Origins: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: masato sakurai
Date: 11 Aug 01 - 01:33 AM

P.S. Here's a list of title-name variants: The Gypsy Davy; Black Cat Davy; Black Jack David; Black Jack Davie/y; Black-Eyed Davy; Balckjack Davy; the Brown-Eyed Gipses; Clayton Boone; Dark-Eyed Gypsy; The Egyptian Davie; Gipsies-O; Gipsum Davy; Gipsy Davie; The Gipsy Laddie; Gyp's Come Tripping O'er the Plain; Gyps of David; The Gyps of Davy; Gypsey Davey; Gypsum Davey; Gypsum Davy; The Gypsy Countess; The Gypsy Daisy; The Gypsy Laddie; The Gypsy Laddies; Gypsy Laddio; Gypsy Lover; Gypsy Rover; Gypsy-O; The 'Gyptian Laddie; Harrison Brady; Harvey Walker; Johnie Faa; Johnny Faa; Johnny Faa, the Gypsy Laddie; Johnny Faw; Johnny the Seer; The Lady and the Gypsy; A Neat Young Lady; The Radical Gypsy David; Raggle Taggle Gypsies, O!; The Raggle-Taggle Gypsies; Seven Gypsies; Seven Gypsies in a Row; Whistling Gypsy; The Wraggle Taggle Cool Cats - Parody; The Wraggle Taggle Gipsies; The Wraggle Taggle Gipsies-O!; The Wraggle Taggle Gypsies; The Wraggle-Taggle Gypsies-O!; The Wraggle-Taggle Gypsies; The Wraggle-Taggle Gypsies, O/Oh!; The Yellow Castle Lady (from Brunnings' Folk Song Index). Let me add some others from Bronson: Lady Cassilles Lilt; The Davy; The Egytian Davy O; It Was Late in the Night When Johnny Came Home; How Old Are You, My Pretty Little Miss; The Lady's Disgrace; The Three Gipsies; Three Gipsies Came to the Door; There Were Seven Gypsies; The Dark-Clothed Gypsy; Draggletail Gipsies; Gipsies of Agee (Egypt) Oh!; The Ragtail Gipsies, Oh!; The Gipsies Came to Lord M--'s Gate; Gipsy Draly; David. Can anyone add more?

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: pavane
Date: 11 Aug 01 - 04:27 AM

Bodley has Gypsy Loddy

A different song, The Gypsies, is about stealing in infant

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: ard mhacha
Date: 11 Aug 01 - 08:11 AM

Malcom Douglas, Christy Moores singing of The Raggle Taggle Gypsy is still the best I have heard, he fairly rattles this out. I have it on a 1973 Polydor LP. On the Disc notes it states that the song was learned from the late John Reilly a travelling man from County Roscommon. The Record was Planxty and was produced by Phil Coulter. Still can be had on CD, great stuff. Slan Ard Mhacha.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Peg
Date: 11 Aug 01 - 02:10 PM

A band from Northampton, MA called Cordelia's Dad did a version of Seven Yellow Gypsies on on of their early albums...

"There were seven yellow gypsies all in a row
None of them lame or lazy-o
And they sang so sweet and they sang so complete
that they stole the heart of a lady-o"

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Mudlark
Date: 11 Aug 01 - 03:21 PM

And...in case you want some simple chords with the words...this great song is in Rise Up Singing, page 16 in my copy...with just 3 chords that work pretty well...Am, Em and D.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 11 Aug 01 - 07:50 PM

I know the Planxty record well, and have had it since it first came out; I took up the bouzouki pretty much on the strength of it.  John Reilly's set of the song was issued on The Bonny Green Tree (Topic 12T359, 1978) but I don't know if it's been reissued since.

I sometimes wonder whether it's such a good idea to resurrect old, long threads like this one; people are so eager to contribute that they tend to repeat information already given.  The Reilly text, for example, has been posted twice in this discussion (on neither occasion was he mentioned), though both times perhaps a little mis-remembered.  Here is a consolidated list of links to some relevant meterial here and elsewhere.  Whether anybody will look at them before adding duplicate material here or in new threads, I doubt; at least the resource will be available in the future.

In the DT:

THE WRAGGLE-TAGGLE GYPSIES  With tune; no source specified.

THE GYPSY LADDIE  Text and tune from a book.

