Lyr Add: Hi Rio, Randy-o! Shanty?

Subject: Lyr Add: Hi Rio, Randy-o! Shanty?
From: Charley Noble
Date: 10 Feb 03 - 04:58 PM

Here's another curious bawdy song from Vance Randolph's ROLL ME IN YOUR ARMS. "Unprintable Songs" Vol. I, pp. 459-460. Curious as it seems related to Stan Hugill's "Rollicking, Randy, Dandy-O!" sea sahnty but with an alternate set of verses.

Hi Rio, Randy-O!

(Traditional as sung by Mr. J. E., Webster groves, Missouri, April 8, 1948; in ROLL ME IN YOUR ARMS by Vance Randolph, pp. 459-460
Tune: Blow the Man Down)

As I was a rambling along the street,
With a ri-o, ri-o, randy-o!
Two gallopin' whores I chanced for to meet,
With a gallopin' roar an' dandy-o!

One she was so very fair…
She called me a stud an' I called her a mare…

The other she had such beautiful locks…
She gave me the clap an' I gave her the pox…

The editor, G. Legman, notes that there were probably additional verses describing the effects of catching venereal disease.

The chorus of Hugill's "Randy Dandy-O" runs:

Now we are ready to head for the Horn,
Way, hey, roll and go!
Our boots and our clothes they are all in the pawn,
With me rollicking, randy, dandy-o!

Any thoughts or other overlapping songs? Legman saw some connection with versions of "The Black Baller" and "Ratcliffe Highway."

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Hi Rio, Randy-o! Shanty?
From: GUEST,lighter
Date: 14 Apr 03 - 04:44 PM

Stan Hugill sang his uncensored version at the Mystic Seaport Sea Music Festival in 1988. It resembled Randolph's version but told also of a painful trip to the surgeon. BTW, I suspect the word in the title of "Galloping Randy Dandy-O" that Hugill admits (in "Shanties from the Seven Seas") to have altered was "Galloping." I believe the original was "ballocky" or perhaps "ballocking."

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Hi Rio, Randy-o! Shanty?
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 14 Apr 03 - 05:21 PM

Ballocky is suggestive of the song "Bollochy Bill the Sailor," often sung by kids as "Barnacle Bill." Ed Cray, "The Erotic Muse," considers the song to be a descendant of "Abel (Abram) Brown the Sailor."
I will post the version in Cray to thread 36791, Abraham Brown the Sailor: Abraham Brown

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Hi Rio, Randy-o! Shanty?
From: Charley Noble
Date: 14 Apr 03 - 06:31 PM

Thanks for the comments!

Charley Noble