meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Feb 24 - 03:03 PM

I still like my idea.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 24 Feb 24 - 02:56 PM

Might well be, Nick, that that is a small part of it, but they are found in nearly all genres of music. The vast collection c1825 of The Universal Songster is full of them, and plenty of Tudor court songs have them, Hey, Nonny No? Some of them are just there to give the soloist a rest and think of the next verse, and some are there to test sobriety of the singers, and some you need an A-level for....Even, dare I say it, Child Ballads have them in abundance.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Nick Dow
Date: 23 Feb 24 - 07:07 PM

I always considered the vocables attached to many folk songs to be based on the accepted local utterance for mouth music, or a Canntaireachd tune system. The latter is less likely unless there is a thriving tradition within the area.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 23 Feb 24 - 09:02 AM

Whilst the vast majority of these chorus vocables are just that, and can be found in all genres of music, a notable few can be traced back to meaningful statements. Check out the 'rigdum' threads for instance. The long string of seeming nonsense that occurs in some versions of 'Froggy' can be traced back to early eighteenth century camp-followers cant.
Some like 'derry down' are so old and ubiquitous that we will probably never know if they had a meaning.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Thompson
Date: 23 Feb 24 - 02:34 AM

It translates more or less exactly as "Fol de lol, lallay".

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Feb 24 - 09:52 PM

My theory was always they were a check on the singer's sobriety. If you can't sing whack fol the diddle really fast, it's time to switch to plain drinking and let someone else sing.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Someguy
Date: 21 Feb 24 - 08:52 PM

ASK the remaining members of Thin Lizzy what it means!!

Subject: RE: synchronicity
From: Felipa
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 06:56 AM

and just yesterday I was reading an old interview with Bill Vanaver in which he spoke about doing a drama based on the tale of King Orfeo (See message from Gallus Moll 17 March (a repeat of a message from Apr 2017)

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Geordie-Peorgie
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 03:26 PM

Oops! Try this

https://youtu.be/cL7jyXCQ2Zc

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Geordie-Peorgie
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 03:24 PM

Here’s a more up-to-date birra nonsense!

https://youtu.be/cL7jyXCQ2Zc

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Geordie-Peorgie
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 03:19 PM

Ah alwez text the audience that “Musharing Dumma doo dum dah” meant “Buy the bearded guy with the guitar a pint!” And “Whack fol the daddio’ meant “Make it a double!”

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Gallus Moll
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 10:00 AM

Apologies if this has already been mentioned, not had time to read the whole thread -
and I am doing this off the top of my head!
- a while back an old man was recorded (in Shetland / Orkney?) singing what he had learned as 'nonsense' words
- fortunately someone recognised them as being fragments of Norn, an old language, thought to have been lost....
was it a ballad about Orfeo, King Orfeo? Think maybe Archie Fishjer sings it.....
Guess I should have checked my facts before posting, but perhaps someone else will do that before I get around to it!
Anyway, it confirms the possibility of nonsense words having been misheard . misunderstood language --- similar to mondegreens?!

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Mar 21 - 04:45 AM

i have no knowledge of this but just to say, when i hear the song and the musha ring.... chourus plays, i can only picture in my mind a leprechaun talkingbto himself.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Dr John
Date: 09 Aug 18 - 03:50 PM

It's a reference to legendary voodoo queen, Masha "Rum Dum" du Lada.
Besides casting spells she also brewed up moonshine in the swamps of Lousiana.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Aug 18 - 06:08 AM

Irish folk songs rock harder than any other

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Pickles
Date: 07 Aug 18 - 06:01 AM

Wack fol the daddy ol

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Pickles
Date: 07 Aug 18 - 05:59 AM

Your all stupid it's a old saying that mean run in the dark

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Gallus moll
Date: 25 Apr 17 - 01:49 PM

See theres a king orfeo thread farther up the forum!!

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Apr 17 - 04:35 AM

"Musha" is the englishing of the Irish Má is ea - "if it is so"; the ring-dum-a-doo-rum-da is port bhéil, or "mouth music", as far as I know.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Jackaroodave
Date: 24 Apr 17 - 08:13 PM

There"s a fascinating thread on the refrain of King Orfeo here. There's quite a story not only to the refrain, but the tune as well. Please check it out if you're interested in how an ancient Greek myth winds up in the Shetlands with a Norn refrain.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Gallus Moll
Date: 24 Apr 17 - 06:58 PM

A good number of years ago a folk researcher in the North of Scotland, maybe Caithness? recorded an old chap singing a fragment of a song which had what seemed to be a nonsense chorus- - - till it was later realised the fragment was a ballad about King Orfeo and the chorus was in fact the remnants of an old language called Norn.
I can't remember the details now - thio I think Archie Fisher might sing (or used to sing) the song -- maybe something in John Purser's book, I shall look when I have time. (I may have heard it on his brilliant 30 episode series on the Music of Scotland which BBC Radio Scotland broadcast many years ago)

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Helen
Date: 24 Apr 17 - 06:33 PM

GUEST,Chrissy, on 18 Dec 10 - 05:59 AM wrote:

"in reply to Roger in Baltimore waaay back in '99 about the song 'Wimoweh' it is actually a South African song written in 1939 by Solomon Linda titled 'Mbube Wimoweh' which translates as 'The Lion Sleeps'."