GYPSY LADDIES  From a recording by Cila Fisher and Artie Treizise; no tune given or traditional source named.

GYPSIE LADDIE  From the singing of Jean Ritchie; no tune.

THE GYPSY LADDIE (4)  Properly called Gypsy Davy.  Set noted by Cecil Sharp from Mrs. Jane Gentry at Hot Springs, N.C.; text collated with other versions.

SEVEN GYPSIES ON YON HILL  With tune; from the Penguin Book of Canadian Folk Songs, ed. Edith Fowke.  No traditional source named.

GYPSY DAVEY  American text; no tune, no source named.

GYPSY ROVER  Leo Maguire's modern song based on the story, often imagined to be traditional.  Learnt at one remove from a Clancy Brothers record.  With tune.

BLACK JACK DAVEY  Learnt from the Putnam County String Band, with tune.

BLACK JACK DAVID  Mike Heron's modern song based on the story.  No tune.

BLACKJACK DAVEY (2)  American set with tune, from Almeda Riddle.

HARRISON BRADY  Noted by Samuel Bayard, from Lily Bell Dietrick at Morgantown WVa, 1944; with tune.

THE LADY AND THE GYPSY  From The Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles, with tune.  Traditional source not named.

WHEN CARNAL FIRST CAME TO ARKANSAS  Noted from Mrs. Zona Blak, Arkansas, 1942.  No tune.

BLACK JACK DAVY (IN ATLANTIC CITY)  Parody by Mark Cohen.

THE HIPPIES AND THE BEATNIKS  Parody by Miles Wooten.

In the Forum:

Raggle-Taggle Gypsy: Authored by?  Brief discussion with one substantive comment, from Bruce Olson.

RE: Raggle Taggle Gypsie 'O  Enquiry from someone who couldn't find the song; hardly surprising in view of the way he spelled it.  Contains several links.

Nic Jones- Seven Yellow Gypsies  Texts of sets recorded by Nic Jones and Cordelia's Dad.  In neither case is a traditional source named.

Gypsy Rover a real folk song   -(To which the answer, though not given in so many words, would be "no".)  Includes background from Bruce Olson, some links, and Alan Foster's parody The Travelling Salesman.

Whistling Gypsy - prejudice?  Lengthy discussion .  Includes lyric of Leo Maguire's modern re-write, The Whistling Gypsy (Gypsy Rover), and an English translation of the unrelated An Spailpín Fánach; also a translation into Gaelic of Maguire's lyric (confusingly, also titled An Spailpín Fánach) made by Proinsias Ó Maonaigh.

Scottish folk  Short discussion in which Child's #200 (The Gypsy Laddie) and #280 (The Beggar Laddie) become confused.

At the  Max Hunter Folk Song Collection:

The Gypsy Davy  As sung by Mrs. George Ripley in Milford, Missouri on November 21, 1959

Black Jack Davey  As sung by Mrs. Lula Davis, Fayettville, Arkansas on June 14, 1958

Black Jack Davey  As sung by Mr. Wise Jones, Fayettville, Arkansas on June 21, 1958

Black Jack Davy  As sung by Sara Jo Bell, Harrison, Arkansas on August 25, 1969

At Lesley Nelson's  Folk Music  site:

The Gypsy Laddie  Jean Ritchie's set, with tune.

The Wraggle, Taggle Gypsies, O!  Set with tune from Folk-Songs, Chanteys and Singing Games ( Charles H. Farnsworth and Cecil J. Sharp, 1909) No traditional source named.

Johnny Faa  Set with tune from The Saltire Scottish Song Book (Cedric Thorpe Davie and George C. McVicar, 1991; no traditional source named).

There is an entry at the  Traditional Ballad Index:

Gypsy Laddie, The [Child 200]

There are a number of broadside editions at  Bodleian Library Broadside Ballads,  including:

Gypsy Laddie  Printed between 1821 and 1838 by W. Stephenson, at the Cheap Song Emporium, No. 8, Bridge street, Gateshead.  (With The Female Smuggler).

Gypsy loddy  Printed between 1819 and 1844 by J. Pitts, Printer, Wholesale Toy and Marble Warehouse, 6, Great St. Andrew Street,Seven Dials.  (With The Oxford scholar).

The gipsy laddie  Printed between 1847 and 1852 by John Ross, Arcade, Newcastle.  (With My Gentle Mother Dear, by Samuel Lover).

