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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: Steve Shaw Date: 04 Mar 18 - 08:55 PM The "Anthems" version, in its context in that "song cycle," is one of my very favourite treasured things and it's on one of the very few folk CDs I play anything like frequently. We were friends with a lovely fellow who used to give it out at the folk club, not a great singer but a smashing bloke, who, sadly, died untimely a few years ago and the song always reminds us of him. It does tend to bring out the lusty and unsubtle, but where's the harm in that! |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: Steve Gardham Date: 04 Mar 18 - 10:56 AM Ref. BL 11621 b 5, item 11. The Lord of Warwickshire's Garland, page 5. The Sailor's Departure from his True Love Nancy. A Young Sailor with his true Love, One Morning in May, Was walking in the Meadows So green and so gay, Where the Birds are sweetly singing, And the Lark ascending high, Which was most sweet and charming To hear their Melody. And as they were Walking, Sweet pleasure for to take, Says the Sailor to his Lover, My dear Love for our Sake, I'll away to the Indies, Whatever may betide, And when I do return Love, I will make you my Bride. Then a heavy Sigh she gave him, Saying, Jemmy My Dear, Whilst down her soft Cheeks, Dropt many a soft Tear: What will you leave me Love, Hear in Sorrow to remain, Till you from the Indies Do return back again. Then off from his Finger, A Gold Ring to her he gave, (plop) Saying take this as a Token, And more you shall have; I am bound over the Ocean, Where the Billows loudly roar, For the sake of my Nancy, The Girl whom I adore. Fare you well, my dearest Nancy, No longer can I stay, Our Topsails are loose And our Anchors under Way, Then with Ten Thousand Kisses, Down her Cheeks the Tears they fell: May the Heavens protect thee, Dearest Jemmy farewell. No doubt hot from the Pleasure Gardens. Of course 'Topsails loosed', & 'Anchors under way' should be as in later versions 'anchor's aweigh' (weighed/raised). Sorry about the plop! Couldn't resist. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: mayomick Date: 04 Mar 18 - 10:55 AM Musically it's like Bunclody with a chorus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLPJ4IJyg4k |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: Steve Gardham Date: 04 Mar 18 - 10:39 AM Since we published a regular version in the second edition of Marrow Bones with a list of printed versions from the early 19thc other older versions have come to light, as often happens. An oral version will be published in the next volume in the series, but for now I'll post a printed version from a garland of about 1800 but possibly older. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: Mo the caller Date: 03 Mar 18 - 06:08 PM Our choir are going to learn this a version arranged by Moeran It says Norfolk Folk son collected & arranged by Moeran. Bit different from the folk club version. What do you think? Maybe I'll get used to it when we learn it ???? |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 27 Jan 11 - 10:48 AM I like to play this song on piano. I agree, this world needs less derogation of lovely things. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: Wheatman Date: 27 Jan 11 - 06:32 AM The late Tommy Morrissey sang it straight in Padstow, ah happy may days. OSS OSS WEE OSS |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: janemick Date: 27 Jan 11 - 05:03 AM I also loathe the hamming up that people do to this beautiful song. Fortunately, as we now live and sing here in Brittany, the song is appreciated for itself and I can enjoy singing it in public again! |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: Wheatman Date: 27 Jan 11 - 03:34 AM Yes it is a beautiful song and I resent the hamming up although I was guilty of that in my teens. I always considered the derogatory comments and actions stemmed from after feast song sessions at Morris (Ring) gatherings, and blamed the Morris for belittling the song. I'll stick to Sam Larner's version and just enjoy it. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: MGM·Lion Date: 27 Jan 11 - 01:19 AM DON'T please "ham it up"; STOP IT!; NOW! It is a beautiful song. Why has it always been subject to such mindless, tasteless, humourless, contemptible disrespect? God, how I hate all those popping noises on "ring from finger" & gazing, eyes shaded, in different directions, on "ship rides at anchor". I really felt shame & embarrassment for a group of the quality of The Spinners indulging in such unspeakable arseholeries. OK, so I am a SOH-less fusspot. I'll live with it. ~Michael~ |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: GUEST,julia L Date: 26 Jan 11 - 10:57 PM We heard the most soulful version of this song by the Bilgerats in St Augustine.. Fred and I usually ham it up in a music hall sort of way, but after hearing the Rats sing this "with feeling", well, it was worth hearing and put the song in a whole different light. Julia |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: bill\sables Date: 26 Jan 11 - 09:12 AM There was a last verse sung in the Durham area in the 60's Now as Willie was a sailing to his own hearts content. His ship struck a reef and to the bottom she went. This left poor Nancy all alone in her sorrow to complain. For the loosing of her William who died on the main. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: Mr Happy Date: 26 Jan 11 - 06:16 AM I heard someone sing another verse in which the sailor returns to Nancy & there's a happy ending, anyone know it? |
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Subject: ADD Version: Pleasant and Delightful From: Joe Offer Date: 12 Nov 10 - 08:50 PM Here's one more:
Posted By: JWB 06-May-04 - 05:47 PM Thread Name: Need a seafaring love song Subject: Lyr Add: PLEASANT AND DELIGHTFUL Guest, Here's the Traditional Ballad Index entry for this song: Pleasant and DelightfulDESCRIPTION: On a "pleasant and delightful" midsummer's morn, a sailor bids farewell to his true love. She gives him a token, and begs to come along with him. He forbids it, but promises that they will be wed "if ever I return again."AUTHOR: unknown EARLIEST DATE: before 1841 (broadside, Bodleian 2806 c.18(276)) KEYWORDS: love farewell ring separation FOUND IN: Britain(England,Scotland(Aber)) REFERENCES (2 citations): GreigDuncan1 64, "The Sailor and His True Love" (12 texts, 10 tunes) DT, PLESDELT* Roud #660 RECORDINGS: Sam Larner, "Happy and Delightful" (on SLarner02) Cyril Poacher, "A Sailor and His True Love" (on Voice02) BROADSIDES: Bodleian, 2806 c.18(276), "The Sailor and his Truelove" ("As a young sailor and his truelove one morning in May"), J. Jennings (London), 1790-1840; also Firth c.12(147), Harding B 17(266b), "Sailor and his Truelove" CROSS-REFERENCES: cf. "Farewell, Charming Nancy [Laws K14]" (plot, lyrics) cf. "The Bold Privateer" [Laws O32] (meter) cf. "The Soldier and the Sailor" (meter) ALTERNATE TITLES: Mary Ann Charming Mary Ann Notes: This song shares many similarities with "Farewell, Charming Nancy" [Laws K14]; it is not impossible that they have a common ancestor. But the degree of difference is now so large that, until an intermediate version shows up, I must regard them as separate. - RBW File: DTplesde Go to the Ballad Search form The Ballad Index Copyright 2009 by Robert B. Waltz and David G. Engle. I can't find my way around the Bodleian Ballads Collection as well as I'd like to, but I think this link will lead to the broadsides referenced above. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Pleasant and Delightful From: GUEST,Bob Coltman Date: 28 Jun 08 - 08:29 AM On the US side of the water, two important early artists introducing "Pleasant and Delightful" to the folksong revival were: Wallace House (a Channel Islander living in the US), on his Folkways LP "English County Songs," 1952. He titled his version "The Lover's Departure." Paul Clayton, who was singing it in club dates and concerts by at least 1952, when he recorded it with Bill Clifton in a set of tapes not issued on LP till 1975. He would first release it on LP on the 1957 Folkways album "American Broadside Ballads in Popular Tradition," but by that time he'd been popularizing it in gigs for some five years. Bob |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Jim Dixon Date: 27 Jun 08 - 04:04 PM One of the broadsides at the Bodleian collection has a better rhyme that the one Nutty posted above. From Johnson Ballads 1161: Then the ring from her finger she instantly drew, Take this dearest Jemmy, and more there's for you; |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Phil Edwards Date: 05 Jun 08 - 12:48 PM Thanks again, Malcolm! I really am going to have to get that book. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: peregrina Date: 05 Jun 08 - 12:05 PM Interesting, thanks... the 'if it weren't for the plough' variant just seemed to have too much gratuitous logic to be other than a repair.. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Malcolm Douglas Date: 05 Jun 08 - 11:47 AM Charles Johnson's 'The Sheep-Sheering Ballad' (music by John Barret[t]) was written for his comedy The Country Lasses: or, the Custom of the Manor, first staged at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, 4 February 1715 (though Cibber, writing in 1753, said it was 1714). It was sung in the first production by Mr Burkhead. The original couplet was When without the plough fat oxen low, The lads and the lasses a-sheep-sheering go. See Marrow Bones: supplementary material: Sheep Shearing for a transcription from sheet music of 1716. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Phil Edwards Date: 05 Jun 08 - 05:08 AM That would make sense! But I think it's more likely that it's a slightly mangled version of a precursor which it shares with the Watersons' version, which puts the ox and the plough together properly ("If it weren't for the plough, the fat ox would grow slow"). |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: GUEST,Shimrod Date: 05 Jun 08 - 04:52 AM "Compare "Rosebud in June", which in the Span version makes no agricultural sense at all - "O to plough where the fat oxen graze", indeed." I have always suspected that it's not 'ploughing' in the strictly agricultural sense that's being referred to in this song. "And it's O to plough, Where the fat oxen graze low, And the lads and the lasses To sheep shearing go." |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Leadfingers Date: 04 Jun 08 - 08:20 PM Well Johnny C WAS involved - and he IS a 'proper' singer ! |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Richard Bridge Date: 04 Jun 08 - 07:38 PM Some of those, Leadfingers, ar quite restrained! |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: r.padgett Date: 04 Jun 08 - 02:47 PM Sheesh! Ray |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Steve Gardham Date: 03 Jun 08 - 05:28 PM Oh God no! I'll have to retire from retirement! Cheers, Nutty |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: nutty Date: 03 Jun 08 - 05:23 PM You may already know this Steve but just in case you don't ..... Pressing 'Control N' opens up a new browser window so you can watch mudcat and ebay at the same time. Now that is addictive |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Steve Gardham Date: 03 Jun 08 - 03:28 PM I think this one can also be found in the shortest folk song lists It was pleasant and delightful... But she doesn't come here any more... or something like that. Cheers, Dave, Malcolm, Mick. Just spotted the 'Make a bluey' at the bottom. Give it a try next time. Damn, just missed something on Ebay! This Mudcat thing is getting more addictive than Ebay! |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: BB Date: 03 Jun 08 - 03:04 PM This song is well-loved in the tradition throughout the West Country and amongst 'revival' singers down here, and the jokey modern words, and the 'pop' after 'The ring from her finger she instantly drew' were never appreciated. Personally, I wish people would actually take in the rather beautiful words of this song instead of taking the p... out of it. Barbara |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Leadfingers Date: 03 Jun 08 - 08:39 AM We (That 'we' inclded Johhny Colins) once did this in four part harmoy with all the wrong last lines !! 'The Sharks they played melodeons at the bottom of the bay' 'I must go and leave my Nancy , she's a filthy old whore' 'Saying May I go along with you ? Oh No my love , like Hell' 'And if ever I return again , I'll be out of my mind' Some of us have NO respect for the tradition at all , have we ?? |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Richard Bridge Date: 03 Jun 08 - 07:03 AM There re other lines that are parodied too. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Phil Edwards Date: 03 Jun 08 - 04:22 AM I doubt if anyone seriously thought that the song originated in 1939 I'm going to have to look at some of those there books before I ask any more stupid questions. In half-hearted defence of the original question, the oldest date that's attached to a song called "Pleasant & Delightful", catalogued online, is the Digitrad's 1963. (That title doesn't appear in the YG, the Folkinfo db or the Coppers' collection; Cantaria has it but dates it back to 1970(!).) Obviously, what this tells me is a) not to rely on online catalogues & b) not to rely on titles staying the same. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: GUEST,PS Date: 03 Jun 08 - 03:29 AM PS that is a joke line---but I meant the general words of songs change. Like chinese whispers and I love the original version but having the version given to me firmly engraioned in my head ...don't think I could memorise it again in a different mode. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: GUEST,tweetiepie Date: 03 Jun 08 - 03:27 AM Thankyou for this thread. A few years ago on one of our visits to Trewarmett, I was asked to learn this song by Edwina. It is a beautiful song but often people sing "The sharks they played melodions" In the first verse! Just shows hows the words are changed as they are passed from one to another but then that is the folk tradition. As In a song by Graham and Eileen Pratt..."Take a song and sing it on and make it all your own"in "Kerry is no more" about a mythical session singer who has gone. It is an evolving part of folk...whether good or bad... Linda X |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Mick Pearce (MCP) Date: 02 Jun 08 - 07:53 PM Just a minor correction to my post above: that 53 entries in