Here is the original version:

Solomon Linda &The Evening - Mbube

And here is a beautiful version by

Miriam Makeba - The Lion Sleeps Tonight

Helen

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Beachcomber
Date: 24 Apr 17 - 10:38 AM

Peter, Paulm & Mary had a version of a song, that is in the Burl Ives Songbook, with a chorus that went
something like this :-
"Shoolie, shoolie, shoolie too, shoolie sackaraka bib - a lib -a-boo, If I should die for Sally-bob-o-link; Come bib-a-lib-a-boo sa roora"
Really.
That was originally an Irish song with the following chorus :- (phonetically)
"Shuil, shuil, shuil a ruin;
Shuil gu suckir ogus shuil gu quun;
Shuil gu dee an doras ogus aye stig lum,
Gus go merrit uu mu voorneen slawn"

translates like
" Walk, walk, walk, loved one,
Walk carefully and quietly,
Walk to the door and listen to me.
That you may survive in good health "

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Robert
Date: 24 Apr 17 - 07:08 AM

I'll be sure to check out that article in a minute! I'll try to find something about The Mongolian Cavalry Fight Song later.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Desi C
Date: 24 Apr 17 - 06:42 AM

You're exactly right Roger, they originate from Ceilidh's where callers would often add such phrases merely from the effort of dancing and songwriters aopted the technique just to fill in the spaces so to speak, common in other forms of music too

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Jackaroodave
Date: 23 Apr 17 - 07:13 PM

I'm so glad you revived this, Robert! I've been searching for decades for a song that was a hit in central Connecticut around 1962 for about a week, then disappeared. From a Mudcat thread on children's chants, I picked up part of it:

atchi katchi boomeratchi (or Liberace).
I love you.

And then on this thread, another part:

kumala kumala kumala vista

I can also recall

5-10-15-20
We don't stop till we get plenty

Googling these got me to this here wonderful article containing multiple variants of all kinds of children's nonsense rhymes and counting games from all over the world.

The article mentions and quotes some commercial songs from 1940s country, 1960s doo wop, and recent rap, all based on those rhymes. But not the one I'm after.Thanks to Mudcat's totally unexpected help, I feel I'm closing in, and I wonder if anyone has ever heard of it.

It was called something like "The Mongolian Cavalry Fight Song," and if anyone knows anything about it, they'd earn my undying gratitude if they shared it.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Robert
Date: 23 Apr 17 - 01:59 PM

I was just doing some drama homework, researching a warm up that we do and I came across this amazing 'chat' from 1999! But anyway, The drama warm up is called kumala vista amd it's another 'nonsense song' and I just realised halfway through typing this that no-one is probably going to see this. :(

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: eftifino
Date: 04 Jun 13 - 01:37 PM

Jack, You're quite right. Lilting or 'Gob Music' was the way those without instruments were taught and learned Irish music, especially during the years where Irish Instruments, music, dance or language had to go underground due to the Penal Laws enacted by those poor misguided souls who thought that they were better than any other race in the world..

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 03 Jun 13 - 10:03 PM

Guest Vic - your grandfather's words would fit to the Scottish song "Rothsea-O".
Here:

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Vic Newfie
Date: 03 Jun 13 - 05:40 PM

Not a song but my grandfather with both Irish and Scottish roots always used to say this verse:
Onery oogery iggery Anne, fillisy, follisy, Nicholas John, coovery kivery Irish Mary, stickler em stackle em Buck! Anyone have any idea where this came from. My pop never knew where he heard it or how he came to remember it. Newfoundland where I am from is the most Gaelic influenced culture outside of Ireland, but for 30 years the meaning or origin of this "poem" or "verse" has been all but lost over here on this side of the pond. I am sure my attempt at the syntax of the words are pathetic however if said out loud it sounds right! Any help would be appreciated. Even the Dean of Folklore at Memorial University of Newfoundland was baffled! Then again, pop was a bit of a cracker........ Maybe he made it all up!

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,P.J.Reilly
Date: 07 Jun 12 - 04:26 AM

"haronumon jowl?"

Probably a corruption of the Gaelic "In ainm an diabhail", which roughly translates as "in the name of the devil".

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Jun 12 - 12:11 AM

Seems natural to us - but the whole family has Tourette's Syndrome as it turns out & we tend to an odd, jangling pattern of speech

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: moecurlythanu
Date: 15 Nov 11 - 04:14 PM

Does anyone know what the Irish exclamation means that sounds something like "haronumon jowl?" It shows up in "Daniel O'Connell" by Johnny McEvoy, as well as other songs.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,BrightonBo
Date: 15 Nov 11 - 05:45 AM

"musha ring dumma do dumma da,
Whack for my Daddy-O"

There is no question that the chorus is in Martian in order that our green brethren can sing along too!

