The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #132032   Message #2983482
Posted By: Gibb Sahib
09-Sep-10 - 06:14 PM
Thread Name: Origins: Lloyd's Coast of Peru
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lloyd's Coast of Peru
This is not very helpful, because I don't have any of my books with me to provide details. But I seem to remember wondering about this once and perusing the print versions...and coming to the idea that one of them was sort of like Lloyd's and perhaps that Lloyd used it as a basic sketch.

I find that when some people try to get tunes from a book, they don't bother to reproduce the tune exactly, but rather get some of it and make the rest go according to their inclination. Mind, I am not saying that they should not do that, however after comparing a lot of "revival" versions of tunes to print versions, I believe that to be the case -- my own sort of "lazy" tendency to *want* to do that is almost "proof" enough. And yes, many will say that of course the tunes differ, because all singers do "folk" music differently and change things here and there etc. -- which is fine, but I don't believe it to be the case in the instances I am referring to. I will leave others to judge the ethics or appropriateness of learning a tune from a book but being careless about accuracy, so that a new tune is spread.

Like I said, not much help, but my 2 cents.

On a different note, I have composed a very pornographic parody of "Coast of Peru," but when I sing it, I do it to the Lloyd/revival/well-known tune. This is essential, as it let people nowadays recognize what is being parodied!

I do hope to learn to sing CoP to one of the "other" tunes some day.