The gipsy laddie, O  Printed between 1863 and 1885 by H.P. Such, Machine Printer & Publisher, 177, Union- street, Borough, S.E.

The gipsy laddy  Printed by W. Forth of Bridlington.  (With The Arab Steed and The Deep Blue Sea).

Gipsie laddie  Printed by A.C. Brander of Elgin.  (With The Female Rambling Sailor).

A much [a]dmired [s]ong called the Dark-eyed gipsy O  Printed c.1867 by W. Birmingham of Dublin.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: pavane
Date: 12 Aug 01 - 05:59 AM

Malcolm, I can't get that last link to open (in large format) although I can get the small version. Is it just a problem at my end?

I always thought that Gypsy/Black Jack Davey and Wraggle Taggle/Seven Yellow Gypsies were two different, though related, songs. The first is sung more from the gypsy's point of view, and he doesn't get hanged. There is obviously a lot of exchange between the songs, though.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: ard mhacha
Date: 12 Aug 01 - 07:29 AM

To tell you the truth Malcolm I wouldn`t break my ass to hear the song, but,Planxty and Christy Moore gave it a blood transfusion.. Slan Ard Mhacha.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Garry Gillard
Date: 13 Aug 01 - 04:17 AM

Seven Yellow Gypsies is on the Mike Waterson LP and also on the Pence and Spicy Ale CD, and has also been re-released on the Mike Waterson CD. A different version of Seven Yellow Gypsies is on Martin Carthy & Dave Swarbrick's Prince Heathen, and also on Martin Carthy: A Collection (1999).

Garry Gillard

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Garry Gillard
Date: 13 Aug 01 - 04:20 AM

Raggle Taggle Gipsies is on The Waterson Carthy Band's Broken Ground.

Garry Gillard

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Mark Cohen
Date: 13 Aug 01 - 06:59 AM

Malcolm, that's an incredible piece of research! I understand your point about old threads, but there's another side to it. For some time now (maybe since the beginning of the Mudcat, for all I know), there have been frequent attempts to get people to check for old threads before starting new ones. In this case Alice did just that, and I appreciated the refresher. Yes, there might be some duplication, but on balance I'd prefer that to a half-dozen disparate threads on the same topic. Unless, of course, you're talking about Seagull guitars....! (Sorry, that was an inside joke at 'Spaw's expense. But I'm sure he can afford it.)

Aloha,
Mark

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From:
Date: 13 Aug 01 - 08:46 PM

Best version of this sort was Davy Graham's Seven Gypsies which he recorded on 'Folk, Blues & Beyond' around 1967 ish. I still have the original LP. Can send lyrics if you want. Gerald.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,Cory Ducey
Date: 31 Jan 02 - 08:43 AM

Being someone that grew up with Folk Music, and being from Newfoundland, Canada where Irish runs in our blood, there is a folk band that sings Folk songs called the Irish Descendants.

They are awesome!!

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: NoMattch
Date: 01 Feb 02 - 11:56 AM

A bad recording but a good version of the song can be found on:

www.greenhotclover.com

I've seen this band do it on occasion when I was in the UK. They're a bunch of Salford college grads from the Manchester area. Definitely worth a listen.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Desdemona
Date: 01 Feb 02 - 06:08 PM

The version on Waterson-Carthy's "Broken Ground" is one of the most artfully arranged I've ever heard; the way it builds gradually is just beautiful.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: WyoWoman
Date: 02 Feb 02 - 12:11 AM

I agree. I have the Waterson-Carthy version and love it. It's such a universal theme -- woman with some fire in her heart married to an emotionally constipated man with ice-water in his veins, throwing all her material wealth away for the sake of true passion, wrapped in a grungy package. The thing I like about the Waterson Carthy version is, I believe, that she doesn't get punished for her choice in the end. She's dirt poor, but doesn't end up drowned or humiliated or burned at the stake. (Of course, I haven't been able to find my CD in over a year, so I could be dead wrong about this and just rewrote the ending inside my own mind to please myself. Self-delusion has its advantages.)

ww

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Desdemona
Date: 02 Feb 02 - 12:06 PM

No, she ends by saying she doesn't care about the nice feather bed et al., she'd rather sleep in the cold open field with the gypsies; hopefully she doesn't end up meeting the fate so many "naughty" wives come to in folk songs!

