Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 17 Feb 21 - 09:15 AM

Sorry to be a bore, but if anyone wanted to use these versions for a study, a very useful and valid occupation, it would be enormously helpful to have a place and date added. This applies to any items of folklore that folk want to post.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 17 Feb 21 - 08:45 AM

One two three O'Leary sung by Des O'Connor.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Feb 21 - 12:34 AM

1, 2, 3 O’Leary
I saw mrs Cleary
Sitting on a bumblebee
Eating chocolate ice cream!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Jul 16 - 06:54 AM

The version I recall - learned from my grandmother, I think, in 50s East London - went like this:

One, two, three, O'Leary
I saw my sister Mary
Sitting in the Maypole Dairy
Kissing Charlie Chaplin.

I was terrible at 'two-balls', but used it for skipping to, I believe.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Anon
Date: 07 Jul 16 - 02:50 AM

I have this chant in my head going back to early childhood in the fifties. Probably from the playground and possibly misheard. I now use it as a rhyme to lull myself to sleep on the odd occasion.

One two three alera   [to rhyme with Sarah]
I saw my sister Sarah
Sitting on her bumbabara [to rhyme with Sarah]
Eating chocolate biscuit.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Morton Levin
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 05:07 PM

We sang:
One,two, three O'Leary
I spy Mistress Mary
Sitting on a bumble leery
Just like a chocolate fairy!
We bounced a ball and sang
This in The Bronx circa 1930's

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Jill Springsteen
Date: 02 Apr 15 - 08:45 PM

So happy to see this! My great aunt Kate ( Ricarda) taught me to play this when I was little. What a wonderful memory and miss her! I have always wondered about the origin? She was German. Thank you :)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Cath P
Date: 11 Mar 15 - 01:49 PM

http://blog.oup.com/2007/04/one_two_three_alairy/

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Guest :Barbara
Date: 05 Mar 15 - 07:09 PM

ONE TWO THREE-A-LEARY
I SAW WALLACE BEERIE
SITTING ON HIS BUMBALEERIE
EATING CHOCOLATE BISCUITS.
As post above, exactly as sung in Fife circa 1959

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: RoyH (Burl)
Date: 05 Mar 15 - 04:49 PM

AS a Cardiff schoolgirl in the 1940's my wife played the ball bouncing game to a chant of
'One, Two, Three Alaira
I saw my Auntie Sarah
Sitting on a German aira
Eating chocolate biscuits'

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: Thompson
Date: 05 Mar 15 - 03:13 AM

In Eilis Brady's comprehensive book on Irish children's games, All In! All In!, she gives this for One Two Three O'Leary:

My mother said,
If she caught me playing with you,
She'd bring me upstairs and give me:

1, 2, 3, O'Leary,
4, 5, 6, O'Leary,
7, 8, 9, O'Leary,
Postman's knock.

Eilis Brady then goes on to write:

Sometimes the first three lines of the above rhyme are omitted altogether or instead of the numbers the following words are used:

1, 2, 3, O'Leary,
I spy Miss O'Leary,
Sitting on her bum O'Leary
Eating chocolate soldiers.

Eilis Brady continues:

The inventiveness of the children in substituting new words to suit new environment is shown in the following version of the above rhyme. The main road to and from the Corporation housing estate in Finglas passes the Merville Dairies where ice cream is made and where many of the tenants also work.

1, 2, 3, O'Leary,
I spy my Auntie Mary
Coming out of Merville Dairy,
Eating chocolate ice cream.

(Elis Brady is described in the 1975 book published by Comhairle Bhéaloideas Éireann, An Coláiste Ollscoile, as a member of staff preparing an Irish-English dictionary in the Department of Education, who has contributed a valuable collection of children's folklore to the Department of Irish Folklore in University College, Dublin. "Her awareness of the similarity between the traditional customs and social attitudes of Gaeltacht people and those of native Dubliners springs from her continued contact with Conamara since childhood. It has helped her to appreciate the importance and urgency of recording the lore and idiom of Dubliners".)

Most unfortunately, she doesn't seem ever to have done a similar book on Gaeltacht children's games.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Mar 15 - 06:10 AM

I

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Melanie
Date: 31 May 14 - 10:17 PM

One two three a Leary, I saw Jock Mcleary sittin on his bumbaleery eatin chocolate biscuits.

