Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby

Subject: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 26 Jan 00 - 03:49 AM

Looking for a song, maybe Irish in origin. It is a lullaby, sung by a father to his wife's baby, which isn't his. One of the lines is 'rocking a baby that's none of my own'. The wife is out on the razz again and he is left at home to look after the little (insert word for illegitemate) and is telling the baby about his life.

Thanks,

LTS

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: AndyG
Date: 26 Jan 00 - 05:03 AM

Liz,
It's in the DT;

ROCKING THE CRADLE

AndyG

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Stewie
Date: 26 Jan 00 - 08:08 PM

There's another version of the song in the DT. It can be accessed by clicking on 'Next Entire Page' after selecting one of the 'Rocking the Cradles' from the 'R' link above. This does not seem to be available from the clicky thing put in by AndyG. Although the version given is from Ian Campbell, it is the Australian version. In Australia, it is better known by the title 'The Man from Kiandra'.

Cheers, Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 26 Jan 00 - 09:03 PM

For another on the same rougfh idea, try a search for [Mama Sings]

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Amos
Date: 26 Jan 00 - 09:54 PM

Odd thing about this song is that it made its way West (presumably during the famine) and became a cowpoke's lament well known to all Western fans:

Whoopie kiyiyo, git along you lil dogies
It's your misfortune, it's none of my own
Whoopiekiyiyo, git along you lil dogies
For you know that Wyomin' will be your new home.

A lot of Irish ended up working the railroads going West, and a good number ended up herding cattle as I guess is obvious from the similarity between these two songs. The Streets of Laredo is another prime example of this migration .

Amos

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Sorcha
Date: 26 Jan 00 - 10:16 PM

Thread drift ALERT! I have noticed that a lot of American cowboy/Civil War era songs are derived from originally Irish melodies, i.e. "When the Work's All Done Next Fall" is "Going Back to Miltown", "Buttermilk Hill" ois "Suil Arun (Shule Aroon)", etc. I have often thought about doing something with this.......a derivitive type song book, but I will prob'ly need several lives just to finish the things I have started.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 26 Jan 00 - 10:18 PM

G'day all,

This song has a most interesting history - far back is the Erse Christ Child Lullaby sung by Joseph to a child 'that is none of his own'. In between are many lullabies like the Australian one sung by Sally Sloane:
I am a young man, cut down in my Blossom,
I married a young girl to comfort my home,
But she goes out and leaves me, and falsely deceives me
And leaves me a baby that's none of my own

(&c)
This was learned from the collector, John Meredith's, note by Lloyd who changed the first line "because he knew someone from Kiandra to whom this had happened".
Anyway, after all these marital tales of woe, we arrive at the other end of the spectrum with Git Along Little Dogies where the cowboy is still singing to a baby (cow) 'that is none of his own'.

It's all in the folk process!.

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 27 Jan 00 - 04:38 AM

Thanks, Andy, couldn't work it out, because it was always introduced as something else. Interesting to see the variants on it, now all I have to do is work out how to operate the new MIDI we got last week and get the tune out......

Thanks again, one and all.

LTS

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 27 Jan 00 - 09:44 AM

Bob Bolton said:

In Git Along Little Dogies, it's not the dogies that's none of his own--it's their troubles. Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: Amos
Date: 27 Jan 00 - 09:50 AM

True; and the version I first learned of the cuckold's song (whatever it is rightly called) was closer:

Aieee, aiiioooo, my laddie lie easy
Sure my misfortune is none of your own
But it's weary I am with rocking and mourning
And rocking the cradle of a child not my own.

I am sorry my neighbors, I married this young one
She favors the neighbors, and none of her own.
She goes out at night out to balls and to parties
And leaves me here rocking the cradle alone.

The tune, also, is more or less directly transported to the roundup song, with the modal 7th chord in the chorus.

A.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: AndyG
Date: 27 Jan 00 - 10:24 AM

For variety, here's the lyric I use for the song.
(Steve Mayne, now deceased, was a mainstay of Harry Boardmans Folk Club in Manchester in the 70's.)

AndyG

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: GUEST,Bruce O.
Date: 27 Jan 00 - 10:55 AM

In a Laurence Price ballad of November, 1631, the chorus goes:

Rocke the Cradle, rocke the Cradle,
Rocke the cradle John,
Ther's many a man rocks the cradle,
when the childs none of his own.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: GUEST,Allan S.
Date: 28 Jan 00 - 09:53 AM

I learned it years ago as AIDEL-O-BOY chorus as follows

Aidel-o-boy sweet baby lie easy Your daddy will never be known Oh, it's weeping and wailing and rocking the cradle For someones baby that is not your own

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Cuckolded lullaby
From: GUEST,Bruce O.
Date: 28 Jan 00 - 06:28 PM

Take a look on at one on the Bodley Ballads website, "I father a child that is none of my own" (1672-84). At Shelfmark in the Search window put in Douce ballads 1(77a)