my copy was supposed to refer to the Roud Index, not the Greig-Duncan collection. Steve - as you see you've got several links to The Castle Hill Anthem before I got back here! Mick |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: open mike Date: 02 Jun 08 - 07:46 PM i am pretty sure the modern (60's) version says "cosmic and freaky" here it is... COSMIC AND FREAKY (Grit Laskin) It was cosmic and freaky, on a midsummer's day And the pipes in the meadow, Man, they blew me away, And the blackbirds and the thrushes were into their own thing, And the larks got off on music, Man like all they did was sing A freak and his ol' lady were out tripping through the heather Said the freak to his ol' lady, "Man, my head's not together, So I'm trucking out to Frisco, Where the alpha waves run free, And the highs you reach on skateboards, Have transcended LSD." Well, a picture of his Earth Shoe, she instantly drew Saying, "This is where I'm at, man, I'm still tuned into you." And as they dug each other's head space, Tears from her eyes he did see She said "Can I come?" and he said "No, Man, don't lay that trip on me." He said, "Man, we're getting heavy, I'm not into what's going down The taxi meter's running, and I'm [turned/bummed off this town But you'll still be my ol' lady If you're ever near San Francisco After all, babe, you're a Pisces, And I'm a Scorpio." from sondra stigen, 1984 Recorded by Laskin- Unmasked see also Pleasant and Delightful |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Malcolm Douglas Date: 02 Jun 08 - 07:18 PM The other thread seems to have been talking mainly about the particular version that Lou Killen picked up, but it may have wandered off topic; I don't know if that was an arrangement of the set Bert Lloyd recorded at the Eel's Foot. I doubt if anyone seriously thought that the song originated in 1939: that is probably the earliest audio recording, though. 'Blackbird and Thrush' was a later form of the broadside song, though it seems to have introduced the 'pleasant and delightful' verse. Here is a list of those editions available at the Bodleian Library website: The blackbird and thrush ("How pleasant and delightful is the bright summer's morn ...") T & W Plant seem to have been contemporary with Such, though a J Plant was printing at the same address back as far as the early 1830s, I gather. See also two earlier forms of the song, lacking the 'pleasant and delightful' verse: The sailor and his truelove / Jemmy's farewell For more detail, see Marrow Bones (revised edition, 2007), 'The Soldier and His True-Love'. I see that Dave has already added Steve's link, but here it is again for the sake of completeness: Yorkshire Garland: Castle Hill Anthem |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: GUEST,Derek Schofield Date: 02 Jun 08 - 06:55 PM Looking back at the other thread, one version that no-one has mentioned is that sung by Sam Larner and included in the 1961 Folkways LP Now is the Time for Fishing (now available on Topic). It was called 'Happy and Delightful' and the first line was ... 'O, I was happy and delightful on one midsummer's morn'. But I think this has wandered from the original question .... who first sang the song in the revival? I had always believed that Louis popularised the song in the revival. Prior to the 1963 recording that Def Shepard mentions, likely recordings would be by MacColl or Lloyd I suppose. Did they record it? It was very popular later in the 60s and into the 70s thanks to The Spinners and Fred Jordan is credited as the source of the song sung by Shirley on Anthems in Eden I think -- Fred would have learnt it from a revival singer. I find it interesting to know how and from whom these well known songs of the revival came to be so well known. (See The Leaving of Liverpool article in the issue of English Dance and Song before the new one!). Derek Schofield |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Folkiedave Date: 02 Jun 08 - 06:44 PM There you go Steve.....You can find it here........ |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: open mike Date: 02 Jun 08 - 06:41 PM It seems I have heard a Hippie version of this..a parody.. how freaky and cool or something like that??? |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Steve Gardham Date: 02 Jun 08 - 06:35 PM Mick, Can you please do him a bluey to our website where he can get a Yorkshire version that has a long pedigree and the history of the song in print? See 'Castle Hill Anthem' |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Big Al Whittle Date: 02 Jun 08 - 06:29 PM I think it was Fred Jordan pointed out, no one ever picked wild mountain thyme....bloody useless stuff! |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Phil Edwards Date: 02 Jun 08 - 06:10 PM Thanks both, that's brilliant. I've a good mind to work up the five-verse version - the promise followed by