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: WyoWoman
Date: 02 Feb 02 - 01:37 PM

Are there ANY folk songs in which the woman hooks up with a NICE or even desireable rich man?

ARE there any nice, desireable rich men? If so, please call 877.555.1212... )

WW

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,riverdan
Date: 02 Mar 02 - 11:08 PM

A year or so ago The Thistle & Shamrock played a version of this song where the king captured the gypsey and killed him and himself by falling out of the tower. The lord was aided by one of his men who blew the hunting horn to call help. Does anyone know who recorded this version and where I can find lyrics?

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Maryrrf
Date: 03 Mar 02 - 09:19 AM

I do the "Wraggle Taggle Gypsies" on my CD "Two Strings on Every Bow" which can be had at CD Baby. It's a collections of ballads with guitar accompaniement. WyoWoman - one song that comes to mind about a woman taking up with a nice rich guy is "Leezie Lindsay". As soon as she realizes he's "Laird Ronald McDonald, a chieftain o' high degeee" - yes, that's really his name but when I sing it in public I change it to "the young laird McDonald" so the audience won't imagine a clown instead of a handsome highlander - she "kilts up her gown of green satin" and runs away with him to the highlands.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 03 Mar 02 - 06:13 PM

Yes, but how do you work out he's nice? She realises he's rich and powerful and decides to throw in her lot with him. (We were singing the song tonight and had to explain it to someone who thought it was an extremely abrupt change of heart on the girl's part - which it is, in my opinion!)

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: bernil
Date: 03 Mar 02 - 06:20 PM

I've downloaded and listened a lot to the version with Tears for Bears , on MP3.com. I think it's great!

Berit

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Maryrrf
Date: 03 Mar 02 - 09:03 PM

Well how do you know if any of them are nice or not until it's too late and you find out the hard way??? At least that's been my experience. For a while they're on their best behavior - then little by little.... I guess I just always imagined Ronald McDonald, um I mean "the young laird McDonald" as being rich AND nice, for some reason. Probably just projecting wishful thinking onto the song. I hope it worked out for young Leezie Lindsay!

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Apr 02 - 01:22 PM

I've only heard the version by the Bothy Band, from their first album, but I love it.

It is on CD and easily available.

The singer's phrasing is amazing.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,Nerd
Date: 09 Apr 02 - 05:20 PM

The Shaman version of this song is on a tape called The Green Man. They're not that hard to find; just go here:

http://www.solstar.org/shaman.htm

I haven't heard this album, but the band members are old friends of mine from years back, which is why I'm butting in...

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: IanC
Date: 10 Apr 02 - 05:08 AM

WW

Two songs you might like are The Gypsy Rover - as far as i know a US version of Raggle-Taggle Gypsies, where the guy turns out to be rich. There's also The Little Gypsy Girl which tells the tale from the other way round. The Mudcat version's a bit twee ... in most of the broadside versions, she finds him VERY nice.

Cheers
Ian

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 10 Apr 02 - 05:21 AM

Gypsy Rover is a modern song by Leo Maguire, an Irish broadcaster; discussed at some length in several of the threads linked to in my earlier post. I don't recall a recording of Raggle Taggle Gypsies on the first Bothy Band album (or any other, indeed); perhaps Guest was thinking of Planxty's arrangement of John Reilly's traditional set. So far as I can remember, the phrasing was based fairly closely on his.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,Nerd
Date: 10 Apr 02 - 02:08 PM

I think malcolm is right, and Planxty is the band our guest was thinking of. By mentioning Sweeney's Men AND the Bothy Band, he covered most of Planxty's members, anyway :-) Many other versions were based on this one, including the Irish Descendants' and the Waterboys'. The Planxty version was closely based on the Christy Moore one mentioned by Bo; it was at the recording sessions for Prosperous that Planxty was born. And I believe Malcolm has it right that Christy took it from John Reilly's repertoire, as he did several great ballads.

My favorite revival version of this song is "Gypsy Laddie" by the Tannahill Weavers, from their eponymous third LP. Great Stuff!

