Any May songs?

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: Haruo
Date: 21 May 24 - 01:31 AM

I'm a bit surprised not to see TEMPUS ADEST FLORIDUM ("Spring Has Now Unwrapped Her Flowers" here. This is the original song to the tune now best known as "Good King Wenceslas". It's a May Day flower carol. Here's a link to a fasola shapenote score of one verse in Latin and three in English from my under-construction "Shape Note Daily Lectionary Hymnal".

Haruo

---

The "Original" song with Lyrics circa 13th Century on YouTube     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zv8PgukSLX0
Many other recordings on YouTube   https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Tempus+Adest+Floridum

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 21 May 24 - 10:20 PM

On 21 May 1688: Poet and satirist Alexander Pope was born in London.

Peace o’er the world, her olive branch extends,
And white-robed innocence from heaven descends.
Swift fly the years and rise the expected morn;
O, spring to light! The auspicious Babe be born!

PEACE O’ER THE WORLD is the signature carol of village communities in the Hope Valley of the Derbyshire Peak District. The text can be found on broadsides and is based on Alexander Pope’s extensive poem Messiah, first published in 1712. The text is set to a tune by Richard Furness of Eyam, c.1820.

‘Peace o’er the World’: Village Carolling in the Hope Valley of Derbyshire by Ian Russell THE FORTY-FIRST KATHARINE BRIGGS MEMORIAL LECTURE, 16 NOVEMBER 2021

---

Bella Hardy sings “Peace O’er The World”     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o790Mu07IFg
Peace O'er the World from Foolow in Derbyshire    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dleat14Wm7A
And at 0.50 in the above video I think Ian Russell is one of the people singing?

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 21 May 24 - 10:54 PM

On 21 May 1851: Gold was discovered in Australia.

Within a few weeks of the reports of Hargraves’ discoveries, songs were appearing about the rush to Ophir. One such song was published in
Bell’s Sydney Life and Sporting Reviewer on 31 May 1851, under the heading On the Gold-digging Epidemic now raging in New South Wales.

It’s off to the diggings we’ll go, Whether they let us or no.
We’ll scramble for gold Through wet, dirt or cold,
And it’s off to the diggings we’ll go.

It’s off to the diggings we’ll go, And perhaps without striking a blow
We may fill up our bags, And then mounting some nags,
We’ll cut to the …. oh oh.

Gold’s called the elixir of life; It certainly causes some strife;

Some of the turmoil created by the goldrushes can be appreciated in these verses from New Words to an Old Song,
again about the rush to Ophir, and written by William Walker ‘on the breaking out of the Gold Diggings, 1851’.

The world is now turned upside-down, And everything seems queer,
For all the men are leaving town, And prog gets dreadful dear.

To talk of love now no one thinks, The men have got so cold
Their heads are stuffed with nothing, but – This cursed, filthy gold.

A woman’s voice sounds dull and tame, In her no charm now lives;
But spades and picks are harmony, And gold the music gives.

Songs from the Australian Goldfields, Part 1: Gold mania by ROSS A. BOTH and WARREN FAHEY
Journal of Australasian Mining History, Vol. 13, October 2015

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 21 May 24 - 11:15 PM

On 21 May 1894: The Manchester Ship Canal was opened.

From Mainly Norfolk with thanks; Harry Boardman sang THE MANCHESTER SHIP CANAL to the tune of The Girl I Left Behind Me on his and Dave Hillery’s 1971 Topic album Trans Pennine. They noted: The Manchester Ship Canal, opened in 1894, was of tremendous economic importance, both to Lancashire and the country as a whole, changing as it did one of the world’s greatest commercial and trading centres from a land-locked city to an important inland seaport.

The Manchester Canal comes from an undated printed sheet and was supplied by Paul Graney of Manchester. The notion of describing a mere canal voyage in terms of the dangers of the deep has been very popular in times past, to judge by the number of versions on the go, one of the best known of which is The Calibar.

Harry Boardman sings The Manchester Canal

O the S.S. Irwell left this port the stormy sea to cross.
They heaved the lead and went ahead on a voyage to Barton Moss.
No fair ship e’er left the slip from this port to Natal
Than the boats that plough the waters of the Manchester Canal.

The third day out or thereabout, a great storm swept the main.
The captain called his officer, I just forget his name.
“You see that light there on the right?” “Aye, aye,” he did exclaim.
“Well it’s the Wilsons’ Brewery lightship at the end of Ancoats Lane.”

---

The Manchester Canal · Harry Boardman · Dave Hillery · Bob Diehl    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZKI2vqgxgQ

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 22 May 24 - 08:07 AM

Here's another song about the Ship Canal; THE SHIP CANAL SONG,  or THE MARY, sung by Gary and Vera Aspey on From the North, Topic 1975.

A hundred years before the building of the Ship Canal, the River Irwell was a busy waterway with packet boats drawn by teams of horses and supplemented by a square-rigged sail. They started at any hour of the day or night, timed to catch the ebb tide at Runcorn, where passengers for Liverpool were transferred to a larger boat. The Mary was the first seagoing vessel to make the journey to Manchester on October 20, 1840.