Glasgow nursery rhyme. That's all I remember.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Mar 14 - 07:41 PM

123 a-laura 456 a-laura 789 a-laura 10 a-laura secord. Toronto Canada 1940's DDN

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Perstephane
Date: 13 Mar 14 - 11:51 AM

My grandmother taught us:

"1, 2, 3 O'Lairy
My first name is Mary
My second name is Anna and
That's how you spell Mary Anna

1, 2, 3, O'Lairy
I spy mistress fairy
Sitting on a huckleberry
Reading the dictionary"

I don't actually remember if it was her who taught us the second verse, but that just came back to me as I was typing.

I always heard it as "alairy", but that's how she did it, always while bouncing her leg over the ball. We were actually just talking about it the other day.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 15 May 13 - 12:56 AM

When I was little, my grandma, whose mother and father were Italian (she must have learned it as a child in America), would play a patty-cake-like game with me and sing:

"1, 2, 3 O'Leary, my first name is Mary,
I received my confirmation on the day of Declaration!"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Ian Ross
Date: 22 Apr 13 - 05:58 AM

When I was a kid we had an LP of songs recorded by the ABC in the 1950s or early 1960s which included this one. Being an official recording, the words are probably a cleaned up version of the street songs but it went like this:

One two three a-lairy
I saw little Mary
Sitting on a dromedary
Eating chocolate fishes

One two three a-lairy
I saw little Mary
Sitting on a missionary
Eating jelly babies

One two three a-lairy
My ball's down the airy
Don't forget to give it to Mary
Not to Charlie Chaplin

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 21 Apr 13 - 01:58 PM

That's an interesting variant, cobber. The reference to 'playing a-lairy' could relate to the playing of a 'ting-a-lairy' i.e., a street organ. But equally 'a-lairy' here could just mean the name of a ball game.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,cobber
Date: 21 Apr 13 - 08:10 AM

Around 1952 as a small boy in Gosport, Hampshire, South of England, we all played in the street with all the other baby boomers. This was a skipping game to us and two kids would turn the rope while everyone else queued up and,one at a time, jumped in and skipped while everyone else sang the verse. At the end of the verse another skipper came in and the song might be changed but just as often, might not. Our words were another variation again which made little sense then or since.

One, two, three a-lairy
My ball's gone in the dairy
Serves you right for playing a-lairy
On a Sunday morning

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Diana
Date: 21 Apr 13 - 01:42 AM

My mother used to sin:
1,2,3 O'Leary
I saw Sister Mary
Down by the Seminary
-

Ithink the last line started with 'Eating' so maybe it was chocolate babies?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 03 Sep 12 - 02:11 PM

50s Hull, Yorks, 2-ball rhyme

1, 2, 3, a lera
I saw sister Sarah
Sittin' on a pumpalera
eating chocolate babies.

I have a vague recollection that a pumpalera was the local word for a pouffe.

The derivation of olairy could be related to the name from the street organ player of pre-war Britain called the ting-o-lairy man.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 03 Sep 12 - 01:11 PM

Taught to me by my grandmother, who would have learned it growing up north of Boston in the 1930's:

1,2,3 O'Leary
4,5,6 O'Leary
7,8,9 O'Leary
10 O'Leary, I made it

Then her version went on to "1,2,3 a basket" (make a hoop with your arms, have the ball bounce through) and "1,2,3 a puppy dog" (get down on one knee, holding your hands up like dog's ears, and up again in time with the ball).

THEN, for a bigger challenge, you moved on to doubles, starting with "1,2,3 O'Leary, O'Leary," where you passed both legs over the ball (one at a time of course!).

Anyone else do something like this, or was it just my grandmother's creative side?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Rose
Date: 24 Jul 12 - 07:03 PM

In the early fifties we used to play two balls against a wall to:-

One, two, three alairy
My ball's down the airy
Don't forget to give it to Mary
And not to Charlie Chaplin.

The we knew the airy as the area down the steps outside the basements that housed the kitchens in Victorian houses.
I noticed recently in "Upstairs Downstairs" that several times they referred to this space as the area.
We always thought that Mary was a reference to Mary Pickford who started United Artists with Charlie Chaplin.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,lrhertz
Date: 15 May 12 - 11:35 PM

Late 1940's, White Lake, New York.