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,Zorikh
Date: 15 Sep 02 - 03:39 PM

I've spent most of the day researching this song, it's origins, variants etc. I first heard the Dave Alvin version ("Blakjack David") and thought I might sing it at a SCA event because it sounded sort of petiod-ish and has a romantic theme. I like how his version makes it uncertain whether David and the lady will make love together on the "cold cold ground" or will join in a mutual suicide pact or a killed by her husband. This song is a facinating textbook example of how a universal theme can be turned into a song with local pesons of fact, fiction, history, and legend, and then changes as it is passed down from hand to hand, culture to culture.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,johnnie
Date: 09 Oct 02 - 11:29 PM

the waterboys - room to roam cd - best one there is

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,Jim Clark..London..England
Date: 10 Oct 02 - 08:38 PM

I have videoed several musicians playing this superb song..you camn hear one in the folk sounds section of my acoustic musicians and poets sound archive MSN website

acoustic musicians and poets sound archive

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: old moose
Date: 11 Oct 02 - 12:34 AM

Back in fifty seven (middle of last century)alongside my research on "Edward, My Son Edward" and "Lord Randall, MY Son" I did a search in the publications on "The Raggle Taggle Gypsies" and had about two hundred and fifty citations; Lord Randal and Edward had a great many more. Some of the citations dated to the fourteen hundreds. The conclusion reached by my professor and myself was to the effect that "The Gypsies" as we called it was an early retelling of the Orfeus myth in a form that could be sung and understood by the audiences of the times. No way of knowing, of course, how many permutations it had gone through, nor has it stopped changing as time goes. I quit working on it because of time considerations;
also it seemed a daunting project for a quarters terminal. It would certainly be worse now. Good for a master's thesis at least. I had no desire to go to graduate school then and now in my seventies--naah. Run for it somebody.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: MikeOQuinn
Date: 11 Oct 02 - 05:31 AM

I have a recording of this song on Carlos Núñez's album "Os Amores Libres." I had heard of Núñez prior to this album as a vocalist, but I had never known that he played the pipes as well, which he does with remarkable skill. (The version of "The Raggle-Taggle Gipsy" on this album, for example, is followed by an absolutely smoking rendition of "Itchy Fingers." The two tunes work great together!)

I also like the Gaita (galician bagpipes) that Núñez plays off and on throughout this album. It's different, but very worthwhile.

-J

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Nerd
Date: 11 Oct 02 - 01:09 PM

Funny this thread is back up. I'm teaching a class on Folklore and just this week I used Planxty, the Waterboys, and a Danish band called Moving Cloud (Irish music from Denmark!) all performing essentially the Prosperous/Christy Moore/John Reilly version of "Raggle-Taggle Gypsies" to show the ways a single version or arrangement of a traditional song can "make the rounds" becoming a standard of the folk revival scene. I also used Thin Lizzy and Metallica (!) doing "Whiskey in the Jar."

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: belfast
Date: 12 Oct 02 - 08:24 AM

Talk about the meaning and origins of the song prompts me to add this.Here's a bit from a play "Paddy on the Road" about Christy Moore. Christy has been talking about Ewan MacColl. His companion PJ agrees but…


"PJ: MacColl was a great man certainly.   But some of his acolytes were an awful pain in the arse. I was standing at the bar one night and I'm listening to Christy singing The Raggle Taggle Gypsies and this fella turns to me and says "That's a terribly interesting ballad. There are versions of it all over Europe. But, as Ewan says, you can never really appreciate such a ballad unless you subject it to a Marxist analysis. This song, you see, is a paradigm of the class struggle. The lady in the ballad has abandoned the ruling class and, in the most profound way possible, has displayed her solidarity with one of the oppressed sectors of society. It foretells, in a sense, the Socialist Revolution and the inevitable victory of the proletariat."   And he drones on like this for about twenty minutes. I take a slug of me pint and says, "Is that a fact now? And here's me thinking it was about some hussy runnin' off with a pack of gippoes"

Oh, I know. I know!   We don't use language like that any more. We don't talk about gippoes and tinkers; we talk about travellers. But there's some people who will be very bloody careful to use the word "travellers" and still treat the people behind the word like shite."

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,Arne Langsetmo
Date: 12 Oct 02 - 01:16 PM

My favourite version is the House Band's, on their
CD "October Song" (Green Linnet, GLCD 1190).
Their song title is "Seven Yellow Gypsies",
but it's the same.

A wicked haunting accompaniment, which should
give an idea why many people thought the
fiddle the Devil's instrument. . .

