Songs about gluttony

Subject: Songs about gluttony
From: Joybell
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 07:11 PM

My Dear-companion and I have been performing a theme concert, at folk festivals here in Australia, on "The Seven Deadly Sins" we have lots of songs about six of them. Enough Lust to last us years. But only "Johnny McEldo" and "I Had But 50 Cents" for gluttony. We prefer traditional or very old songs. Don't want songs about being fat. They are usually nasty and too close to home anyway. Nor songs just about food -- Pure Gluttony is what we are after. Any ideas?

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 07:20 PM

"Stuff Your Guts" Posted thread 54929: Stuff Your Guts

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 07:24 PM

I know this is not on point with the original thread message, but a wonderful song about food and the dangers thereof is
HERE, IN THE DT

It's hilarious.

I don't have access to or knowledge of the original tune, so I crafted my own. I've had very good audience reaction using it. If you want it, perhaps you can catch me on Paltalk, in one of the "LIVE" rooms. Or perhaps I could make an MP3 and send it as an attachment to an Email to anyone who wants it.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 07:37 PM

"Some Little Bug is Going to Find You," sheet music at Levy. 1915.
There was a similar song farther back, but not the one in the DT.

B. H. Burt and Roy Atwell wrote the words, Silvio Hein the music for the version in the DT. Like so many other songs in the DT, the composers are not credited.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: wysiwyg
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 08:13 PM

Attributions. Well, I don't want to spark the ongoing upset/debate/defense on that one. But I would point out that these attribution issues are largely due to a lack of community contribution, not a lack on the part of those who DO contribute to the body of knowledge and song around here. Example-- someone wanted lyrics the other day, I gave them lyrics, as best I could. I do not always have time or resources for an exhaustive source search, but I do often have the words if people want to SING a song. IMO what we need are more like Q and masato, who so often finish the detail on a song thread, so that the good people who harvest songs for the DT have all they need to make a good entry.

~Susan

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: GUEST,Bruce O.
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 08:36 PM

Look for 'Nicholas Wood, the great Gluttton of Kent', c 1632, in the broadside ballad index at www.erols.com/olsonw. His name got mixed up with 'Michol o Cod', who was three years earlier, so "Buffalo Boy" in DT somtimes survived with the wrong name attached to it.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: GUEST,reggie miles
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 12:09 AM

I've submitted this before. A little dittie of mine which pays homage to the Christmas feast and it's consumption. I can never seem to pull myself away the table until I'm as stuffed as a turkey on Christmas morn.

Oh come get a faceful
Christmas dinner's ready
Oh come eat, oh come eat
The turkey is done
Potatoes and dressing
All smothered in gravy
Homemade bread and cookies
Pumpkin pie and whipped cream
Eat until your pants scream
Too tight! No more!

Sung to the tune of, you guessed it, "Oh Come All Ye Faithful"

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From:
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 12:22 AM

Probably the penultimate song of the subject

I Love to Go a-Gorging

Enjoy! I DO!

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: mack/misophist
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 02:29 AM

Not sure about the spelling, but how about Johnny McEldoo?

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 04:16 AM

I know an old lady who swallowed a fly ?

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Padre
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 08:29 AM

"How many biscuits can you eat, this morning,
How many biscuits can you eat this evening,
How many biscuits can you eat?
42, and a ham of meat,
This morning, this evening, right now."

Sung by Charlie Poole (?)

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Margaret V
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 12:11 PM

I'm not sure if you mean you don't want any songs "just about food" at all, but "The Mallard," in which the singer describes eating every last part of the mallard and finally ending up in "debility house" as a result, seems to me the very essence of food gluttony. Can be found on Cliff Haslam, "The Clockwinder."
Cheers, Margaret

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Leadfingers
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 01:59 PM

The Kippers did a cracker called 'The Seven Deadly Sins'which sounds ideal for your purpose.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 02:47 PM

See the other side of the coin; "Eat, Ye Paupers, Eat," thread 62932: Eat, Ye Paupers, Eat

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Joybell
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 06:07 PM

Great. Thanks so much. Lots of good food for thought here. Sorry couldn't help it.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Joybell
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 06:23 PM

George, thank you   We'll include that. It's a winner. Might even have Dear-one do a german yodelling chorus at the end. We'll dedicate it to you. And Reggie's might do that. Also thanks Bruce for your great ballad index and for The Great Glutton of Kent. We already have Johnny McEloo but we might drop it in favour of these others. The Old Lady we had thought of, but couldn't decide if she was a glutton or was just experimenting with alternative healing. Thank you Thank you

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: GUEST,reggie miles
Date: 14 Sep 03 - 09:48 PM

How could I have forgotten this gem. I reworked the melody and did this one at a benefit concert where all the performers participating had to do an Ochs song. It took me a while to locate a song by Phil that I wanted to perform for the event but I finally found this one online and also found a small sound file which gave me the basic melody structure. It's about an actual event that happened in the late 1800's. I think it could be just what you're looking for.