One, two, three alary,
I spy Madamsary,
Sitting on a pumpkinary,
Eating chocolate babies.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 07 May 12 - 02:40 PM

Skipping rope rhyme, Eugene, Oregon, 1954

One two three Alairy
I spy Isadairy
Sittin on a bumbelairy
One two three alairy.

I interpreted "bumbleairy" to mean bumblebee.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Mar 12 - 04:41 PM

One two three o'leary
I saw Paddy Cleary
Sittin on his bumbeleeri
Eatin chocolate biscuits

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One Two Three O'Lairy (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Jane Ann Liston
Date: 11 Dec 11 - 06:38 PM

Sought out this thread because I recognised the tune on the recent programme on the first part of 'The People's Post' on Radio 4 on Friday

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b017x7g8

- two more parts to come, I think on 16th and 23rd Dec. The programme was using the 'open the door and let me in' verse and it was the instrumental part of the song which I recognised from Edinburgh in the 1960s as 'one, two three a-leerie' (that was the spelling I assumed was used, never having seen it written) finishing 'ten a-leerie , Postman', as mentioned earlier.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,Guest E.Morris
Date: 30 Nov 11 - 05:51 PM

ONE TWO THREE-A-LEARY
I SAW WALLACE BEERIE
SITTING ON HIS BUMBALEERIE
EATING CHOCOLATE BISCUITS.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Nov 11 - 11:15 AM

I love the way variants of this keep coming.
And particular much belated thanks to Chris Vening for the Basie lyrics.
Ewan

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: Mr Happy
Date: 16 Nov 11 - 10:15 AM

It was 'O'Leary' round here.

Always thought 'twas an Irishman, like 'O'Grady says'

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: Paul Burke
Date: 16 Nov 11 - 02:01 AM

This was used as a two- ball rhyme by Salford (UK) girls in the late 50s. "A-laira" the pronunciation I remember.

I wonder if it was French influenced- "a l'heure" perhaps. Quite a few French words entered Scots usage, perhaps due to the presence of French troops in the 16th century, perhaps because of many Scots becoming mercenaries over the years, perhaps via sailors.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,Jim McLean
Date: 15 Nov 11 - 05:15 PM

One, two, three a leerie,
Haud ma ba' til ah spin ma peerie.

Translations: hold my ball while I spin my top.

We sang this as kids in Paisley

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 11 - 10:42 AM

One two three Olairy
I saw me Auntie Mary,
Sitting on a ?,
Eating chocolate candy.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,Karen Teeling
Date: 08 Sep 11 - 12:04 PM

OMG! This song comes in and out of my conscious world all the time. My brother-in-law taught it to my son 30 years ago, along with Your Baby Has Gone Down the Plughole and The Cat Began to Bubble. My brother-in-law is from Lanark! Thanks for the memories!!!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,Steve
Date: 10 Apr 11 - 04:48 AM

ball bouncing song from belfast 1940,s so my mum remembers

123 o leary
456 o leary
789 o leary
10 o leary
over me

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: EBarnacle
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 11:20 AM

When I was a kid in Hoboken, NJ, the rhyme was:
1, 2, 3, a-lairy,
I spy Mistress Mary,
Sitting on a bumbleairy...
Looking at Ewan's 1999 post suggests to me that a-lairy might be a corruption of all awry. Any other thoughts?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,ettedanreb
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 08:39 AM

My mum told me this rhyme for bouncing the ball and swinging your leg over it.
One, two, three O'Laire(pronounced O'Lairer)
Four, five, six O'Laire
Seven, eight, nine O'Laire
(don't remember the last line)
Mum was born in 1919, so assuming she played it when she was about ten years old, that makes it 1929. She lived in Cadishead near Irlam in Lancashire.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,michelle,
Date: 03 Oct 10 - 06:49 PM

my granny from scotland used to sing

1.2.3 O'Leary
i saw paddy cleary
sitting on his bumaleary
ten a lady
policman

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: Bert
Date: 16 Apr 10 - 12:38 AM

Talking of Aireys

Dad used to sing....

