Origins: Musha ringum duram da...

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 21 Dec 17 - 07:52 AM

If it does mean anything it would be more like a corruption of “rince (rinka) do mo da “ I'd have thought . Dance to your daddy

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: Thompson
Date: 21 Dec 17 - 05:38 PM

Má 'sea = If it be so

Ring dum a doorum da = mouth music of the kind that's used in singing all over the world, like the scat (skat?) in American black city music, like Cab Calloway's Hidey hidey hidey hi, hodey hodey hodey ho, heedey heedey heedy he, skiddly-boom skiddly-ba skiddly… umm, he loses me at that stage. But that's what it is. Vocal play, just for fun.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 06:03 AM

I'm not so sure,Thompson .Mouth music as sang in English language Irish songs could in some instances have been attempts at imitating the old gaelic. The first Google search entry for the song Juice Of The Barley For Me gives the chorus as:
" Singing banya na mo if an ganna. And the juice of the barley for me."
That's the way I always used to sing it thinking it was just mouth music .
Check out the Buttermilk Hill chorus as sung by Peter Paul and Mary:
Shule, shule, shule-a-roo
Shule-a-rak-shak, shule-a-ba-ba-coo
See this link for how the original Gaelic chorus became "splendidly mangled" :
https://mainlynorfolk.info/folk/songs/shuleagra.html

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: Thompson
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 06:59 AM

Yeah, but anyone hearing banya na mo etc will immediately recognise it as bainne na mbó is na gamhna (the milk of the cow and the heifer), and shule a roo as siúl a rún (go, my darling) and so on.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 07:48 AM

as I said , I didn't know that the "bainne na mbó is na gamhna" chorus meant anything until I started to learn a cupla focal . I grew up in England . How many in the Appalachian mountains would have immediately recognised that they were singing a corrupted version of siúl a rún? Had you asked some good ol' boy a hundred years ago they would   have said "'t'ain't supposed to mean nothing , just a bit a ol' time mouth music." I imagine so anyway lol!

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 08:05 AM

When I moved to Ireland I heard a friend’s five year old singing “Ta mamai is teach , duirt dadio ta mamai’s is teach” ( not sure if that’s the right gaelic, I still cant speak it ! ) . It was to the same tune as a football chant used to be sung in England.”We won the cup ee I addio we won the cup”The addio bit is “daddio” as gailge ,the teach sounded like “cup”. (It could be the case that the Irish kid’s song was taken from the English football chant by the Irish nianra , mind you .I’ve tried to find a link to the song Do you know the one I’m talking about?)

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: Thompson
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 08:32 AM

I don't, but it's "Mammy's coming, said Daddy, Mammy is coming" and it's really Tá Mamaí ag teacht. Unless it's Tá Mamaí san teach, or "Mammy's in the house".

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: Thompson
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 08:33 AM

Sorry, I mean "said Granddad" if it's Daideó.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 08:47 AM

talking about corruption, how come my apostrophes comes out as question marks?

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 08:57 AM

I think it could be a case of gibberish made up to sound Irish , interspersed with real Irish words as heard by second or third generation Irish people. Which is not to say that some choruses aren't completely made-up .

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 23 Dec 17 - 09:00 AM

"Tá Mamaí ag teacht". Yes, that's what my friend told me it was at the time

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: Gallus Moll
Date: 24 Dec 17 - 07:08 PM

Regarding what appear to be nonsense words / choruses, there was someone in the North - Shetland? Orkney? Caithness? - a number of years ago who was singing what appeared to be a nonsense song/rhyme- till the right person heard him and realised it was a fragment of Norn, and the song was the remains of the ballad of King Orfeo.

I think there's details of this in John Purser's book (Music of Scotland?) , and I also think I heard Archie Fisher speaking about it on Travelling Folk many years ago -- -

I will take so long to seek out the information I am sure someone will be able to elaborate on this much sooner than I shall!

- However - sometimes the nonsense words are not actually so?!

(I can sing a number of foreign songs eg the Norwegian National Anthem, without having a clue as to what the words mean. I am quick at picking up and remembering songs by ear---some are from over 50 years ago.)

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Dec 17 - 05:12 AM

There's also a long tradition of mouth-music - nonsense syllables spoken fast or sung for the heck of it - in Ireland.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: mayomick
Date: 27 Dec 17 - 12:25 PM

something on what Gallus Moll wrote about the fragment the ballad of King Orfeo at the link below .......from the singing of John Stickle of Unst recorded in 1952 ...."Apparently Stickle himself thought the song to be something of a nonsense lyric and was totally unaware of its rarity."

https://mainlynorfolk.info/steeleye.span/songs/orfeo.html

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: GUEST,Y Garth
Date: 03 Jan 18 - 06:07 PM

Well, Captain Farrell would be English, so there'd be no point in talking to him with any sort of heavenly language. I've got something that seems to make sense to me (given the circumstances):

"Push your ring, dummer do, dumb or die."

That would be, "Shove your ring over here dumb person, remain dumb or you'll die..."

If you push your ring off your finger you hand is outstretched and in full view. If you pull your ring off your finger your hands are crooked and close to your body and may be concealing something, or may quickly grab a weopon from inside your clothing.

Roadside arguments, and pleas for clemency were the bane of a highwayman's life, hence silence was a requirement (in this case anyway). A dumber or dummer was a mute person in those days.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Sep 21 - 11:57 PM

The devil is in the woman.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 01:34 PM

I know it was 4 years ago but if Mick is still interested the kids' song he was after is the ring game 'The Farmer wants a wife'

The farmer wants a wife
The farmer wants a wife
Ee I addio
The farmer wants a wife

etc. a choosing game ending with the dog being patted sometimes quite forcibly by all the rest.

We all pat the dog etc.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: GUEST,Pet
Date: 11 Dec 21 - 08:47 AM

Such a fan of Lizzie, I know its an old folk song. But its been fascinating reading. Its funny too because I thought it meant a 'Ring of Mushrooms" as in a fairy ring.

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: meself
Date: 11 Dec 21 - 12:01 PM

"Captain Farrell would be English" - Of course - with a name like 'Farrell'! (Yeah, I know: the post referred to is a few years old, but - couldn't help it ... !)

Subject: RE: Origins: Musha ringum duram da...
From: GUEST,KESx
Date: 05 Jun 22 - 01:27 PM

context: it's a retelling of a story. He was betrayed by his lover.
She got him drunk in their chamber as part of the betrayal (the devil is in her)

after centuries of it being heard, rhymed, scatted - we get what we hear.

This may be what he said in the chamber...

"Indeed, lets drink (indeed! (musha) he realizes the betrayal now in the song)

(she says:) all of it my old man (whack fol da daddi-o)

there's whiskey in the jar

He repeats the betrayal in the song as things get worse

2cents :)