage and patronage of monarchs held estates all over the country, and both sides of the border after the union. There are bound to be Barnard and Musgrave properties and names all over the border areas and beyond. The Percys for instance had lots of land in my neck of the woods, East Yorkshire, miles away from the borders.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 22 May 08 - 05:21 PM

Even the choice of swords occurs in other ballads (likely originated in C81).

Captain Jack, is that you?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 22 May 08 - 05:23 PM

with the greatest respect have you lost your marbles

When you've seen Sedayne perform a couple of times, you won't harbour any such suspicion.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 22 May 08 - 06:18 PM

"Several contributors to this thread have referred to episodes within this ballad as though they belong to this ballad alone. The majority of the older ballads of the 16th/17th centuries are riddled with commonplaces,"

I remember my daughter, who is now a 14 year old Baby Goth, nicking one of my Christy Moore cassettes when she was about 6 years old. I used to hear the strains of Little Musgrave emanating from her bedroom, and singing the song became her party piece (though she'd never admit it now).

I remember, some years later, when she'd heard a number of other English songs, she asked me, "What is it with the cheek and chin? It's ALWAYS cheek and chin."

Welcome, my love, to the Floating Verse.

*I'd like to think that those early experiences with tragic/morbid traditional songs have led her, in a somewhat unexpected way, to her current Gothy sensibilities...

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Barry Finn
Date: 22 May 08 - 07:03 PM

This like many of the Child Ballads & many other trad ballads many contain the "moral of the story". The versions may differ but the moral (usually) stays the same. Don't cheat on your spouse or with someone's elses spouse, they may bury you. The Twa Sisters, sibling rivalry, the mother & the penknife, etc. The difference in the versions suit the singer, listener, the regional culture. These are not the soaps of yesteryear but in a way they had their multi uses & passing on morals orally as a growing up guide was one of them. Nic's version is as well or better if it suits you personnaly as any of the other well done versions. When the versions travel sometimes they get watered down, sometimes they get spiced up. Sometimes it depends on where they travel to, sometimes it depends on who those versions are getting transported with. The story usually stays the same & the the morals usually do to, thought sometimes ovee time both may get lost in the passing of time travel. So the changes & differences don't detract or enhance from the ballad so much as our personnal take of each of the versions of the ballad appeal to our own physc. Granted there are poorer & richer versions but putting thata aside it doesn't make one better than another. An example would be Sir Lionel. In the American verisons the mystical & supernatural is almost completely missing but the versions Abraham Bailey is not a lesser ballad because of it (though it does retain something of the older European elements), moral on that one being it doesn't pay for the supernatural in ballads to mess with mere mortals, someone is always badder & they come along, eventually,,,, joke).

Barry

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: meself
Date: 22 May 08 - 08:44 PM

Re: 'commonplaces'. Helen Creighton would sometimes prompt 'source-singers' (to use a term I've learned off Mudcat) by asking if they knew "the song about the milk-white steed".

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 23 May 08 - 05:43 AM

This like many of the Child Ballads & many other trad ballads many contain the "moral of the story"

Whilst traditional ballads entertain on a similar level of amoral reportage that one finds in tabloids, they do so without the implied morality - or worse, the moral of the story, which just isn't there. You can't reduce the immediacy of narrative actuality (no matter how contrived) to the level of it being somehow didactic. They're not telling you not to do these things, rather they're thrilling you with stories of those who did, and with the entirely believable consequences thereof. Like Lucy Wan - what is the moral here? Don't fuck your sister, much less chop her in three in you get her pregnant?

Whilst it's absurd to think that any ballad operates on this level, we must at least recognise that life and art very often intermingle - as do the makers of soaps, hence the statement if anyone has been affected by any of the issues raised in this programme, here is the number to phone... if East Enders have touched upon a particularly sensitive subject. Often, after singing a sensitive ballad, I've thought of saying something similar, but the catharsis is in the experience of the story, hence there is, one would hope, no need for any more. In other words, it contains the essense of its own effectiveness, which can't be anything so simple as a mere moral. Often they're pure grand guignol, Long Lankin for instance, unless the moral here is be sure to pay the builders! The effectiveness of any narrative lies not in its morality, implied or otherwise, but in its complete lack of it, by which, one might experience a life less ordinary than ones own. No matter how complex, it's the thrill that makes it work, and that thrill can only exist by getting outside of the mundane moral mindset of the listener, offering them a glimpse of a world beyond.   

My favourite at the moment is the free-wheeling epic of Child #7 : Earl Brand. I sang this recently and a chap said to me "Well, he deserved to die - for having a relationship with a 15-year-old." Interesting how such things filter through into the modern consciousness, who would hear it in those terms!