While she was talking to a policeman
up agin the airey rails
she quite forgot the little baby in her arms
telling him some fairy tales.
She dropped the baby down the airey
Oh poor Mary Jane
and she didn't get it back
until she gave the word
that she wouldn't drop the baby down again.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Apr 10 - 11:55 PM

When I was little (mid 1960s), my mom taught me the "postman" variant. I learned a lot of girly rhymes. I think she wanted a girl.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 19
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Apr 10 - 11:44 PM

In the early 1950's in Kitchener, Ontario, the girls in my Lancaster Street neighbourhood played this ball bouncing game and sang:

One, two, three, a lairy
I spy sister Sairy
Sitting under a bungalairy
Eating choc'late candy.

If we could get away with it, we bounced our red, white and blue sponge rubber balls off the wide door of our next door neighbour's garage.

Helen

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 19
From: GUEST,Mandy
Date: 12 Jan 10 - 06:39 PM

Aerie is not "area" as described above but it is what the below street level suites were called. They were usually fenced (wrought iron) and gated with narrow stairs leading down to an apartment or room. I always assumed they were called aeries because they resembled bird cages. Even my Dad called them aeries and he was from North London.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 19
From: GUEST,Mandy Brock
Date: 12 Jan 10 - 06:32 PM

We learned as children in East London. It is a bouncing ball game and everytime one sings O'Leary one leg crosses over ball. It must be an old Irish game East London was full of Irish immigrants at one time. My mother played it as well.

We learned it as;

One, two, three O'Leary
Four, five, six O'Leary
Seven, eight, nine O'Leary
ten O'Leary drop the ball.

When you wanted to pass the ball to the player behind it was

One, two, three O'Leary
My balls down the aerie
Don't forget to give it to Mary
early in the morning.

Subject: Lyr Add: ONE TWO THREE O'LAIRY (Count Basie, 1940)
From: GUEST,Chris Vening
Date: 26 Dec 09 - 01:25 AM

For Ewan McVicar ten years ago, here are the lyrics to the Rushing song (my transcription from CD). It was recorded on 2 July 1941 by Count Basie and His Orchestra with Jimmy Rushing vocal and it's now widely available on CD. Apparently Vaughan Monroe also recorded it that year. The Basie band did at least five takes (see list at http://people.pwf.cam.ac.uk/djh1/lps/lp0030.html); some of them are on the French CD 'Count Basie - The Alternative Takes, Vol. 3: 1941' (see http://www.answers.com/topic/the-alternative-takes-vol-3-1941). The song was written by Don Reid and Max Chamitov in 1941; its full title is "One, two, three O'Lairy (Oh! My! Whoa! Mary!)". As you see, they took considerable licence with the old rhyme.

ONE TWO THREE O'LAIRY
(Count Basie, 1940)

One, two, three O'Lairy,
How the boys love Mary,
Cause they know when the lights are low
Oh my, whoa Mary!

One, two, three O'Lairy,
Though she's wise and wary,
Steal a kiss and steal a hug,
And then, whoa Mary!

Mary had a little lamb
But that was long ago.
Now I goes where Mary goes
No lamb could love her so.

Whoa!

One, two, three O'Lairy,
Though the boys love Mary
It's plain to see that she does love me,
Oh my, whoa Mary!

O'Lairy, two Lairy,
One Lairy, two Lairy,

Mary gonna marry me
[Ensemble]: What a bringdown!
[Spoken comment indecipherable]
Mary's gonna marry me.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: Billy Weeks
Date: 31 Oct 09 - 02:21 PM

'Airey' is a London child's pronunciation of 'area'. In the days when ball games could still be played in the street - and where the street happened to be one with houses with basements (as many in the East End were, before the Blitz) - a ball that went 'down the airey' had to be retrieved by opening the gate and going down the narrow steps, risking the wrath of the occupants.

MtheGM's version was the usual form when I was a child in the 1930s, but I don't hear it much now. The aireys have nearly all gone and so have the safe, car-free streets in which children's games could be played.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 31 Oct 09 - 02:36 AM

Apologies - word at end of line 2 should be spelt 'airie'.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 31 Oct 09 - 02:31 AM

Peter & Iona Opie give the WallaceBeery/ShirleyTemple version in The Lore & Language of Schoolchildren [1959], ch 7: attribd 'Edinburgh c1940; Girl, 14, Kirkcaldy, 1952, for ball-bouncing.'

They also give

One, two, three a-lairy,
My ball's down the airey,
Don't forget to give it to Mary,
Not to Charlie Chaplin.