Have fun

The Ballad of Alferd Packer - Phil Ochs


In the state of Colorado
In the year of seventy-four
They crossed the San Juan Mountains
Growing hungry to the core.
Their guide was Alferd Packer
And they trusted him too long:
For his character was weak
And his appetite was strong.

They called him a murderer, a cannibal, a thief.
It just doesn't pay to eat anything but government-inspected beef.

Along the Gunnison River
An Indian camp they spied.
An Indian chief approached them,
To stop them he did try.
He warned them of the danger
In the snow that lay around,
But the danger was in Packer,
For his hunger knew now bound.

They called him a murderer, a cannibal, a thief.
It just doesn't pay to eat anything but government-inspected beef.

Two cold months went slowly by;
Packer came back alone.
"My comrades they all froze to death,
I'm starving," he did moan.
The Indian chief knew how he lied,
He spat upon the ground,
For Packer's belly hung out all over his belt:
He'd gained some thirty pounds.

They called him a murderer, a cannibal, a thief.
It just doesn't pay to eat anything but government-inspected beef.
The Ballad of Alferd Packer cont.


Well for nine long years he ran away
But finally he was tried.
He claimed he didn't kill them,
He only ate their hide.
That County had six dem-o-crats
Until that man arrived.
Well only one lives on today:
He ate the other five.

They called him a murderer, a cannibal, a thief.
It just doesn't pay to eat anything but government-inspected beef.

Eighteen years he stayed in jail,
It was a dreadful fate,
For he suffered indigestion
Every time he ate.
Still, it's hard to blame this hungry guy
Who went searchin' for the mines,
For when he ate his friends
He'd never heard of Duncan Hines.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Charley Noble
Date: 15 Sep 03 - 12:15 PM

There's also the old sea poem "The Rhyme of the Nancy Bell" which describes how the narrator survived by gobbling up the cook, the captain bold, the crew of the captain's gig, the bosun and the midshipman. All rendered in the best of taste! If interested, you can find it somewhere in the DT.

I'm also fond of the old Music Hall version of "Sweeney Todd the Barber."

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Menolly
Date: 15 Sep 03 - 03:33 PM

This song isn't traditional but Dave Summers wrote a lovely song called "Gluttony and Sloth". It mentions all the deadly sins but decides that these two are his favourite. Very funny. Only available on cassette, I believe.
Menolly

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Joybell
Date: 15 Sep 03 - 06:24 PM

Thank you Thank you. I have an idea I've heard the Alferd Packer song. Had forgotten about it. I'm glad I found you all. Me and my dear-companion know a lot of songs -- happens when you get on a bit -- but now we have so many new and helpful friends it's great. We decided on gluttony and sloth as being the sins we like - but there's a lot to be said for lust in the right situation. The last time we did this theme concert the audience seemed to increase when we got to Lust. We were tastful though.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: GUEST,Leslie Butler
Date: 16 Sep 03 - 11:21 AM

How about: The Irish Jubilee, There were Three Men of Bristol City and The Skipper's Wedding; and for (US)Country flavour, The New Lost City Ramblers' 'Chicken Pie' And surely some drinking songs count? Glorious Ale, for example.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: GUEST,Leslie Butler
Date: 16 Sep 03 - 11:37 AM

And oh yeah, there was a sort-of white rap song that got into the UK charts a few years ago done by some feller with a Geordie accent that basically listed all the things he liked to eat and had the refrain: "It really is amazing just how much I like my nosh" or something like that.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Peterr
Date: 16 Sep 03 - 11:45 AM

My mum used to recite this when asked to do a 'turn'. Don't know where it came from, but someone could easily put a tune to it.

Little Thomas was a glutton
He ate four times beef and mutton
Then undid his waistcoat button
And consumed plum duff.

He was told 'You won't get thinner
If you will eat so much dinner
And then finally some inner
Part of you will bust!'

He cried out 'What does it matter
Even if I do get fatter?
Put more pudding on my platter
Let it do it's wust!'

