No tune.

I share in the sentiment of your comment, Lighter.

I should have mentioned that I thought this was an interesting reference to share because Abrahams' comment about the sharing between corn-shucking and other "inland" work-songs with chanties has been one of the ideas on this thread. I think that when Abrahams did his Caribbean chanties research he may not have realized the extent of sharing, but then later when he wrote this book all about corn-shucking bees he was struck by the similarities.

Whether those overall similarities may have caused him to "stretch" in making some connections is a different matter.

Abrahams presented the "ju-ran-zie' song in the book before making the comment. When I saw the song, I actually immediately thought, "ranzo!" I may be stretching as well! - but looking at the material with similar "eyes" as Abrahams.

But then when I saw his endnote saying this was a "version" of "Reuben Ranzo," I was surprised that he would be so positive about it. I would leave it at the possibility that the phrase "ranzo" courses through a number of song choruses.

I believe Abrahams' rationale here goes beyond the immediate contents of the text in the example. He does also mention the "Grey Goose"—good catch, John Minear! He points out that "Grey Goose" and some other songs have a similar narrative in the solo lines. He considers this what he calls the "Marster-John" theme, about a slave owner trying to kill a slave, but the slave won't go easily. ...so... Abraham reads the story of "Reuben Ranzo," who is whipped and punished by the ship's "master" as being a "re-coded" version of what "might at one point have been a cante-fable."

The very short solo lines, like, "and then this happened. and then this, then this. then this" do seem to characterize Reuben Ranzo, Grey Goose, and the corn-shucking example. Abrahams, I believe, is juggling all the loose characteristics—poetic meter, narrative theme, "ranz" morpheme, working context—and making a connection. This is the type of thing I've been hoping to accomplish with this thread, etc....to read better between the lines after exposure to lots of data.

However, I do balk again when I read another of his statements. "It should be noted that almost all of the corn songs reported here are also widely found as sea chanteys." (pg191) Almost all?