Joe, I heard this song at a summer camp, over half a century ago. I have provided all the words I remember, and the tune in fa-so-la format, and I can recall no more. It may well be Austrian or Tyrolean in origin; or the tune may be of that origin and the words may have been composed in English, or may have any degree of relationship to the original lyrics from as accurate a rendering as the prosodic constraints permit to no connection whatever.

As we see from the example Polly provided, the Lederhosen guys and Dirndl maidens do sing songs with effusive praise of the home turf and with yodel-lay-hee-hee refrains. The tune sounds Tyrolean enough to me. I suppose a potato farmer in Idaho named MacTavish, if he had some talent, could hear a dozen such songs and compose one in the same vein good enough to pass it off (on me, at least) as an authentic Alpine hoot; so I can't guarantee that it was written with the clang of Brown Swiss cowbells and the honking of alpenhorns in the background. But I am inclined to think that it probably was.

I don't think it was traditional in the area where I heard it; the local German was Pennsylfaanideitsch, which is rather different from Tyrolean, or Steiermärkisch, come to that. And I never heard it anywhere else.

If I can figure out how to do it, I will send a MIDI; I did a NoteWorthy file when I had reconstructed the tune.

Stephen

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