Lyr Add: Charles Augustus

Subject: Lyr Add: CHARLES AUGUSTUS
From: Andrus
Date: 23 Oct 09 - 12:41 AM

My grandfather used to sing this song. He's gone now, and my mother has no memory of where, exactly, it came from. I'm hoping this rings a bell for someone. I've searched for it fairly extensively, and have come up with nothing...

And please forgive the pathetic attempt to spell the word that is supposed to sound like "fuh-lye." If I sat here long enough to come up with a spelling I was satisfied with, I'd never get this posted.

This is how I remember it:

^^
CHARLES AUGUSTUS

Oh, I'll tell you now a tale
Of a gay young cavalier who
Not many years ago,
Lived in this town right here
His name was Charles Augustus
And divinely he could sing
And he was a clerk at a dry goods store
And he wore a diamond ring.

(chorus)
Whack!
Tilly fa-lie fa-lay
Fa-lie fa-lay fa-lay whack!
Tilly fa-lie fa-lay, and he wore a diamond ring.


Well, he had a grand mustache
His hair hung down in curls, oh!
What a fellow to smash
Said unsuspecting girls.
Sly glances he would fling
As he passed them on the street
What a handsome ladies man
With his elegant diamond ring

(chorus)

To parties he would go
And with the girls he'd flirt oh!
What a handsome catch (?)
the girls would all assert
He had plenty of cash on hand
And all that sort of thing
And he wore a two-forty coat
And he flashed his diamond ring

(chorus)

At last suspicion came
To his employer's mind, oh
Charles Augustus' clothes
Were all together too fine
So watch was set on him
To stop that sort of thing
And they caught that handsome clerk
Doing "this" with his diamond ring

(chorus)

Well they had him up in court
Before a judge he was tried, oh
Since the case was plain
His guilt was not denied
So they sent him for his health
To the village of sing-sing
To play checkers with his nose
Without any diamond ring

(chorus)



Any bells? Anyone? Help!! And

–– Andrus

---

Click to Play

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Oct 09 - 01:07 AM

Interesting song, Andrus. Any way you can send a MIDI of the tune to me for posting?
-Joe-
[e-mail]


Oh, and I didn't find anything about the song, but I found a great map of the Village of Sing Sing.

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 23 Oct 09 - 01:29 AM

Of course... as soon as I figure out how to make a midi file. :)

but, yes.

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 23 Oct 09 - 01:33 AM

and very cool map of sing-sing.

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Oct 09 - 02:19 PM

refresh - we need more information on this song.

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Barbara
Date: 23 Oct 09 - 11:33 PM

Joe sicced me on transcribing your mp3. I should have it up in a day or two.
Is "this" in the song accompanied by any gesture? It occurs to me that diamonds make excellent glass cutters, but other than that, I couldn't think of what he might be doing.
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 24 Oct 09 - 04:11 AM

Yes! The "this" is a of swipe of the hand (as in stealing from the cash drawer).

And THANK you so much for the hep with the file!

––Andrus

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 24 Oct 09 - 08:15 PM

refresh

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Barbara
Date: 26 Oct 09 - 05:42 PM

Andrus, I haven't forgotten you, I've just been busy. Things will slow down a bit tomorrow, and I'll try to find time to transcribe the tune. It's sitting here waiting for me.
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 30 Oct 09 - 02:21 PM

refresh

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Barbara
Date: 30 Oct 09 - 06:58 PM

Hi Andrus, I haven't forgotten you or the tune. I just spent a while transcribing it and I have the notes down (piece'a' cake) but not the time, Agggh. See this handful of hair. Time is always my undoing.
Soon tho.
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 31 Oct 09 - 03:13 AM

I can sing it into a quicktime file and email it to you, if that would help...?   Let me know! I'm sorry if it's a pain. I may be able to find someone out here who can help me... ?

