Hostile baby rocking songs

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 02:46 AM

Traditional Native (American) Potery from this link

www.brandonu.ca/Library/CJNS/5.1/grant.pdf


"Many lullabies are recorded which were the special domain of the women
They range from the Creek "Cradle Song," which has many similarities to
poetry from Western cultures, to some rather startling Blackfoot lullabies which
are guaranteed to subdue even the rowdiest youngster.

Cradle Song
(Creek)

Down the stream
You hear the noise of her going
That is what they say
Up the stream
Running unseen
Running unseen
Up the stream
You hear the noise of her going
That is what they say
to the top of the bald peak
Running unseen
Running unseen.         (Sanders and Peek, 1973:57)

Lullabies
(Blackfoot)

I

Come wolf, bite this baby:
He won't sleep

II

Come, old woman, with your meatpounder
And smash this baby's head;
He won't sleep.         (Colombo, 1983 I:60)

-snip-

I read in another link

(google Blackfoot Lullabies and Language Revitalization)

that the Blackfoot lullabies are considered by adults to be funny not threatening and are demonstrated as such. In the other link the "Wolf" was translated as "coyote."

Don't know why but since I loaded Google Chrome browser I can't get blue clicky maker to follow PDF links.

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 03:24 AM

This is part of a tale we recorded from small farmer Francie Kennelly, here in West Clare (Ireland) some years ago.
The story tells of a peat-cutter's wife having an affair with a young neighbour.
She arranges for the lover to visit when her husband goes to make a long delivery very early on morning, but the husband returns before the lover arrives because of the bad weather :

.......But they (husband and wife) was no length in the bed anyway, when the knock came to the window (knocks table). Of course, the wife was in terrible hot water, she was expecting this man.
Well, someone belonging to her must be a poet anyway, but she had nothing to do and she had to think and think quick. The knock came to the window again anyway, (knocks table) like that, and she took up her child out of the cradle, that was about ten or eleven months, and you know yourself, when you take up a child, they cry. And she had to start... she started singing for the child. She had to make up this quick now; as I said before, someone belonging to her must be a poet:

(Sung:)
"The wind and the rain brought your daddy home again,
Go away from the window, you big bogey-man."

'Course, the whole time the husband thought 'twas for the child she was singing. But the knock came to the window again (knocks table) and she sung it again:

(Sung:)
"The wind and the rain brought your daddy home again
Go away from the window, you big bogey-man."

And the child crying the whole time. But that way himself, the man outside didn't ... he didn't catch on, he didn't catch on. He was knocking again (knocks table) and she had to put a few more lines to it; quick she had to do it and do it quick.

(Sung:)
"The wind and the rain brought your daddy home again
Go away from the window, you big bogey-man.
For you are a thundering fool, go round and see your mule,
Go away from the window, you big bogey-man,"

He went around and he saw the mule and he knew well there was something wrong, that the man had turned. He went home anyway. But the following night was a grand fine night and he had no trouble at all when he came up.

The tale seems to have survived as an English song - minus the body of the story - entitled 'Go From My Window'
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Megan L
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 03:29 AM

Ok I had a bad night and i'm tired but the mental picture of hostile babies rockin did make me giggle.

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 06:19 AM

Hi Azizi –

If you click on the blue banjo-&-catfish logo at the top of the screen, then scroll about halfway down the page, you'll see four links which lead to different Amazon outlets (USA, Britain, France & Canada). Whenever you're visiting Amazon, if you access it through those links Mudcat will get a cut of the profits from anything you buy. I also think the traffic-volume from just using them could be beneficial too, so perhaps even merely clicking those links may help in some way, whether a purchase is made or not. (I'm not sure about that last point: can anyone enlighten me?)

Anyway, you want to check out both the Amazon.com site and also the British one, Amazon.co.uk (the first two on that page, amazon.mudcat and amazonUK.mudcat). because the Warner book was originally published in England. (Marina Warner is – or at least was – a Visiting Fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge.)

You'll probably also want to take a look at another book of hers, From The Beast To The Blonde: On Fairy Tales And Their Tellers which is just as good. The "Briggs" award is the Katharine Briggs Folklore Award, which I know little about, but I expect it's google-able. (If you want to look at only British web pages, you should be able to do this by going to www.google.co.uk and then asking it to narrow the search to the UK; ditto Ireland if you type www.google.ie – but I'm not sure if one can do that from there – worth a try, though.)

When you get to each of the two Amazon sites, narrow the search to Books and then do two separate ones: "Warner Bogeyman" and "Warner Beast Blonde" (if you leave the Blonde out, you'll get Warner Bros films!) which takes you to these titles. Try this with the UK one too, using the same search terms. Or, you can just search "Marina Warner" if you want to look at her other work too. She did a wonderful book on the imagery and lore concerning the Virgin Mary ("Alone Of All Her Sex") which is superb too.

Whew! No, I'm not getting an agent's commission . . .

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: CamiSu
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 02:48 PM

Amos--

I was told so long ago I cannot remember by whom that the second of your verses

Aieee, aiooo, my laddy, lie easy
Sure my misfortunes are none of your own.
But it's weary I am with rocking and mourning
And rocking the cradle of a child not my own

was the house slave rocking her master's child while her own was God-knows-where

Cami

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: CamiSu
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 02:51 PM

Amos--

I was told so long ago I can't remember who told me that your second verse

Aieee, aiooo, my laddy, lie easy
Sure my misfortunes are none of your own.
But it's weary I am with rocking and mourning
And rocking the cradle of a child not my own

referred to the house slave rocking her master's child while her own was God-knows-where.

