Wow! What a thread. To the original topic - researching song variants is my weakness! I actually was able to do a master's thesis on 'textual variation' in folksongs...looking at reasons and types of textual variation. I used the (bawdy) folksong "the crabfish" as the basis for my research. Since "The crabfish" has one of the longest lineages of any folksong and because it remained mostly in oral tradition due to it's lyrics, it was perfect for demonstrating textual variation. I still love to collect different versions of folksongs - for some reason I love to read the different manifestions of the "gyspy laddie/rover'.

amy