Lyr/Tune Req: Mary of the Wild Moor

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: Mary of the Wild Moor
From: Joybell
Date: 09 Aug 13 - 08:32 PM

Thank you so much, Guest. What a great study.
Joy

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: Mary of the Wild Moor
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Aug 13 - 12:24 AM

There's more here than most people would want to know about Mary.

http://www.justanothertune.com/html/maryofthewildmoor.html

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: Mary of the Wild Moor
From: Joybell
Date: 07 Aug 13 - 05:23 PM

I've wondered about Mary being a "gay village bride". I thought she'd gone astray after her marriage. I've also wondered if we're supposed to believe that her father was actually hard of hearing. He clearly didn't know Mary was on her way home. Either way shame is implied. She was "wandering home". The image is of a lost and fallen woman.
Joy

Subject: ADD Version: Mary of the Wild Moor
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 Aug 13 - 01:56 AM

MARY OF THE WILD MOOR
(Joseph W. Turner, 1845)
As recorded by Johnny Cash on "American III: Solitary Man" (2000)

It was on one cold winter night
When the wind blew across the wild moor,
When Mary came wandering home with her child
Till she came to her own father's door.

"Father, dear father," she cried.
"Come down and open the door,
Or the child in my arms will perish and die
From the winds that blow across the wild moor."

But her father was deaf to her cry.
Not a sound of her voice did he hear,
So the watchdog did howl and the village bells tolled
And the wind blew across the wild moor.

Oh, how the old man must have felt
When he came to the door the next morn
And he found Mary dead, but the child still alive
Closely grasping his dead mother's arm!

In grief, the old man passed away,
And the child to its mother went soon,
And no one, they say, lives there to this day
And the cottage to ruin has gone.

But the villagers point out the spot
Where the willows grew over the door,
Saying: "There Mary died, once the gay village bride,
From the wind that blew across the wild moor."


Source: Johnny Cash - Mary Of The Wild Moor Lyrics | MetroLyrics
http://www.metrolyrics.com/mary-of-the-wild-moor-lyrics-johnny-cash.html (corrected)

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Here's a recording of the song by Johnny Cash: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDOSOWj86MM



And by the Louvin Brothers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJrKke0sf0s

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Joe Offer sez: Here's the Traditional Ballad Index entry on this song:

Mary of the Wild Moor [Laws P21]

DESCRIPTION: Abandoned Mary comes with her child to her father's door on a bitter winter night. Her father fails to hear or ignores her cries, leaving her all night on the doorstep. In the morning he finds her body. He dies of grief and the child of neglect
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: before 1839 (broadside, Bodleian Johnson Ballads fol. 27)
KEYWORDS: death father children family hardheartedness grief
FOUND IN: US(Ap,MA,MW,NE,Ro,SE,So) Britain(England(North),Scotland(Aber)) Canada(Mar,Newf,Ont) Ireland
REFERENCES (38 citations):
Laws P21, "Mary of the Wild Moor"
Thompson-Pioneer 85, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text)
Sturgis/Hughes, pp. 44-46, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
GreigDuncan6 1175, "Why Did I Leave My Auld Hame?" (1 text, 1 tune)
Williams-Thames, pp. 213-214, "The Wind Across the Wild Moor" (1 text) (also Wiltshire-WSRO Gl 89)
Kidson-Tunes, pp. 77-78, "Mary Across the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
RoudBishop #124, "Mary Across the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Graham/Holmes 48, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Belden, pp. 207-208, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text plus references to 5 more)
Randolph 72, "The Wild Moor" (3 texts, 3 tunes)
Randolph/Cohen, pp. 107-108, "The Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune -- Randolph's 72A)
Moore-Southwest 111, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Owens-1ed, pp. 75-77, "The Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Owens-2ed, pp. 69-70, "The Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Eddy 88, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Peters, p. 216, "Young Mary" (1 text, 1 tune)
Brewster 45, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text)
Neely, p. 149, "Mary o' the Wild Moor" (1 text)
BrownII 78, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text)
BrownSchinhanIV 78, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (3 excerpts, 3 tunes)
Joyner, pp. 51-52, "Mary on the Wild Moor" (1 reconstructed text, 1 tune)
Morris, #213, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text)
Scarborough-SongCatcher, pp. 335-336, "The Wind That Blew O'er the Wild Moor" (1 text, with local title "Poor Mary"; tune on p. 448)
Hubbard, #114, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Stout 20, pp. 28-30, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (3 texts)
Leach, pp. 733-734, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text)
Leach-Labrador 62, "Mary Across the Wild Moor" (1 text)
Mackenzie 61, "The Village Pride" (1 text)
McNeil-SFB1, pp. 132-134, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Sandburg, p. 466, "When Mary Came Wandering Home" (1 fragment, 1 tune)
Botkin-NEFolklr, pp. 548-549, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text, 1 tune)
LPound-ABS, 35, pp. 81-82, "Mary o' the Wild Moor" (1 text)
JHCox 148, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text plus mention of 3 more)
JHCoxIIA, #27, p. 103, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 fragment, 1 tune)
DSB2, p. 28, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (1 text)
WolfAmericanSongSheets, #1393, p. 95, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (2 references)
cf. Gardner/Chickering, p. 481, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (source notes only)
DT 503, WILDMOOR* WLDMOOR1*
ST LP21 (Full)
Roud #155
RECORDINGS:
Blue Sky Boys, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (Bluebird B-8446/Montgomery Ward M-8667, 1940)
Letys Murrin, "Mary of the Wild Moor" (on Ontario1)
BROADSIDES:
Bodleian, Johnson Ballads fol. 27[many illegible words], "Mary of the Moor," J. Catnach (London), 1813-1838; also Johnson Ballads 1802 View 2 of 2, Harding B 11(3), Harding B 11(2364), Harding B 11(2365), Harding B 11(1501), Firth c.12(443), Harding B 11(4232), Harding B 11(4233), Firth b.25(147), Harding B 15(188b), "Mary of the Moor"; Firth b.27(69), Harding B 26(600), "Poor Mary of the Wild Moor"; Firth b.34(229), Firth c.26(275)[some illegible lines], 2806 c.16(261), 2806 c.14(78), 2806 c.14(13)[some illegible words], "Mary of the Wild Moor[!]"; Harding B 11(2789), Harding B 17(243b), Harding B 25(1538)[some illegible lines], 2806 c.18(252) [some illegible/missing words], "Poor Mary of the Moor"
LOCSheet, sm1882 10438, "Mary of the Wild Moor," Oliver Ditson & Co. (Boston), 1882 (tune)
LOCSinging, sb30333b, "Mary of the Wild Moor," H. De Marsans (New York), 1861-1864; also as108620, as108630, "Mary of the Wild Moor"
Murray, Mu23-y4:018, "Poor Mary of the Wild Moor," unknown, 19C
NLScotland, L.C.178.A.2(072), "Poor Mary of the Wild Moor", unknown, c.1860
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Fatal Snowstorm" [Laws P20] (theme)
SAME TUNE:
Robin's Petition (per broadside Bodleian Harding B 25(1538))
NOTES: Quoted by Laura Ingalls Wilder in chapter 14 of By the Shores of Silver Lake. She does not repeat the sad ending, of course. - RBW
Broadside LOCSinging sb30333b: H. De Marsans dating per Studying Nineteenth-Century Popular Song by Paul Charosh in American Music, Winter 1997, Vol 15.4, Table 1, available at FindArticles site. - BS
Last updated in version 4.1
File: LP21