Then one day, and little wonder
There was a report like thunder.
Doors and windows blew asunder
And the cat had fits.

His old nurse cried out, much disgusted
'Drat that boy, he's gone and busted
Just when I had swept and dusted
Leaving such a mess.'

Then the painful task of peeling
Thomas from the walls and ceiling
Gave the family a feeling
Of sincere distress.

Any sorrowing relation
When asked for an explanation
Of the awful detonation
Was obliged to say.

'Russians have not been to bomb us
It was only Little Thomas
Who, alas departed from us
In that noisy way.'

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: LadyJean
Date: 17 Sep 03 - 01:59 AM

My sweet old grandma used to recite the following:
Mary had a little lamb, a little pork, a little jam
some ice cream soda topped with fizz,
and oh how sick our Mary is!

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: JennyO
Date: 17 Sep 03 - 10:43 AM

This is not a song, but my dad used to recite this - a parody of "The boy stood on the burning deck":

The boy stood in the banquet hall,
When all but he had fled.
He'd finished off the cakes and jam,
And nearly done the bread.

"This is my thirteenth cup of tea!"
He cried in accents wild,
"Just one more crust before I bust...."
(He was a vulgar child!)

There came a burst of thunder sound.
The boy - oh where was he?
Just ask the maids who swept him up,
All cakes, and jam, and tea.

Jenny

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Menolly
Date: 17 Sep 03 - 02:08 PM

As I was coming home for tea,
I thought I'd have a luxury!
So off I went to Mother MacPinkles
Bought myself a pennyworth of winkles,
took them home,
put them on a plate
as happy as can be.
I went upstairs,
while all the family
was picking all the big ones out!
Picking all the big ones out!
Did you ever see a fella's face full of wrinkles
when he saw his penny worth of winkles,
all the big ones gone?
It made me rave and shout,
for there were the missus and the seven little kids
picking all the big ones out!

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: open mike
Date: 17 Sep 03 - 05:59 PM

there is a song we sang at summer camp
part of it went:
fried ham, fried ham,
eggs and baloney,
and after the macaroni
we'll have pizza

and i do remember this images form a cartoon
where pporky pig sits strapped to a chair
like a barber's or dentist's
with all sorts of food
being stuffed down him...
pies thst rotate in front of his face,
and corn cobs spinning up against
his teeth....
i think he wore a bib--or a red and white
checkered napkin tied around his neck.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Joybell
Date: 18 Sep 03 - 02:00 AM

Menolly - a friend of mine with an English-music-hall-singer mother sings this song but it's a whole lot naughtier. I think it starts the same way and gets ruder. Of course it's all in the way you use you eyes as you sing. Thanks for the reminder. Thanks to every-one else too. I think the recitation is a winner Jenny - and the Mary one Thanks Lady Jean. Mike Was that Summer camp in America? We'll look out for the cartoon.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: rich-joy
Date: 27 Oct 05 - 09:57 PM

Well, these are not exactly songs about gluttony – but I guess the recipes are rather more-ish!!!

So checkout our new website and our new FOOD SONGS CD - and see for yourself!!
http://www.peculiarhand.com/pages/atogm.html

ENJOY!!!

Cheers! R-J
Down Under

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: GUEST,Joe_F
Date: 28 Oct 05 - 09:46 PM

"Mrs Moore, Don't Have No More" is only partly about gluttony, but the title is suggestive.

Too many double gins give the ladies double chins.

--- Joe Fineman    [e-mail]

||: In peace, sons bury their fathers. In war, fathers bury their sons. :||

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Bert
Date: 28 Oct 05 - 09:54 PM

When I was a kid we learned to the tune of John Brown's Body...

Dorcas had some marmalade and
Dorcas had some jam
Dorcas had some potted meat and
Dorcas had some spam
Dorcas had some lemonade and then some ginger beer
and the Dorcas wondered why Dorcas felt so queer

Whups came the marmalade and
Whups came the jam
Whups came the potted meat and
Whups came the spam
Whups came the lemonade and then the ginger beer
and then Dorcas knew why Dorcas felt so queer.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Bill D
Date: 28 Oct 05 - 10:20 PM

They're made out of sugar and butter and flour;
You put'em in the oven about a quarter hour,
But the thing that gives'em their magic power
Is the chocolate chips inside.

Chocolate chip cookies, I gotta have more,
You can bake'em in the oven, or buy'em at the store
But whatever you do have'em ready at the door
And I'll love you till I die!