––Andrus

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Barbara
Date: 31 Oct 09 - 01:30 PM

I have the mp3 you sent Joe. There's nothing the matter with that file, it's just me, trying to learn about compound times. I'll take another swing at it today.
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Barbara
Date: 01 Nov 09 - 06:37 PM

Hi Andrus,
I just posted the midi to Joe. If you want to pm me your email, I'll send you a copy too.
I'm not sure I've got the time right on the last two lines of the verse, the part that goes "And he..." Give it a listen and see what you think.
Blessings
Barbara
Oh, and I didn't put in the retard in the middle the way you do. Midis are inflexible that way.

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Joe Offer
Date: 02 Nov 09 - 02:20 AM

Here's Barbara's MIDI:

Click to Play

Thanks, Barbara and Andrus!

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 02 Nov 09 - 03:37 PM

THANK you Barbara! (Sounds great!) And the last line is exactly right, :) Thanks so much for your help. (You too, Joe).

I wish I had more info on where it came from. I'm pretty sure that it was a childhood song of my Grandfather's-- he was born in 1924, and grew up in Hartford, CT.

(Sing Sing prison was completed in 1826.)



Thanks again!

––Andrus

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Barbara
Date: 03 Nov 09 - 03:20 AM

Tell us more about your grandfather. What was his nationality, ethnic background, place of work, stuff like that. Where could he have learned the song? When did he sing it around you? Who else joined him?
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 04 Nov 09 - 02:46 AM

I hope the right mudcatter stumbles onto this thread...

Anyway...
Okay, so I was a few miles off. He grew up in New Haven in the 1920s and 1930s (his father having come from the Hartford area). The Adirondacks in the summers. Of mostly English descent, I believe. (He was a Latin teacher, and his father was in the oil business. My grandfather's uncle (who I believe he spent a fair amount of time with) was the Rev. Joseph Twichell (who lived in West Hartford and was very close friends with Samuel Clemens, I have photos of them on riverboats together, and loafing around on porches, which is fun. But obviously is unrelated).

I remember him singing it to my brother and I at bedtime when we were little, and in the car. (As did my mother).

The family members I've asked so far have no idea where he might have picked up the song. Nobody remembers anyone in the family being particularly "musical," as they put it. And so their best guess is that it came from a nanny or an odd family friend. I'm going to keep digging around. I know that this is not much help.

I do have a vinyl recording of him singing it, at age 28, which he made for my mother for her 4th birthday while he was away for awhile. (The flip side is "Workin' on the Railway :)

Also, my aunt's memory of the lyrics differs slightly from mine. Here they are... and they must be more correct than mine... First of all, things rhyme where they are supposed to, and also I've spent plenty of years wondering what a "240 Coat" was. "Drove a 240 Horse" makes far more sense...LOL :

Oh, I'll tell you now a tale
Of a gay young cavalier who
Not many years ago,
Lived in this town right here
His name was Charles Augustus
And divinely he could sing
And he was a clerk at a dry goods store
And he wore a diamond ring.

CHORUS:

Whack!
Tilly fa-lie fa-lay
Fa-lie fa-lay fa-lay whack!
Tilly fa-lie fa-lay, and he wore a diamond ring.

He'd a handsome black moustache
His hair hung down in curls, oh!
What a man to smash
Those unsuspecting girls.
As he passed them on the street
Sly glances they would fling
What a handsome ladies man
With his elegant diamond ring

(chorus)

To parties he would go
And with the ladies flirt
Oh, what a handsome beau
the girls would all assert
He had plenty of cash on hand
And all that sort of thing
And he drove a 240 horse
And he flashed his diamond ring

(chorus)

Well at last suspicion came
To his employer's mind
That Charles Augustus' clothes
Were all together too fine
So a watch was set on him
To prevent that sort of thing
And they caught that handsome clerk
Doing "this" with his diamond ring

(chorus)

Well they had him up in court
And before a jury tried,
But since the case was plain
No guilt was there denied;
So they sent him for his health
To the village of sing-sing
To play checkers with his nose
Without any diamond ring

(chorus)

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 04 Nov 09 - 02:50 AM

my brother and me. yikes.

