The jaunty, major tune Tony Rose sang to "Banks of Green Willow" seems bizarrely upbeat for the story, but for some reason I prefer it to the more "fitting" modal variant Martin Carthy used, despite that generally such variants (darker, non-major, freer pacing...) appeal to me more. One of those little mysteries.

Then there are all those lullabies like "Rock-a-bye baby" which relate horrendous impending disasters, or "Alouette", which gleefully encourages sadistic animal cruelty.