I can do without booze; I can do without pot;
I can do without nicotine, no thanks a lot!
But bring'em from the oven, nice and hot
And I'm a chocolate chip cookie fiend.

CHORUS

You can't eat one; you can't eat two;
Once you start chewing, there's nothing to do
But clean your plate, and eat the crumbs too,
Then go and find some more.

CHORUS

If you want to make a friend,
You don't need beauty or money to spend;
Give'em all your love, but be sure you send
Some chocolate chip cookies, too.

CHORUS

I knew a little woman, once upon a time:
Ugly as sin and she didn't have a dime;
I was just gonna leave her but she changed my mind;
She made those cookies for me.
CHORUS

I know another woman, pretty as a star,
Had a lot of money and a big sports car,
But I had to leave her, that's the way things are;
She couldn't make cookies for me.

CHORUS

Now when it comes to women, you must be wise;
Sometimes you have to compomise;
I finally met a girl who was just my size,
So I made cookies for her.

CHORUS

Now when I die, I don't want wings,
A golden halo or a harp that sings
Give me a book, a fire and someone who brings
Chocolate chip cookies all day.
CHORUS

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Flash Company
Date: 29 Oct 05 - 09:35 AM

There is one called O'Hooligan's Christmas Cake, cant remember the words, but I do recall that 'the sides they were nailed on with glue!'

FC

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 29 Oct 05 - 09:42 AM

It's in the DT as "Miss Fogarty's Christmas Cake" although the version I know is "Mrs. Hooligan's Christmas Cake"

DC

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: rich-joy
Date: 29 Oct 05 - 06:44 PM

er ... forgot to add in my post of the 27th, re our Food Songs CD just out : we do have PayPal
:~)))


Cheers! R-J

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Joybell
Date: 29 Oct 05 - 07:56 PM

Fun to see a little piece of my very first request surface again. After asking for ideas for gluttony songs we did a theme concert at the National Folk Festival here in Aus. (back in 03) on "The Seven Deadly Sins". Peterr's song about "Little Thomas" was a great success. It fits well to "Hark the Herald Angels Sing". Cheers, Joy

Subject: RE: More Than Your Fill Of Gluttony
From: Severn
Date: 30 Oct 05 - 01:16 PM

Three that I can think of off hand are:

"Johnny McEldoo" that The Clancy Brothers recorded at least twice, with the words printed in the back of the "Hearty & Hellish" LP on Columbia. Another version on the Tradition Records "Come Fill your Glass With Us".


An old blues 78 by Sylvester Weaver (of Steel Guitar Rag authorship) called "Me And My Tapeworm" which I believe was on the Humorous Songs volume of the Bicentennial collection of American folk music put together by Dick Spottswood for the Library Of Congress on LP in 1976.

....and, of course, The Holy Modal Rounders' immortal tribute to Western Pennsylvania-style celebration, "The Happy Scrapple Daddy Polka" from the "Good Taste Is Timeless" LP originally on Metromedia, and reissued on CD by somebody or another. (words on request)

More for the Readers to Digest uncondensed if I think of them....

Subject: Songs about gluttony
From: GUEST,keberoxu
Date: 23 Oct 15 - 10:46 PM

Wish I could locate the song I have in mind. The story ABOUT this song can be pieced together, though.
Before Michael Flanders was "At the Drop of a Hat" famous, he wrote a text that went by the title of "Gluttony."

When I don't know, but composer Joseph Horowitz put "Gluttony" to music. If you know your Michael Flanders history, then you recognize the name Joseph Horowitz, as the composer of "Captain Noah and his Floating Zoo" for which Flanders wrote the book/lyrics.

Oddly, no one will quote the lyrics but people will mutter about them, using words like "savage." One statement emerged, that the manufacture of foie gras by force-feeding geese, is given some attention in the song.

Subject: RE: Songs about gluttony
From: Paul Burke
Date: 24 Oct 15 - 07:19 AM

Only a dozen nyears late. but:

Pendant la messe, les prières
Et puis après, un bon fricot
Rien ne vous met le cœur à l'aise
Comme le goût d'un bon gigot

Le samedi, de la bonne viande
Le vendredi, du bon poisson
Et des bouteilles le dimanche
Voilà la vie des bons garçons

Le bon fricot, ça met à l'aise
Et le bon vin, ça met en train
Allons, amis, la sauce est bonne
N'hésitons pas, vidons les plats

Et maintenant, donnez à boire
Car de chanter met en sueur
Allons, remplissez bien les verres
Ça réjouira tous les chanteurs