>> The various morphings seemed more like an LSD trip than anything else. <<

In a workshop I once shared with Jody Stecher and Kate Brislin, Jody remarked that the narratives of ballads often have a dreamlike quality, particularly with respect to the alternation of detailed accounts of action or dialogue with sudden lurches to a different time-frame (what Ruth Perry calls 'leaping and lingering'). On the same occasion, his account of the morphing of Napoleon Bonaparte into the meaningless 'Young Rapoleon' in the Appalachian 'Bonny Bunch of Roses' variant was rather amusing.

It's a bit off topic, but on the subject of modern retellings of ballads, I know there have been fantasy comics based on them, and then there was a detective novel by Ellis Peters (the Brother Cadfael author) called 'Black is the Colour', in which one of the ballad stories (I forget which) was the key to the mystery. Who could resist the following synopsis?

"Singers and musicians are gathered for a course in folk music that will occupy a weekend in the fantastic country mansion called Follymead. Most come only to sing or to listen, but one or two have non–musical scores to settle. When brilliantly talented Liri Palmer sings "Black, black, black is the color of my true–love's heart! His tongue is like a poisoned dart, The coldest eyes and the lewdest hands…, "she clearly has a message for someone in the audience. Passions run high. There is murder brewing at Follymead...."