'... heard recently in Camberwell and Hackney' [districts respectively of S & E London] '... reported as current in Montreal...'

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,DonMeixner
Date: 30 Oct 09 - 09:54 PM

I have only every heard the Shirley Temple verse in a cut on a recording by The Corrie Folk Trio and Paddie Bell.

one two three o'leery
four five six o'leery
seven eight nine o'leery
ten o'leery, Over Ball

one two three o'leery
I saw Wallace Beery
Sittin' on his Bomboleery
Kissin' Shirley Temple.
ten o'leery

Don

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: Fergie
Date: 30 Oct 09 - 09:39 PM

One, two , three, O'Leary
I saw missus Cleary
Sitting on her bum-ba-leary
Eating chocolate soldiers.

Sung by the girls playing bouncy-ball on the northside of Dublin in the 1950's

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,Barbie Meyer
Date: 30 Oct 09 - 09:06 PM

Mom's Chicago rendition, "one, two, three, O'Leary, four, five, six, O'Leary, seven, eight, nine, O'Leary, ten, O'Leary the postman." Leg circles over the ball on O'Leary. I use it with our senior's exercise class while seated in a chair.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: Snuffy
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 08:20 PM

One two three a-lairy
I saw Aunty Mary
Sitting on the lavatairy
[last line forgotten]

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: One-Two-Three-O'Lairy (Count Basie 1940)
From: GUEST,Ann J Scotland
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 02:32 PM

round about 1966, i would play ball games againt a wall using 2 balls and sometimes only one hand!! (impressive!!)

i remember:-

one two three o'leery
four five six o'leery
seven eight nine o'leery
ten o'leery
out of it.


also;-

sonia heeney skates like this(spin round and catch the ball after spin)
skates like this
skates like this
sonia heeney skates like this
skates(spin) like(spin) this (spin)   !!!!!


braw fun!!!!!!
skates like

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: bassen
Date: 26 May 99 - 08:12 AM

In the interests of completing the charting of cultural diffusion: in suburban LA in the early 50's we sang much the same as Sandy's Midwest 1940's version except we sang "o'leary" and we finished with the rhythmically succinct "10 o'leary MEN". I seem to recall that we sang up to 10 and then back down to 1: 10, 9, 8 o'leary, etc. finishing with "1 o'leary MAN"

bassen

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: The Fat Boy (inactive)
Date: 26 May 99 - 07:28 AM

Des O'Connor had a hit with 'one, two, three O'Leary ,games I played with Mary'.....yuhcck !!

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Ewan McVicar
Date: 23 May 99 - 07:52 AM

Sandy, My information comes from Sail Away, put together by Eleanor Locke, Boosey & Hawkes, 1981/1988.

She gives 5 verses, collected in Calif in 1978, then quotes from Mary & Herbert Knapp, One Potato Two Potato, 1976. They in turn quote from "a 1370 ms of Piers Plowman. When Piers goesd to check on those who are helping him plow his half acre, he finds them loafing about, pretending to be crippled : Somme liede here leggie a-lery, as such losellis cunne. (Some made their legs crooked as such losers will.)" So no reference to beggars _ I invented that! Startling to find such a modern use of losers here too! Don't have OED to hand!

Ewan

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 23 May 99 - 01:17 AM

Thanks for the corrected dope on those clever beggars with their "legs alerie." Now I'll have to go and actually look up the reference! Have you found the word used in any other context? Time for the OED and Chambers, if not my trusty old Century.

Sandy

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: alison
Date: 23 May 99 - 12:25 AM

I think it's still in fashion..... Teletubbies still do it.... occasionally the program features a jazz group doing very snazzy renditions of Humpty Dumpty and Jack and Jill.

My kids love it.....

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Ewan McVicar
Date: 22 May 99 - 12:00 PM

As always, child lore proves startling and confounding of expectations. Up till I started this thread I was so so confident about this song being almost exclusively Scots. Thanks to all who proved me wrong, and gave me a new interesting puzzle - if it was so widespread in the US of A, why does it turn up so rarely in print? (Or am I missing things here too?)
Re Jimmy Rushing - at that time there was a fashion for jazzers to 'jazz' up kids songs. Roy Eldridge did a medley called Schooldays. The best known was Mairsy Doats and Dozy Doats, by I do believe Nat King Cole. This is very old, as 'Mares eat oats and does eat oats'.

