The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #10638 Message #4007581
Posted By: Lighter
06-Sep-19 - 10:44 AM
Thread Name: Origin: Long Time Ago/Hoosen Johnny/Sam Houston
Subject: RE: Origin: Long Time Ago/Hoosen Johnny/Sam Houston
As I was saying,
next brings in a couple of cliche' lines, and ends with something unrelated to anything that's gone before.
It's partly free improvisation, partly a "re-telling" of another song, and partly the importation of familiar lines from elsewhere.
The repeated lines (unlike the couplets of chantey books) are typical of field-recorded chantey singing; Carpenter's chanteymen, for example, rarely use couplets.