The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #16554   Message #154735
Posted By: Metchosin
28-Dec-99 - 02:49 AM
Thread Name: Help: What is a bulgine?
Subject: RE: Bulgine Run
"Sharp says that the air is a variant of the Irish folk-song "Shule Agra" and the "low back car" would support this origin. The probability is that some Irish sailor, ashore on liberty in Mobile, sang "Shule Agra" in a water-front saloon. It pleased the ear of the negroes hanging about outside; and the next day they sang what they could remember while screwing home the great bales of cotton in some Liverpool ship's hold. Negro fashion, they put in the rattling sucession of 16th notes, and added "bulgine" for good measure. The crew of the ship heard and liked it, perhaps without recognizing its origin; and took it back with them to Liverpool. There the crew of the Margaret Evans, a well known American packet-ship, lying in the Clarence or the Waterloo Dock, picked it up and fitted in the name of their ship, and took it back to New York, with Liza Lee and the bulgine still in close conjunction with the low-backed car, to the puzzlement of future folk-lorists!" (Colcord, Johana C. 1924. Roll and Go)