I'm afraid the references to "Rise Up Singing" were my fault. I was venting in an earlier post to this thread.

And Greg, I didn't mean to be critical with my remarks. It would indeed be great to find those songs.

But speaking of Abrahams' collections from the Pacific Islands I have an observation to make. For the most part the songs he collected did not have story lines which is a typical feature of sea songs from that area. "Grey Goose Come Home", one of the songs Abrahams collected, I originally heard sung by an English shanty band replete with something of a story line in it. I'll bet many a song underwent this kind of transformation as songs passed from Pacific Island traditions to English traditions.

Greg, "Rise Up Singing" is a collection of songs put out by Sing Out! (the folk song magazine). It's very popular in a lot of circles, loved by many and detested by some. The problem is that if everyone uses that one collection we miss out on the myriad of variants in existance. Just as there is no definitive version of any folk song there is also no definitive collection of folk songs. Problem is that a lot of folks consider RUS to be the bible of songs and arrive at any gathering with book in hand. And some people don't even bother to learn lyrics of a song 'cause they have the book with them. Okay, okay, enough said.