Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads

Subject: Lyr Add: BIDDY McGRATH
From: eftifino
Date: 16 Dec 10 - 01:38 AM

Here's a ballad I heard in Dublin Pubs in the '60s. Would love to know the origins:

BIDDY McGRATH
(Unknown)

I'll tell to you a story that'll give you all a shock.
It's about a double murder on the Dublin docks.
The girl in question was Biddy McGrath
And she strangled two sailors with the straps of her bra.

CHORUS: With my too rye ah, fol de diddle dah,
Too rye oo rye oo rye ah.

Well, they tried hard to trick her to get into her knickers,
But smart as they were, she was very much quicker.
She remembered the story told by her ma,
And she quietly untied the straps of her bra.

CHORUS

She tied one o' the straps around the big sailor's cock
And trun him in the Liffey tied to a big rock,
The little sailor laughed and he went "ha, ha"
Till she stuffed up his mouth with the rest of her bra.

CHORUS

Well, she went home about a quarter to one,
Very happy and contented at a job well done.
She ran and told her ma and her pa
Saying, "Thanks be to Jaysus I was wearin' me bra."

CHORUS

Now if you're a young one who dates sailors at night,
Just make sure that the straps of your bra are tight.
Remember the story of Biddy McGrath.
Keep one hand on your knickers and the other on your bra.

CHORUS

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: zozimus
Date: 16 Dec 10 - 04:17 AM

I think it may have been written by Matt McGinn

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Dec 10 - 06:19 AM

"I think it may have been written by Matt McGinn "
He certainly recorded it on the album 'Honesty's All Out of Fashion"
Always thought it strange that there aren't too many 'bawdy' Irish songs - traditional ones at least.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: eftifino
Date: 16 Dec 10 - 06:25 AM

Well, there are quite a few, like

The German Clockwinder (lyrics available)

The Jolly Tinker ( DITTO)

and the like, where double-entendres were the norm. Of course, there's 'The Monto' but you'd need a Dublin Slang dictionary to decypher it!

Cheers!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: GUEST,MARINER
Date: 16 Dec 10 - 11:09 AM

I always thought that Biddy McGrath was written by Shay Healy.Could be wrong though

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: zozimus
Date: 16 Dec 10 - 02:19 PM

Speaking of double-entendres;
"A lady went up to the barman and ordered a double-entendre
So the barman gave her one"

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: JohnB
Date: 16 Dec 10 - 11:30 PM

There is one about a condom in a box found in a peat bog.
Can't for the life of me think of any more right now.
JohnB

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: GUEST,Shonagh M
Date: 17 Dec 10 - 01:41 AM

Hi,
Matt McGinn's song " Biddie McGrath" is on www.mattmcginn,info alphabetically arranged under B for Biddie. It doesn't have the "c" word in it!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Bawdy Irish Ballads
From: GUEST,John Moulden
Date: 17 Dec 10 - 10:16 AM

Before about 1850, there were many bawdy songs in English printed in small songbooks and on ballad sheets - some of them quite explicit if expressed in metaphor. However, only a few survived in oral tradition following a wave of puritanism that affected both the Catholic and Protestant religious traditions.

The song about the 'ancient old Irish french letter' is quite recent, from a formally educated tradition, and concerns Brian Boru and his wife. It can be easily found by a Google search - the first line is "I was up to me oxters (or uxters) in muck, sir,"