Rosebud in June - age?

Subject: Rosebud in June age?
From: GUEST,guest
Date: 06 May 13 - 11:35 PM

I'm doing a program of sheep/shearing-related songs at a museum in conjunction with a sheep to shawl competition.

I'll be singing Rosebud in June and wondered if anyone has anything further to say about its origins and/or date than what I found on
http://mainlynorfolk.info/steeleye.span/songs/rosebudinjune.html, which seems to indicate that the earliest record is 1715.

It "feels" earlier to me, but what do I know? :-)

Thoughts?

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 07 May 13 - 01:09 PM

I cant provide any further facts, but I am experienced at reading text written by people who are trying to hide their lack of knowledge. And one thing people really have lack of knowledge about is tunes.

The site you linked finally comes out and says:

"It was sung on the stage in a play called The Custom of the Manor in 1715, but it's doubtful whether a town composer made it, even though it's an unusual shape for a traditional tune. Most probably he lifted it from tradition."

Well, that writer might have thought the tune had an usual shape for a traditional tune, but I don't think so. It's got a usual shape for a kind of tune called a slow air. And it's my impression that the poor people of the British Isles have been composing slow airs for a long, long time while publishers, etc have paid almost no attention. So that tune could have been original in 1715 or it could have been around for a hundred years already.
=========
I hope you won't mind a suggestion. If you are going to sing this song for an audience, sing it more happily than Steeleye Span does it. That Steeleye Span recording could be about a battle or a massacre or the crucifixion. It's a happy song, so sing it happily. Your audience will pay more attention, I think.

You don't have to speed it up or make it trivial, but if you smile with your eyes as sing about dancing and making love, it will be a better song.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 07 May 13 - 01:21 PM

Likewise just an opinion. To me this epitomises the theatrical tunes flying about in the early 18th century, as do the pastoral words. It was extremely popular in those 18th century upmarket songsters as well as on later broadsides aimed at a lesser audience. Why is it 'doubtful that a town composer made it'?

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: GUEST,sciencegeek
Date: 07 May 13 - 01:37 PM

I do have to agree with Leeneia... it should not be sung sung like a dirge.

What other selections have you found for the program? Darby Ram and Click go the Shears ( Australian)are two good choices that spring to mind. The Scottish song Work of the Weavers might fit... but I can't remember if sheep to shawl uses knitting or weaving for the final product...

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: GUEST,original poster
Date: 07 May 13 - 02:04 PM

Thanks for the input. I'll probably just say it dates to mid-18th century or earlier.

As for the other selections, it's been a fun challenge. As it's a very general audience, I wanted a combination of familiar and unfamiliar, plus a couple for the kiddies.

General sheep-farming songs:
From the Lambing to the Wool (Judy Small)
Now I'm Easy (Eric Bogle)
Broom of the Cowdenknowes
Waltzing Matilda

More specific to the processes:
Click Go the Shears
Tarry Wool
Spinning Wheel

Children's songs:
Baa Baa Black Sheep
Mary Had a Little Lamb

I would have liked to pin down a weaving song, but time was limited and I could only learn so many new songs in the time.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 07 May 13 - 02:56 PM

I don't know if you'd want it for your show, but I'd like to mention that one of the most tender songs about shearing that I've ever heard was sung by Martin Wyndham Read. Called (I think) "I don't go shearing anymore," it is an old man's sad, gentle farewell to the life he once knew.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 07 May 13 - 03:05 PM

Here's a chirpier version: Sproatly Smith

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 08 May 13 - 12:09 PM

Thanks, that's a nice version.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: pavane
Date: 08 May 13 - 02:08 PM

"Searching for lambs" is a classic - try and find it by Tony Rose

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 08 May 13 - 03:58 PM

I agree with Steve G on "Rosebud in June" - it's always struck me as a song full of vague pastoral cliche, very much a "town composer" job.

"Searching for lambs" is one of my favourite songs in the world, and Tony Rose's version is terrific. Failing that it's sung here by, um, me.

Glad you're not doing "The shearing's not for you".

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June age?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 29 Apr 16 - 10:07 PM

Here's the Traditional Ballad Index entry on this song:

Rosebud in June

DESCRIPTION: "Here the rosebuds in June and the violets are blowing, The small birds they whistle on every green bough." Singer celebrates joys of spring, dancing on the green, and sheepshearing. The song may describe the cycle of the seasons.
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1840
KEYWORDS: ritual dancing nonballad sheep
FOUND IN: Britain(England)
REFERENCES (3 citations):
Sharp-100E 93, "It's a Rosebud in June" (1 text, 1 tune)
Palmer-ECS, #11, "The Rosebuds in June" (1 text, 1 tune)
DT, ROSEBUDJ*
Roud #812
ALTERNATE TITLES:
Here's the Rosebud in June
Rosebud in June
NOTES: This song, a simple pastoral on its face, has ritual overtones. Note the chorus: "We'll pipe and we'll sing, Love/We'll dance in a ring, Love/When each lad takes his lass/All on the green grass/And the lads and the lasses to sheep-shearing go." Ring-dancing was characteristic of rituals in pre-Christian Europe. Other verses have hints of sympathetic magic as well. -PJS
Last updated in version 3.7
File: ShH93

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Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 30 Apr 16 - 11:02 AM

PJS.
Some people will read magic into anything and nothing.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 03:52 PM

Joe - needs update

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: GUEST,#
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 05:31 PM

'll need to scroll down from the page with the zed-ish squiggle on it.

https://www.google.ca/books/edition/The_Country_Lasses_Or_the_Custom_of_the/PV1MAAAAcAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&printsec=frontcover

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: GUEST,#
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 05:34 PM

Page 14. Sorry 'bout that.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: JHW
Date: 22 Jun 21 - 05:26 AM

Interesting. Have sung it in the past and may do this weekend at a garden do, while it's still June. There's an interval after 'where the fat oxen lie low' then 'and the lads and the lasses' that had made me doubt its authenticity. But I sing anything that sounds like a folk song. (When allowed)

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: leeneia
Date: 22 Jun 21 - 02:27 PM

I've been playing this song as shown in the DT, with an eye to adding it to my repertoire. It's got promise, but it seems showy and rather lumpy. It has a range of an octave plus three notes, which is too many for most people, and I feel some of the jumps are too big.