Other CD tracks good too, including the title
song.

Cheers,

                            -- Arne Langsetmo

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 07:33 PM

There are two popular written sources likely responsible for some of the dispersion of the Raggle-Taggle version among 20th century revival singers, neither of which are mentioned in this discussion: Cecil Sharp's One Hundred English Folk Songs, a likely source for many folkies on the east side of the pond, and on the west, virtually the same version is in the Fireside Book of American Folk Songs.

I'd like to know where the "ah-dee-doo" chorus comes from. I remember it from the Kingston Trio, but who was singing it before that, anyone in the American stringband tradition? (This is where I want a copy of Bronson...)

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 07:52 PM

Sharp's book was actually published in America, though a similar edition appeared (under a different title) a little later in the UK. For at least some of the answers to the ah-de-doo question, see the second part of the discussion Gypsy Rover a real folk song.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 19 Mar 03 - 01:37 AM

Thanks for pointing me to the right thread, Malcolm.

~ Becky

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: open mike
Date: 19 Mar 03 - 02:34 AM

we used to sing this in girl scouts..
probably what prompted me to run away
from suburbia and live in a tipi on a
commune! i have to check out the thread
on The Beatniks and the Hippies...
I represent that!!

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: robinia
Date: 20 Mar 03 - 01:32 AM

I like the "realistic" note on which an Appalachian version of the song (as sung by Jean Ritchie) ends: "Oh soon this lady changed her mind/ her clothes grew old and faded/ Her hose and shoes came off her feet/ and left them bare and naked.
Just what befell this lady now/ I think it worth relating/ Her gypsy found another lass/ and left her heart a-breaking."

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 21 Mar 03 - 01:21 AM

Hmm. Sounds like a 20th century addition to me! (Good though.)

~ Becky

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: IanC
Date: 21 Mar 03 - 04:39 AM

Well, actually, some of the earlier English versions have similar realism ... "The gold ring on her finger's gone, and the gold plate on her bosom" for example.

:-)

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,DeadMan
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 08:05 PM

Hi!
I have the song on my computer, so if you know of a possible way to copy it you're welcome to do so.

DeadMan

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Leadfingers
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 08:26 PM

An old mate ( Louis Robinson by name) was in a 'Folk Group' which did gigs in a lot of NON Folk venues. They used to get a lot of requests for various versions of this song, and rather than learn them all or
tell the customer they didnt know the song, Louis wrote a song that would fit , Whichever was requested. The song he wrote is called :-
'The Raggle Taggle Black Jack Gypsy Davey Came Whistling Over The Hill With Six of His Mates' - IF any one wants this posted , Just ASK.

Subject: RE: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: hobbitwoman
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 09:14 PM

There's a recording of The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy on Further Down the Old Plank Road, performed by The Chieftans with Nickel Creek. Or Nickel Creek with The Chieftans. Not sure which. :o)

Subject: RE: Origins: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST,stace
Date: 12 Jun 04 - 11:01 AM

do any of you know of the irish band the raggle taggle gypsies and where i can get info on them??

Subject: RE: Origins: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Sep 04 - 12:16 AM

If you are asking about the Chieftans irish band the album is called "Further Down the Old Plank Road", they are a band playing traditional irish music, this is a second album from concert session pairing this tradional irish band with well known musicians mostly troubadors of country music. The first alblum is called of course "The Old Plank Road" . "Further.." is available from the Victor record label #82876-52897-2, I got mine from towerrecords.com. I also have a recording of the song from German countertenor Andeas Scholl the album is "Wayfaring Stranger-Folksongs". the concept of this recording is to take the old European songs back from America and reinterpret them by a modern European singer. The Songcather second soundtrack albun (not songs from the movie, but old folksong that "inspired" the movie has a great version of "Black Jack Davey"

Subject: RE: Origins: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Leadfingers
Date: 11 Sep 04 - 05:59 AM

I still like the Louis Robinson rewrite 'The Raggle Taggle Black Jack Gypsy Davy came Whistling Over the Hill With Six Of His Mates' - It was written so that whichever 'Gypsy' song was requested , the song fitted .

Subject: RE: Origins: The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy
From: Leadfingers
Date: 11 Sep 04 - 06:14 AM

Incidentally , Do I score any points for the hundredth post to a thread ?