Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 05 Jan 13 - 09:44 AM

Ouch!

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: Charley Noble
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 06:02 PM

And note that the final verse is an appeal for affirmative action, "A jolly lot more like that handsome cabin boy."

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 12:51 PM

I don't find it melodramatic, just hilarious.

Anyway, trite melodrama, done right, can be as satisfying as any other method - emotionally if not intellectually.

Last night I watched the great Shirley Temple in "The Littlest Rebel" (1935), an unbelievably sentimental tale of the American Civil War: Lincoln was in it too, with Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, and how can you beat that combination?

What made it work was everything *except* a nonexistent commitment to gritty realism. Just like "The Handsome Cabin Boy."

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST,SirCoughsalot
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 11:14 AM

I'm sorry, I keep forgetting to add my name!

On the recording I heard of Billy Faier doing it, he said he got into an argument with a good friend of his about it, who said it was a terrible song. He said that it was true that the song bordered on hopelessly trite melodrama, but the fact that the only reason the girl left home was to find adventure, not to save her mama from prison or her dear old daddy from prison, made him like it very much.

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 11:08 AM

I haven't heard Lloyd's recording of it, just MacColl and Billy Faier, who got the song from MacColl, so it's pretty much the same version. I'd be interested in hearing those other tunes.

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 11:01 AM

MacColl recorded the song in 1956, Lloyd around 1961.

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 11:00 AM

Great job, Threelegs! I enjoyed it!

MacColl sang one tune, Lloyd another, Threelegsofman a third.

I seem to recall a fourth tune, from Canada, that is associated with other songs too.

Point of interest: a local harpist told me three years back that, as far as she knew, her melody (Lloyd's) was called "The Handsome *Galway* Boy."

Many people seem to think of "trad" and "Irish" as practically synonymous.

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST,B.B. Cone
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 05:55 AM

Interesting! I learnt it from the singing of Isobel Sutherland on the album 'A Pinch of Salt' which (I think) pre-dates the MacColl and LLoyd one. Her version doesn't have the D to C chord changes, just the usual tonic, sub-dominant and dominant.

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: Uncle Tone
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 04:01 AM

Or (from memory)

D                         Am               G                        D
It's of a pretty female, as you may understand
D                                        Am               G                              D
Her mind bein' bent for rambling unto some foreign land
D                                          Am                        G                   D
She dressed herself in sailors clothes, or so it does appear
D                                    Am                     C               G         D
And she hired with a captain for to serve him for a year

Tone

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: threelegsoman
Date: 04 Jan 13 - 03:33 AM

My version of this song can be found by following this link:

Handsome Cabin Boy

Whilst Ewan MacColl did sing it, he did not write it. It is a traditional song (Roud 239; Laws N13)

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST
Date: 03 Jan 13 - 08:52 PM

I figured it out almost immediately after I posted it. I play it in E, from a D position capoed at the second fret.

D                         C                D
It's of a pretty female, as you may understand
D                                  G               D
Her mind bein' bent for rambling unto some foreign land
D                                          G               D
She dressed herself in sailors clothes, or so it does appear
D                                    C               G
And she hired with a captain for to serve him for a year

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: Leadfingers
Date: 03 Jan 13 - 08:32 PM

I am fairly sure its a Modal progression

Subject: RE: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Jan 13 - 08:10 PM

The chords run basically from G to F or the equivalent in whatever key you pick to sing it in.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: Chord Req: Handsome Cabin Boy
From: GUEST,SirCoughsalot
Date: 03 Jan 13 - 06:52 PM

I'm looking for the chords to Ewan MacColl's version of the Handsome Cabin Boy. I tried working it out for myself, it seems like there's only two chords but I couldn't figure out if it was E and A or E and D. I figured this would be the place to ask. Thanks.