the ring makes more narrative sense. I'm also pleased to see "the hills and the valleys" being covered with corn, instead of "the fields and the meadows" - meadows, of course, aren't where you grow corn. Nice to see it's just a bit of oral mangling. (Compare "Rosebud in June", which in the Span version makes no agricultural sense at all - "O to plough where the fat oxen graze", indeed. But if it's nonsense, it's genuine orally-transmitted nonsense. (The agricultural story editor seems to have had more input to The Watersons' version.)) |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Mick Pearce (MCP) Date: 02 Jun 08 - 05:01 PM The Roud Index shows earlier collected versions than Lloyd's - the Greig-Duncan collection (53 entries in my copy) has a handful collected between 1903 and 1907, and Hammond also collected several version around 1905/6, for starters My copy of the Roud Broadside index shows only one listing (plus two references to the song) - by Harkness of Preston in the Madden Collection. Mick |
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Subject: Lyr Add: BLACKBIRD AND THRUSH (from Bodleian) From: nutty Date: 02 Jun 08 - 04:47 PM Sorry but the above was from me - I'd lost my cookie I have transcribed the words from The Blackbird and Thrush mentioned above ^^ BLACKBIRD AND THRUSH (from Bodleian) How pleasant and delightful is the bright summer's morn When the hills and the valleys were covered in corn The blackbird and thrush sing on every green tree And the lark sing melodious by the dawning of the day As a soldier and his true love their pleasure did take Said the soldier to his true love I must you forsake I am going to cross the ocean where the loud cannons roar I must go and leave my Nancy the girl I adore Three heavy sighs she gave saying , Jemmy my dear Are you going to leave me in sorrow and despair Are you going to leave me in sorrow to complain While you from the Indies do return back again Fare well my dear charmer I can no longer stay For our ships sails are hoisted and I must away I'm going to the ocean with a sweet pleasant tide And when I return love I will make you my bride Then the ring from her finger she instantly drew Take this dearest Jemmy and more you shall have And while they were embracing tears down her eyes did flow May heaven go with you wherever you go The earliest broadside I found in the Bodleian is dated ..... Printers: Bebbington, J.O. (Manchester); Beaumont, J. (Leeds) Date: between 1855 and 1858 Imprint: J.O. Bebbington, Printer, 26, Goulden-street, Oldham Road, Manchester, sold by J. Beaumont, 176, York Street, Leeds. Printer's Series: (346). Ballads on sheet: 3 Copies: Firth c.26(295) |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: GUEST Date: 02 Jun 08 - 04:30 PM Sorry it's taken me so long to find this but the song exists on a broadside in the Bodleian Libraray and is much earlier than the 1939 previously mentioned although unfortunately a date is not given Printer: Plant, T. and W. (Nottingham) Date: [s.a.] Imprint: T. & W. Plant, Printers, Clare Street, Nottingham Illus. Ballads on sheet: 2 Copies: Harding B 11(2059) Ballads: 1. The lark and her nestlings ("A lark fed her nestlings one day in the corn ...") 2. The blackbird and thursh [sic] ("How pleasant and delightful is the bright summer's morn ...") |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Phil Edwards Date: 02 Jun 08 - 03:10 PM Thanks - don't know how I missed that. So it goes back to 1939 and Bert Lloyd - or at least a microphone held by Bert Lloyd. Interesting that Paul Clayton recorded a bluegrass version. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: John MacKenzie Date: 02 Jun 08 - 02:54 PM Earlier thread here , with quoted collection facts. G |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Bonnie Shaljean Date: 02 Jun 08 - 02:52 PM Phil - are you after the history of the song itself, or history of recordings? (Def & I cross-posted.) |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Bonnie Shaljean Date: 02 Jun 08 - 02:51 PM A. L. Lloyd makes a reference to it in Folk Song In England - if somebody doesn't beat me to it I'll look it up but can't right at the minute. |
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Subject: RE: Pleasant and delightful From: Def Shepard Date: 02 Jun 08 - 02:50 PM so far I've found the Louis Killen link a midnight folk concert in London in1963 which was recorded by Decca for the LP Hootenanny in London. plus two later recordings by Shirley Collins, on her records Anthems in Eden and Amaranth. Still hunting for any earlier recordings though. :-) |
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Subject: Pleasant and delightful From: Phil Edwards Date: 02 Jun 08 - 02:43 PM Are there any sightings of this song before Louis Killen sang (and recorded) it in the early 60s? |
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