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Subject: RE: Tune Req: Mary of the Wild Moor
From: mg
Date: 07 Aug 13 - 01:21 AM

great song. also, i wondered for years about a tune for gift of the sea by kipling..another sad story about a dead child. you have to cut the words way down but it makes a wonderful song.

Subject: Lyr Add: MARY OF THE WILD MOOR
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 07 Aug 13 - 01:17 AM

From The Shilling Song Book [Boston : O. Ditson & Co., 1860], page 41:


MARY OF THE WILD MOOR

1. One night when the wind it blew cold—
Blew bitter across the wild moor,
Young Mary, she came with her child,
Wandering home to her own father's door,—
Crying, "Father, O, pray let me in!
Take pity on me, I implore!
Or the child at my bosom will die
From the winds that blow 'cross the wild moor!

2. "O, why did I leave this fair cot,
Where once I was happy and free?
Doomed to roam without friends or a home!
O, father, take pity on me!"
But her father was deaf to her cries,—
Not a voice or a sound reach'd the door;
But the watch-dogs did bark, and the winds
Blew bitter across the wild moor.

3. O, how must her father have felt,
When he came to the door in morn!—
There he found Mary dead, and the child
Fondly clasped in its dead mother's arms;—
While in frenzy he tore his gray hairs,
As on Mary he gazed at the door!
For that night she had perished and died,
From the winds that blew 'cross the wild moor.

4. The father in grief pined away;
The child to the grave was soon borne;
And no one lives there to this day,
For the cottage to ruin has gone.
The villagers point out the spot
Where a willow droops over the door,
Saying, "There Mary perished and died
From the winds that blew 'cross the wild moor!"

Subject: RE: mary of the wild moor
From: jofield
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 11:41 PM

The version shown here is a rather florid interpretation -- though obviously the original, if copyrights are to be believed -- compared to the more soulful and "traditonal American" version of the Blue Sky Boys.

James in Bristol, RI

PS -- In the final verse the Blue Sky Boys sing "...Saying there Mary died, once a gay village bride, by the winds that blow 'cross the wild moor.", making it clear that she did not leave home in disgrace.

Subject: RE: mary of the wild moor
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 05:09 PM

Little Mohee/Mohea, or the Indian Lass, is in DT with music. Search on (Laws) 'H8'. DT #648 gives that and another song.

Subject: RE: mary of the wild moor
From: Pene Azul
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 12:27 AM

Sheet music to MARY OF THE WILD MOOR at The Lester S. Levy Collection of Sheet Music.

(also emailed)

PA

Subject: mary of the wild moor
From:
Date: 20 Aug 00 - 12:10 AM

Can anyone help me find the sheet music to Mary of the Wild Moor. Also looking for Little Mohee.

Thank you

Debi