Try playing it in G, simply substituting C for C#, and see what you think.

Gayle sang this at the singaround yesterday. She can handle it, that's for sure.

Subject: Lyr Add: SHEEP SHEARING + SHEEP SHEARERS etc
From: GUEST,Rory
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 12:37 AM

"The Sheep Sheering"
Printed in: 'The Country Lasses; or, The Custom of the Manor', by Charles Johnson, 1715, Act 1, Scene 1, pp.3-4.

The text and tune also printed in:
'The Merry Musician; or, A Cure for the Spleen', Printed by H. Meere, Vol 1, 1716, pp. 234-236.


When the rose is in bud, and blue violets blow,
When the birds sing us love-songs on every bough,
When cowslips, and daisies, and daffodils spread,
And adorn and perfume the green flowery mead;
When without the plough fat oxen low,
The lads and the lasses a sheep-sheering go.

The cleanly milk-pail
Is fill'd with brown ale;
Our table's the grass;
Where we kiss and we sing,
And we dance in a ring,
And every lad has his lass.

The shepherd sheers his jolly fleece,
How much richer than that which they say was in Greece!
'Tis our cloth and our food,
And our politic blood;
'Tis the seat which our nobles all sit on;
'Tis a mine above ground,
Where our treasure is found,
'Tis the gold and the silver of Britain.




"The Sheep-Shearers"
Bodleian Library Broadside Ballad Collections: Firth b.25(209)
Printer: Evans, J. (London)
Between 1780 and 1812


There's the rosebud in June, and violets blow,
And the small birds they warble on every bough,
There's the pink and the lily, the daffy-down dilly,
To adorn and perfume the sweet roses in June.

We hold on the plough, fat oxen draw slow,
While our lads and our lasses a sheep-shearing go.

When the shepherds have shorn their jolly fat fleece,
What joys can compare, when he talks of increase;
Each lad takes his lass gently on the green grass,
To adorn and perfume, there's the rose-bud in June,

We hold, &c.

There's our clean milk pails, which foam with good ale,
At our table where plenty is found;
We whistle and sing, and we dance in a ring,
To adorn and perfume the sweet meadows in June.

Now sheep-shearing's over, and harvest draws nigh,
We'll prepare for the fields, our strength for to try;
We'll reap and then mow, then we'll plough and sow,
To adorn and perfume the sweet meadows in June.

Now our barns they are full, and our fields they are bare,
We must thrash for the market, and our ground we must till;
We must reap and then mow, next plough and then sow,
To adorn and perfume, 'till June does return.



"Sheep Shearing Song"
Sung by farmer William King to Cecil Sharp at Castle of Comfort, Mendip, Somerset on 15 April 1904. 
Published in: Folk Songs from Somerset 1, 1904, pp.36-37.

1
It's a rosebud in June, and violets in full bloom,
And the small birds singing love songs on each spray.
We'll pipe and we'll sing, Love,
We'll dance in a ring, Love,
When each lad takes his lass
All on the green grass,
And it's all to plough where the fat oxen graze low
And the lads and the lasses to sheep shearing go.

2
When we have a-sheared all our jolly, jolly sheep,
What joy can be greater than to talk of their increase?
We'll pipe and we'll sing, Love,
We'll dance in a ring, Love,
When each lad takes his lass
All on the green grass,
And it's all to plough where the fat oxen graze low
And the lads and the lasses to sheep shearing go.

3
With the lily-white pail filled full of brown ale,
Our table, our table is all on the green grass;
We'll pipe and we'll sing, Love,
We'll dance in a ring, Love,
When each lad takes his lass
All on the green grass,
And it's all to plough where the fat oxen graze low
And the lads and the lasses to sheep shearing go.


.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: JHW
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 06:12 AM

I did see some violets (and primroses) still out between Muker and Keld (Yorkshire Dales) yesterday 22nd June. No shorn sheep. I'd doubted 'the violets in full bloom' but I see them again in the song above.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 06:22 AM

We must nearly have bumped into you as we were out in the meadows between Muker and Gunnerside! There were a pair of kestrel chicks in a recess in a barn wall to see as well.

Robin

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 09:26 AM

Nice one, Rory!
Is that you, Ruairidh?

The only thing I can add to your post is I have got the writer of the song down as John Barrett, and I have the date down as 1714. I wonder if there was an earlier edition.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: GUEST,Rory
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 08:16 PM

The play 'The Country Lasses; or, The Custom of the Manor' premiered at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London on 4 February 1715.

The first edition of the publication was printed in 1715 by the publisher J. Tonson (London).

There are references given as 1714/1715. So there may be some confusion as to which year the play was premiered and publication printed.


No I am not Ruairidh
I have been posting since 2020.

Subject: RE: Rosebud in June - age?
From: JHW
Date: 24 Jun 21 - 05:25 AM

There are good meadows and usually orchids either side of Gunnerside. I've often walked to Muker by Oxnop Gill and back north of the River but I though parking would be impossible in Gunnerside, always busy.