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Barbara
Date: 04 Nov 09 - 01:28 PM

The horse is also in Jingle Bells -- two-forty for his speed -- guess it's good. Wonder what the measurement is of? MPH?
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 04 Nov 09 - 02:51 PM

Ha. Yes...

Here's what I found about that on an earlier thread What means240 as his speed :

wo-forty [so called fr. its having once been a trotting record] 1: a speed of a mile in two minutes and forty seconds 2: high speed
--Webster's Third New International Dictionary


––Andrus

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 04 Nov 09 - 02:52 PM

my blue clicky didn't work... hm

http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=86906&messages=11

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 07 Nov 09 - 08:57 PM

refresh

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 23 Nov 09 - 05:55 PM

refresh

Subject: Lyr Add: DIAMOND RING (from Christy's Minstrels)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 01:48 AM

From Christy's Bones and Banjo Melodist by George N. Christy (New York: Dick & Fitzgerald, 1862), page 56:

[Note: No chorus is indicated.]

DIAMOND RING
As sung by Christy's Minstrels

1. I'll sing you in my song,
Of a gay young cavalier,
Who once upon a time lived
In this town right here.
His name was Charles Augustus,
And divinely he could sing
He was clerk in a dry-goods store,
And he wore a diamond ring.

2. He wore a black moustache
His hair hung round in curls
Oh, he was the fellow to smash
The unsuspecting girls.
He'd meet them in the street.
Sly glances they would fling
At the handsome ladies' man,
For he wore a diamond ring.

3. To parties he would go,
And with the ladies flirt.
He was such a charming beau,
The girls would all assert.
Had plenty of cash on hand,
And all that sort of thing.
He drove a two-forty horse,
And he sported a diamond ring.

4. Now things went on quite well.
Our hero cut a dash,
Like many a dandy swell,
On his employer's cash.
But his salary was too small
These luxuries to bring.
He had the run of the drawer,
And he wore a diamond ring.

5. Now at last suspicion rose
In his employer's mind
That Charles Augustus's clothes
Were altogether too fine.
So a watch was set one day
To stop that sort of thing,
And our dry-goods clerk was caught,
Coming this, with his diamond ring.

6. So our dry-goods clerk was taken,
And before a court was tried;
And as his case was clear,
His guilt was not denied.
They sent him for his health
To the village of Sing Sing
To play chequers with his nose
Without any diamond ring.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE DIAMOND RING (Tony Pastor)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 02:32 AM

Better still, from the sheet music at The Library of Congress American Memory Collection:


THE DIAMOND RING
By Tony Pastor. Arranged by T. B.
New York: C. H. Ditson & Co., 1877.

1. I'll sing you in my song of a gay young cavalier,
Who once upon a time lived in this town right here.
His name was Charles Augustus, and divinely he did sing.
He was clerk in a dry-goods store, and he wore a diamond ring.

Chorus: Ri tid de fa ral ri tid de fa ral ri tid de fa ral de ro.

2. He wore a black moustache. His hair hung round in curls.
Oh, he was the fellow to mash the unsuspecting girls.
When they met him in the street, sly glances they would fling
At the handsome ladies' man, for he wore a diamond ring.

3. To parties he would go, and with the ladies flirt.
He was such a charming beau, the girls would all assert.
He had lots of cash on hand, and all that sort of thing.
He drove a two-forty horse, and he wore a diamond ring.

4. Now things went on quite gay. Our hero cut a dash,
Like many a dandy swell, with his employer's cash.
His salary was too small to stand this sort of thing,
But he had the run of the drawer, and he wore a diamond ring.

5. At last suspicion arose in his employer's mind
That Charles Augustus's clothes were altogether too fine.
A watch was set on him to stop this sort of thing,
And our dry-goods clerk was caught "coming this" with his diamond ring.

6. Our gay young cavalier before a court was tried,
And as his guilt was clear, of course was not denied.
They sent him for his health to the village of Sing-Sing
To play checkers with his nose without any diamond ring.

Subject: RE: Origins: Charles Augustus
From: Andrus
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 03:48 AM

WOW. I had stopped checking this thread. Thank you, Jim! Incredible. YAY!!!