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Morris-ey
Date: 23 May 08 - 06:29 AM

I had a badge made may years ago which read: Matty Groves is guilty as sin.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 23 May 08 - 06:44 AM

"the song about the milk-white steed"

Is that the one with the four-and-twenty young men playing football? I like that one.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Barry Finn
Date: 23 May 08 - 08:07 AM

I don't disagree with you Sedayne

The moral is only one level as is the lack of morality, as is the thrill, the entertainment, the story itself. The ballad works on many levels affecting & encompassing many human emotions, "the more the merrier".
My point was that in the final "analysis" it is neither poorer nor richer by imposed standards but more by the personnal tastes of the folk mill of the day or process of those that carry it on or if you will, keep the song alive. Be it by any treatment that the singer gives it.

Barry

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 23 May 08 - 09:12 AM

On another thread somebody said everyone in the Musgrave story made the wrong choice - and it's just as well they did, as if they hadn't there'd be no song. It's certainly hard to imagine a happy ending for Musgrave -

"Oh, well I like your bed, he said,
And well I like your sheets,
But I wouldn't know about your fair lady... oh, you mean this fair lady! Now, I know how this must look, but there's a perfectly simple explanation..."

Something Little Musgrave shares with Lucy Wan/Edward is the way it invites sympathy for someone who's in a bad situation that's only going to get worse - you've done that, and what the hell are you going to do now? Sympathy doesn't mean approval or thinking they're a great guy, just fellow-feeling - for a while the song puts you in their shoes.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 May 08 - 09:35 AM

"stereotyped characters" and "sensational plots" are pretty standard in ballads and folksongs generally. I'm not implying that that is is necessarily a failing.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 23 May 08 - 09:38 AM

Sympathy doesn't mean approval or thinking they're a great guy, just fellow-feeling - for a while the song puts you in their shoes.

Butter and Cheese and All is a good example of that; a comic misadventure but one that nevertheless has one gripped out of our general ability to if not sympathise with their predicament then to certainly empathise with how they're feeling. East Enders has had some good Butter and Cheese and All story-lines over the years...

As for Lucy Wan, I feel the most telling part is not so much the killing of the sister but the dialogue with the mother, especially when her ultimate reaction is What will you do when your father comes to know?. That just shifts it onto a whole other level - first time I heard it, the singer placed such emphasis on this it was as if the floor fell away. This was when I was fifteen, hearing it sung by a young female floor singer who also gave the line For there is a child between my two sides that's from you dear brother and I such a darkly erotic spin that it freaked me out for at least a fortnight. Even now...

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Barry Finn
Date: 23 May 08 - 12:54 PM

Does she gain no favor or sympathy for standing up for Musgrove so gallanty? After all Little Matty was fair, handsome, sometimes even a gauld knight. She was of good kin too, does she get no break for her brass & sass. After all her Lord, who thinks highly of the Mat prior to his sleeping with the wife, is off tending other fields far & away, there's a moral there too. Don't leave the back door open if you're not coming home for a spell. Well, it does spin a lovely tale, no matter the version. If Lord "Stay My Hand" were cast as a better man he would have spared at least one of the two, so he's not cast as a good bedfellow & mopre of an asshole. Should she suffer him just because they're married to each other? In real life she could've dumped him, in ballad style some blood is always called for to thicken the stew.

Barry

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: DannyC
Date: 23 May 08 - 01:16 PM

Hold on a minute - thar's a new version been discovered out in Californee starts like this:

City girls just seem to find out early
how to open doors with just a smile
a rich old man - and she won't have to worry
she can dress all up in lace and go in style

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 23 May 08 - 02:39 PM

"After all her Lord, who thinks highly of the Mat prior to his sleeping with the wife, is off tending other fields far & away, there's a moral there too. Don't leave the back door open if you're not coming home for a spell. Well, it does spin a lovely tale, no matter the version."

Attending to your duties, such as driving the cattle, is leaving the back door open? What happened is Barnard's fault?

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: GUEST,Steve Gardham
Date: 23 May 08 - 05:15 PM

Sedayne,
Yes ballads work on many levels and their effects are different for differnet audiences, but as your own example testifies they certainly work on the 'moral' level.

I happen to believe that the 'Cruel Mother' broadside is the original and certainly an important purpose here was to warn young girls of the nobility to avoid liaisons with servants. Child was wrong to identify Child 20 with European counterparts. The counterparts he quotes are actually relatives of C21. The few versions found in Denmark in the 19thc are most likely derived from Grundtvig's translations of British versions.

Subject: RE: Nic Jones - Analysis of Little Musgrave
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 24 May 08 - 04:48 PM

Hmmm. A lot of versions of the Cruel Mother jettison the conception altogether, beginning with the birth. In fact, I have a hunch the conception is a later addition as it seems a tad extraneous to the entire sense of the song. My favourite version is that as sung by Mrs Pearl Brewer in 1958 - listen to it at The Max Hunter Folk Song Collection. I use Mrs Brewer's tune with a Scottish set of words in my own version (currently playing on my Myspace page) and recently explored the notion that the protagonist of The Cruel Mother is, in fact, entirely innocent; a innocence that ultimately transcends the small minded morality that couches the litany of punishments.