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Philippa
Date: 22 May 99 - 04:02 AM

Jo, your story of the faux pas belongs on Art Thieme's infamous thread

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 22 May 99 - 02:29 AM

Perhaps I should confess that I recorded Jeannie Robertson's version in a cluster of kids' songs on my Elektra record of 1959. Fortunately, that record has long been out of print.

Sandy

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Susan of DT
Date: 21 May 99 - 07:54 PM

Brooklyn in the 50s ball bouncing rhyme:
1, 2, 3 o'leary
4, 5, 6, o'leary
7, 8, 9, o'leary
10 o'leary, I made it

not very thrilling. I think we bounced the ball on the numbers and turned it under a leg on o'leary.

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Jo Taylor
Date: 21 May 99 - 05:49 PM

One, two, three a'lairy
I saw sister Mary
Sitting in a basket chair-y
Eating jelly babies

That's just popped into my head from childhood (Devon, England). I think we skipped to it. Probably a polite version of Alison's!

Do you have jelly babies in the US? I s'pose they'd be bit squidgy seeing as your 'jelly' is our jam. Talking of jam, a friend of mine, visiting here in France went into a cafe last Friday and ordered himself 'un croissant avec preservatif' and got a very strange look from mademoiselle...
Jo, suffering from ill computer.

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Roger the zimmer
Date: 21 May 99 - 10:20 AM

I've followed this thread with interest. I remember this song from youthful playgrounds late'40s/early'50s, but Jimmy Rushing?? I can't hear it in his marvellous voice in my mind's ear, somehow! I've checked my Basie and Rushing recordings and haven't come across it. I'd be fascinated by the eventual answer!

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Ferrara
Date: 21 May 99 - 07:43 AM

We (Washington DC, early 40's) sang more or less this version given by Sandy: U.S. Midwest, 1940s:
One, two, three a'leary,
Four, five, six a'leary,
Seven, eight, nine a'leary,
Ten a'leary, POSTMAN!

But I think we sang o'lairy, not a'leary, hard to tell now because I've heard it several ways. My memory may be playing tricks, but we may have bounced the ball hard on the ground twice on POSTMAN.

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Penny S.
Date: 20 May 99 - 05:34 PM

I heard, as a child, in the South East, "One two three a-lairy, my ball's in the airy". So it went with ball games. But as I was hopelessly clumsy with those games, and no-one would teach me them, that's all I know.

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Ewan McVicar
Date: 20 May 99 - 05:11 PM

Many thanks. Fascinating stuff all. The union / bathing suit verse is the only on new to me, and is I think American. There is also in a US version I saw Miss McClearie, sitting on a dromedary, eating chocolate babies, and a couple of other verses of the like. Jeannie Robertson's verse turns up a lot in Scotland, as do the 'Dublin' ones. There is also 1 2 3 Gibraltar, my boyfriend's name is Walter - dictionary and 1 2 3, aleerie, hold my top till I spin my peerie Oh, I canny spin my peerie, wish I was a lauddie And various verses for specific ball-bouncing actions. What tune/s was/were used in the US? In Scotland it is a Scots port a bheil Say o alo alachian (phonetic spelling) A tune also used for Hirum ho for Donald Don With all his tanterwallops on. The Piers Plowright reference is to 'sturdy beggers holding their legs alerie', ie ablebodied men pretending their legs are bent - as one bends one leg while lifting it to bounce the ball beneath. There was even a 1960s UK pop hit version sung by either Val Donnican or Matt Munro (I have a copy of the sheet music), but I'm still keen to find what Jimmy Rushing sung.

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: alison
Date: 20 May 99 - 10:35 AM

Hi Sandy,

You have to remember I was very young in the 70's **grin** and it's slowly coming back to me I think she was "eating sugar / (or possibly chocolate) candy.")

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 19 May 99 - 11:48 PM

Wow, if that's rude, I'm never going to post some of the other songs I know! (Just kidding, Alison.)

Thanks, Joe. You're a blinkin' marvel!

Cyber-klutz

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: alison
Date: 19 May 99 - 10:34 PM

Hi,

That was the "rude" bit, I had forgotten....

Sittin' on her bumble-eery,
Eating..........???????????