Cami

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: CamiSu
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 02:54 PM

Rats--the first post didna show up til I did the second. Danged steam driven computer!

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 03:09 PM

"And rocking the cradle of a child not my own"
Common in Ireland - not too many hose slaves there - unless you follow 'The Female Eunuch'!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Azizi
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 06:08 PM

Bonnie, thanks for posting that information and those directions.

I appreciate it!

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Amos
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 06:16 PM

Cami:

It may have migrated that way to Amrikay, but the Irish original had this as the next verse:

"I'm sorry, my neighbours, I married this young one!
She favours the neighbors and none of her own!
She goes out all night, out to balls and to parties,
And leaves me here rocking the cradle alone!!


Which seems to indicate it a marital problem rather than a chattel arrangement. Although, I suppose, the two might sometimes be similar....


:D


A

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 06:29 PM

Roud 357, and evidently of C19 Irish origin in that form ( broadsides: Rocking the Cradle ); though the basic pattern is found in English broadside songs back as far as Lawrence Price's 'Rocke the cradle John' of c.1635:

Rocke the Cradle, rocke the Cradle, rocke the cradle John,
Ther's many a man rockes the cradle, when the childs none of his owne.

Of course, it isn't a lullaby, but a song about a man singing one. Any reference to slavery is likely to be a modern gloss. See past discussions here for more detail.

'Go From My Window' (Roud 966) is interesting, too. See thread Lyr Req: A parody of 'go from my window' for some of its early history. A L Lloyd (Folk Song in England, 186-190) goes into further detail, including the point that the accompanying story was also known in England (Baring-Gould heard it from a Dartmoor blacksmith) though, as Jim has said, the song seems more usually to have been sung without additional apparatus, which probably evolved in order to explain what had originally been obvious in the song itself.

Again, a song about a lullaby rather than a lullaby as such, though Lloyd quoted from several Spanish analogues which were actually used as lullabys in their own right.

Subject: Lyr Add: HUSH LITTLE BABY (violent parody)
From: Charley Noble
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 08:26 PM

I've posted this song that my mother composed before on this forum. Some reacted in abject horror but they just don't understand how hostile baby rocking songs relieve tension:

Words by Dahlov Ipcar, Circa 1970
Parody of "Hush Little Baby"

Hush, Little Baby-2

Hush, little baby, don't you cry;
Mama's gonna pock you in the eye;
If that pock in the eye don't hurt,
Mama's gonna rub your face in the dirt;

If that dirt don't make you sore,
Mama's gonna wallop you some more;
If that walloping don't make you sick,
Mama's gonna whack you with a stick.

If that whacking don't break some bones,
Mama's gonna hit you with some stones;
If those stones don't hurt you none,
Mama's gonna shoot you with a gun.

If that gun don't kill you dead,
Mama's gonna bash you in the head;
If that bashin' seems like fun,
You're sure a tough little son-of-a-gun!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Rowan
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 10:03 PM

Malcolm (and Amos and CamiSu), there's a similar song in Oz (and thus much later than the ones Malcolm gave) called "The young man from Kiandra". Kiandra was a gold town in the Australian Alps and is known as the location of the world's oldest ski club.

It's sung to a slow 3/4 rhythm and has been used as a lullaby but seems to have no hostile intent towards the baby, nor any reference to chattels; more a reflective (and self-pitying) lament on the theme of "marry in haste and repent at leisure.

The first verse is as follows; I'll try and dig up the rest (another three verses and same chorus) later.

I am a young man from the town of Kiandra,
I married a young woman to comfort my home.
She goes out and she leaves me and cruelly deceives me
and leaves me with a baby that's none of my own.

Ch.
Oh dear, rue the day ever I married,
How I do wish I were single again.
She goes out and she leaves me and cruelly deceives me
and leaves me with a baby that's none of my own.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 10:25 PM

That one's in the DT and at least one of the past discussions I mentioned. I gather that Bert Lloyd was responsible for changing the original location to 'Kiandra'.

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 01:19 PM

I'm not sure whether this one counts as hostile or not: a mother who seems to be uncertain whether the baby that she is singing to, and that is being so troublesome, is really her child or a changeling. The song is Changeling's Lullaby on the CD "Changeling" (Wildgoose Studios WGS315CD). The sleeve notes say
"This song started as a fairly bleak and random thought of Gavin's on whether some of the mythology of the Changeling had a link to women's experience of Post Natal Depression (on which he says he's no expert!) and he managed to get a song out of it. Jess wrote the tine and sings it here."

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Jayto
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 03:06 PM

My girlfriend scolded me last night for singing the Sex Pistols and the Vandals to our newborn daughter as I rocked her just last night. I guess we all have different ideas of baby songs lol. I did make a sweet nursery type melody for Anarchy Burger and God Save the Queen though. I thought it was sweet :)
cya
JT

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: Michael
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 04:18 PM

I don't think anybody's mentioned "All My Trials"

'Hush little baby don't you cry
You know your Mamma was born to die"

It seems to work (as a lullaby that is) with my children and grand children.


Mike

Subject: RE: Hostile baby rocking songs
From: GUEST,McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 04:40 PM

I always wondered why she should fly home if it was on fire and her kids weren't there anyway said katlaughing.

That's because kat evidently didn't hear the full version - which continues (with variants, of course

All except one, and her name is Ann,
And she has crept under the warming pan.

So she's being told there may still be time to save one. Except, of course, there's no real fire - it's all just a fib to get her to get out of a dangerous environment where she could get squashed, and go off home.