Lyr Req: The Butcher boy

Subject: The Butcher boy
From: Melodeon
Date: 10 Oct 99 - 10:47 AM

I have mislaid my copy of the murder ballad of this name, I know the first line is "His parents gave him good learnig" I sang it many years ago and was reminded of it when I heard Ray Fisher singing it at Sidmouth this year.

Melodeon

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From:
Date: 10 Oct 99 - 12:45 PM

* The Butcher Boy - Click Here *

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From: Melodeon
Date: 10 Oct 99 - 03:14 PM

Thanks whoever you are but that is not the version I am looking for.

It begins My parents gave me good learning, Good learning they gave to me, They sent me to a butchers sop A butchers boy to be.

Meloden

Subject: Lyr Add: THE BUTCHER BOY
From:
Date: 12 Jan 02 - 06:41 PM

I don't seem to locate (Supersearch having problems.) whether this request was answered in a subsequent request.....

From Suzanne's Songbook
The Butcher Boy

Trad
 
My parents gave me learning, good learning they gave to me
For they sent me to a butcher's shop a butcher boy to be
 
It's there I met sweet Mary Ann with the dark and the rovin' eye
And I promised I would marry her in the month of sweet July
 
He went down to her mother's house 'tween the hours of eight and nine
And he asked her for to walk with him down by the foaming brine
 
Down by the foaming brine we'll go, down by the foaming brine
Now that won't be a pleasant walk, down by the foaming brine
 
They walked it east and they walked it west and they walked it all alone
Till he took a knife from out his breast and he stabbed her to the ground
 
She fell upon one bended knee and for mercy she did cry
Oron Willie dear, don't murder me, I'm not prepared to die
 
He took her by the lily-white hands and he dragged her to the brim
And with a mighty downward push he threw her body in
 
He went back to his mother's house 'tween the hours of twelve and one
And little did his mother think what her only son had done
 
He asked her for a handkerchief to tie around his head
And he asked her for a candlelight to show him off to bed
 
No sleep, no rest did the young man get, no rest he could not find
For he thought he saw the gates of hell approaching his bedside
 
For the murder it was soon found out and the gallows was his doom
For the murdering of sweet Mary Ann who lies where the roses bloom
 
As sung by Enoch Kent

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 12 Jan 02 - 10:27 PM

There's a list of links to quite a lot of related material here and elsewhere in this earlier discussion:  Hanged I shall be.  At least one of the previous discussions here gave the date and location of the original murder, if I recall correctly; from Bruce Olson, so pretty reliable.

The text at Henry and Susanne's Songbook, quoted above, came from a record made by Enoch Kent, who learned it from Jeannie Robertson.  Disregarding the numerous small changes characteristic of aural learning (dark and the rovin' eye instead of dark and rolling eyes, for instance) there are two changes from her traditional version which impair the sense:

Verse 6, line 2: Oran should be Roarin[g]

Verse 10, line 2: Gates should be fires.

We may as well have a tune available for this set, so here is a midi made from notation in Jeannie Robertson: Emergent Singer, Transformative Voice (James Porter and Herschel Gower, 1995).  Until it gets to the  Mudcat Midi Pages,  it can be heard via the  South Riding Folk Network  site:

The Butcher Boy (midi)

The notation is of the kind that offers several alternatives in many places, so I've gone for the combination of notes which seems best to fit the first verse.  In one place it has been necessary to split a note to accommodate the lyric.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 12 Jan 02 - 10:30 PM

I screwed up the midi link. It should have been:

The Butcher Boy (midi)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From: toadfrog
Date: 12 Jan 02 - 10:59 PM

I am more familiar with this "Butcher Boy," on Levy

Title: Oh! Ma-Ma! (The Butcher Boy). Composer, Lyricist, Arranger: By Rudy Vallee and Paolo Citorello. Based on the popular Italian song success "Luna Mezzo Mare." Additional choruses by The Andrews Sisters.
Publication: New York: Shapiro, Bernstein & Co., Inc., 1928.
Form of Composition: strophic with chorus
Instrumentation: piano and voice, guitar
First Line: Mama, dear, come over here, and see who's looking in my windows
First Line of Chorus: Oh! Mama! Oh! Get that man for me
Performer: Dick Robertson
Engraver, Lithographer, Artist: unattrib. photo of Robertson; Immermann
Advertisement: ads on inside center margins and on back cover for Shapiro, Bernstein & Co. stock
Subject: Portraits
Subject: Cartoons
Subject: Peddlers
Subject: Food
Subject: Windows
Subject: Courtship
Subject: Love
Subject: Marriage
Call No.: Box: 158 Item: 164

Mama, dear, come over here, and see who's looking in my window.
It's the butcher boy and oh! he's got a package in his hand!
"Tell me why he winks his eye whenever he comes by my window"?
"Daughter, Daughter he's in love and you're in love, and love is grand"!

Oh! Mama! Oh! Get that man for me
Oh!Mama! How happy I will be!
Tra-la-la, and cheery beery be!
If I'm going to marry, it's the butcher boy for me!

I last heard that tune at the wedding in The Godfather

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From: GUEST,Melodeon
Date: 13 Jan 02 - 03:30 PM

Thanks George and Malcolm

After 18 months I was astonished that someone resurrected the thread.

While looking for something else, about a year ago, tucked into a totally different album sleeve I found what I was looking for. The booklet from 'Fair Game and Foul' vol 7 of Folk Songs of Britain Caedmon Records.

Sung by Jean Robertson, although not all of it is on the record the booklet has the full version so I was able to get the bits I had forgotten. As Malcolm says it's sustantially the same as Enoch Kent's version exept that it doesn't have his 4th verse,which doen't ring true to me anyway.

Thanks

Melodeon

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 13 Jan 02 - 03:39 PM

Actually, Jeannie did sing that fourth verse, at least sometimes; the Caedmon series was heavily edited, often for no apparent reason, and bits of songs were often omitted.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Butcher boy
From: Genie
Date: 14 Jan 02 - 05:17 AM

If you check out the website for the Record Lady, you'll find a country version of "The Butcher Boy," which is the same story as Joan Baez's "The Railroad Boy."' (This tale has been told above.) I think the song she has is by Judy Canova.

Genie

Link fixed. You omitted one quotation mark. --JoeClone, 15-Jan-02.