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 19 May 99 - 10:12 PM

Darn! I need Joe's magic cookie again. One line break omitted in the Dominic Behan rhyme. Can you fix it for me, lad? I'm trying to be better!
Sandy

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 19 May 99 - 10:08 PM

Chicago, early 1940s:

One, two, three a'leary,
Four, five, six a'leary,
Seven, eight, nine a'leary,
Ten a'leary, USA! (Patriotic WWII times, those)

U.S. Midwest, 1940s:

One, two, three a'leary,
Four, five, six a'leary,
Seven, eight, nine a'leary,
Ten a'leary, POSTMAN! (unexplained, until we heard Dominic Behan sing, in London, 1958:

Open the door and let me in sir,
I am wet unto the skin, sir.
Open the door and let me in, sir,
All to post me letter.
One, two three a'lairy,
Four, five, six a'lairy,
Seven, eight, nine a'lairy,
Ten a'lairy, POSTMAN! (Dublin, ca. 1930s)

Vermont, early 1960s:

One, two, three o'leary,
My first name is Mary.
If you think it necessary,
Look it up in the dictionary.

Boston, early 1960s:

One, two, three o'lairy,
My first name is Mary.
Don't you think that I'd look cute
In my father's union suit? (That's how we heard it, Barry, from a woman who would be a bit older than your sisters could have been.)

And, finally, Jeannie Robertson, in Aberdeen, Scotland, in 1958, sang for us:

One, two, three a'leery,
I saw Wallace Beery,
Sittin' on his bumble-eery,
Kissin' Shirley Temple.

Actually, we have found one more, but I can't think of it right now. Something about "Mistress Mary looking like a chocolate fairy..." Perhaps on her bumble-eery, too. I dunno. Maybe another Mudcatter can help.

By the way, Jean Redpath pointed out, as she was doing one of these ball-bouncing/leg-cross-over games, that there is a line in Piers Plowman about beggars sitting at the city gate, "Legs aleery." I'm not sure of the spelling, but the meaning was clear: they had their legs crossed, i.e.: sitting in what we call "Indian fashion." In the game, of course, the player crosses her leg (this is usually considered a girl's game) over the bouncing ball.

Hope this helps.

Sandy

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: alison
Date: 19 May 99 - 09:28 PM

Ewan,

There is a great book of Belfast childrens songs, (quite a few of the street games variety), I'm sure many of them would have been in Scotland too. I remember being sung to sleep with Coulter's candy,..... definately Scottish.

The book is "Keep the Kettle Boiling, Rhymes from a Belfast childhood." by Maggi Kerr Peirce, published by Appletree Press 1983, (ISBN 0-86281-116-3).

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: alison
Date: 19 May 99 - 09:23 PM

Hi,

We used to play it as a ball game in Belfast in the 70's, so it made it across from Scotland.

1,2,3 O'Leary
4,5,6,O'Leary
7,8,9,O'Leary
10 O'Leary, oh.

There was another version too.....

1,2,3 O'Leary
I saw Mrs Cleary........
it got rude after this (well we thought it was rude at the time....), unfortunately I can't remember what happened next.

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Barry Finn
Date: 19 May 99 - 08:31 PM

Sorry, should've said that would've been mid 1950's. Barry

Subject: RE: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Barry Finn
Date: 19 May 99 - 08:30 PM

I remember my sister & all the other girls in the hood singing this as they bounced a ball & threw a leg over the ball as it bounced, singing:
"One, two, three, O'Leary, my first name is Mary Don't you think that I look cute, in my mother's bathing suit".
Barry

Subject: Jazz Lyric '1 2 3 O'Lairy' - Count Basie 1940
From: Ewan McVicar
Date: 19 May 99 - 12:32 PM

I'm researching Scottish children's songs. One which only occurs very rarely outside Scotland is One two three aleary (many possible continuations to this recurring first line.)

I have one 1978 printed account of the song being collected from kids in the USA. But just now while reading Count Basie's autobiography, GOOD MORNING BLUES, I was dumbstruck to read p248"One [1940 recording] was a little novelty for Jimmy [Rushing] called One-Two-Three O'Lairy". An Internet Search for Count Basie sites did not produce a lyrics site. Can anyone help with lyrics, or a site for obscure jazz lyrics? It occurs to me I should also try a search for Jimmy Rushing.