The Ship Canal Song was published on a handbill in 1840 by Wilmot Henry Jones of Market Street, Manchester. Ian Woods added the chorus calling for support for the building of the Ship Canal,
which was opened by Queen Victoria in 1894.

---

The Ship Canal Song -   Gary and Vera Aspey on YouTube    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O03Ie1ylC6U
Another song on YouTube about this theme from Gary & Vera Aspey is Manchester Ship Canal    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1JerOXpAgM

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GeoffLawes
Date: 22 May 24 - 07:15 PM

And yet another song about The Manchester Ship Canal is THE MANCHESTER SHIP CANAL NAVVY -   Ian Woods     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5-ACXwSJyM
And yet another is BRING THE SEA TO MANCHESTER   -   Jon Raven     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj7ihIOLxmI&list=OLAK5uy_k5aFUmD66dw9WdPtvl30S2OCxccw9SoIw

And a snitch of a recording by Nick Dow   https://www.waterwaysongs.info/Songs/M/manchester.htm

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GeoffLawes
Date: 23 May 24 - 08:16 PM

24 May 1915 John Condon was killed in action in a gas attack during the Second Battle of Ypres.

JOHN CONDON  written by Mary Dillon
John Condon  -   Niamh Parsons & Graham Dunne     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWK-0dVUQbk
John Condon -   Fairport Convention     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7wU1tpU5hs
John Condon  -   Rebecca Hall     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVxNTFhhmeE
John Condon  -   Flossie Malavialle     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-db-DaEk6Eg
John Condon - Janet Dowd    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ip27e6xZK8w
John Condon (British Army soldier) from Wikipedia     https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Condon_(British_Army_soldier)
Mudcat Thread, Lyr ADD: John Condon - about WWI soldier     /mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=82078&messages=43#top

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 23 May 24 - 11:02 PM

More Manchester Ship Canal songs; the construction of the Ship Canal caught the imagination of contemporary writers and continues to do so today.

‘Tales from the Towpath’ was a BBC Radio 2 programme first broadcast on 27 May 1997. It tells the story of the building of the Manchester Ship Canal.
The programme featured Mike Harding, the Albion Band, Bridgewater Brass Ensemble and Mikron Theatre Company.
https://www.waterwaysongs.info/AV/tales_from_the_towpath.htm Original songs;

36 miles Away from the Sea
Tales of the Towpath
We Can't Get the Wares Away
The Ganger's Wife
Your Loving Son, Dan
Big Ditch Flood
A Modern Marvel

Manchester Ship Canal recorded by Pumpkin Pie
https://www.waterwaysongs.info/Songs/M/manchester_ship_canal_2.htm

Manchester Ship Canal by John Gill recorded by Hindle Wakes
https://www.waterwaysongs.info/Songs/M/manchester_ship_canal_gill.htm

NEW SONG ON THE PROPOSED SHIP CANALTo enable large vessels to be navigated from Liverpool to Manchester
Text is from a broadside which stated it was to be sung to the air "Grandmother's Chair".
https://www.waterwaysongs.info/Songs/N/new_proposed_canal.htm

SEAPORT TOWN OF MANCHESTER   or Prosperity to the Ship Canal
Text is from the broadside printed by Jack Harkness, Printer, Church Street, Preston.
https://www.waterwaysongs.info/Songs/S/seaport_manchester.htm

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GeoffLawes
Date: 25 May 24 - 05:45 AM

EDWARD BOYLE  aka   My Charming Edward Boyle
In the time I well remember,
it was in the month of May
When Flora’s flowery mantle
bedecked the meadows gay.

Various recordings of “Edward Boyle “ on YouTube     https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=++Edward+Boyle+song

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 27 May 24 - 01:01 PM

> From: GUEST,henryp - PM
> Date: 21 May 24 - 11:15 PM
> On 21 May 1894: The Manchester Ship Canal was opened.

[Pedant mode on] Yes but the song quoted in the rest of that post is not about the Ship Canal but about one of the older canals serving Manchester. As described here, insofar as the place names make any sense, they refer to a "voyage" from somewhere on the eastern side of Manchester, past Wilson's Brewery and ending "just south of Salford station".

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GeoffLawes
Date: 28 May 24 - 07:18 AM

Friday, May 30, 1907 Bertha Boronda cut her husband's penis off with a razor while in bed believing that her husband Frank had visited a place of prostitution.


BAD BERTHA    by squirrel Butter    https://soundcloud.com/squirrelbutter/bad-bertha
Bertha Boronda from Wikipedia     https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertha_Boronda

Subject: RE: Any May songs?
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 28 May 24 - 07:40 AM

Correct, Richard! It mentions Pomona Bay. Just for curiosity, the song (Away down to) Pomona originated in Manchester. The Pomona Palace and Gardens (named after the Roman goddess of fruit trees and orchards) were in Cornbrook, Hulme; the site was later used to build the Pomona Docks at the terminus of the Manchester Ship Canal.

Inglis Gundry notes in his introduction to Canow Kernow (published by the Federation of Old Cornwall Societies, 1966): '...the process of balladry still goes on. In the Logan Rock Inn at Treen a popular song called Way down Albert Square is gradually being transformed into a folk-song called Lamorna."