Personally, after I've had my head buried in the Jar-O for any significant period, I prefer to translate the English lyrics into Saturnalian, which translates into: "shhhllllerrr, shhhllllerrr, I 'kin love you, shhhllllerrr, outside you ****, whack, thwack, zzzzzzzzz".

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Mario
Date: 04 May 11 - 10:27 AM

I'm Romanichal- I type of Gypsy originating in England since pre-1500's. You can Wiki it.
We were persecuted by the English as were the Irish. The "highway man" lifestyles most certainly intersected.
In the Romanichal dialect this phonetic correlation:

"musha ring dumma do dumma da"
"Musha ring te m'dood te m'da", which translates to:
"The man's Ring for my star, for my Mom".

This fits perfectly with the stort from the song and validates the next line:
"Whack for my Daddy-O" which I like to believe is actually
"Worked for my Daddy-O".

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Rumbz
Date: 24 Feb 11 - 10:25 AM

I stumbled upon this trying to find if the words we sang as a war cry at school actually meant anything. Devastated to find that flee fly is a song but quite pleased that the non commercial version is quite popular too. to add something to the mix, there was a song i learnt at school when i was about 7 and the words were

marezy-dotes and dozy dotes and liddy lambsy ivey
a kiddle dee divey doo, wood ant you. (thats about as phonetic as i can get) and then next verse which we learnt when we were 8 was

if the words sound queer and funny to your ear a little bit jumbled and jive-y, sing
mares eat oats and goats eat oats and little lambs eat ivy....

leaving me to assume the next line was a diw would eat ivy too, wouldn't you(?/ wood and chew.

i don't know but this makes me smile everytime it pops in my mind.

gutted about flee fly.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,J. Leach-Clark/guest
Date: 28 Jan 11 - 04:30 PM

I think the lyrics once meant "Whiskey, the water of life" but have been sung so often, by so many, they don't mean anything in their current state. Hope this helps. J.Leach-Clark

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jan 11 - 04:23 PM

I think the lyrics once meant "Whiskey, the water of life" but have been sung by so many, so many times they now mean nothing. Hope this helps.J.Leach-Clark

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,bev. in pgh
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 02:52 PM

I would love to have copies of the 2 albums from the star of david singers. I had tapes that i cant find. We went to Faith Community in south hills of pgh. where i met chrissy rogers. and the star of david singers. The music was timeless and very encouraging. ty.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Chrissy
Date: 18 Dec 10 - 05:59 AM

One reading most of these posts I think the origins of 'musha ring dumma do damma da' are lost in 'antiquity'. BUT in reply to Roger in Baltimore waaay back in '99 about the song 'Wimoweh' it is actually a South African song written in 1939 by Solomon Linda titled 'Mbube Wimoweh' which translates as 'The Lion Sleeps'. And in response to Joe Offer in '99 Abiyoyo was also a South African folk tale made into a song by the wonderful Pete Seeger.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: scowie
Date: 17 Aug 10 - 02:46 PM

I agree with an earlier post from Sean Mac Ruaraiah, stating these choruses formerly had meaning, even if they have lost them of late.
I would point anyone interested in the direction of "The Druid Source Book" ISBN 1 86019 8422 and particular to the chapter by Charles Mackay,
on "Druidical Chants Preserved In The Popular Songs Of England, Scotland,Ireland and France.
It is eye-opening! I did not fully believe it all, untill I had it examined by an old Gaelic fluent friend Dicky Lett, of the sainted memory! who to my amazement confirmed all the chapter contains.
I sugest any doubters do the same, and examine this text.
Sorry I am technically incapable of helping you further.
Good Luck, Scowie.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Aug 10 - 12:33 AM

Re all the speculations thruout this thread [some convincing, others perhaps less so] that the words in the thread-title are a garbled version of meaningful Gaelic phrases: it might not be out of place to remind here of the send-up of such interpretations in the well-known students' song which travesties Scottish balladry, Phearson swore a feud Upon the Clan McTavish", where the chorus goes

Cammer-oo cammer-i cammer-o
Cammer-oo cammer-i cammer-oris
Cammer-oo cammer-i cammer-o ~~
And that's the Gaelic chorus!

~Michael~

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,AJ
Date: 16 Aug 10 - 02:05 AM

Well accordin to the net it means if it be so music from the mouth

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Kevin Z.
Date: 17 Mar 09 - 04:48 AM

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: rick fielding
Date: 31 Jan 99 - 12:16 PM

can anyone remember: "iss biddly oten doten bobo". I can swear I heard my mother (singing?) that when I was an impressionable youth.


    Felix Unger (Tony Randall) sings something like this on an episode of the 1970s series The Odd Couple:

   "Skiddle-ey biddle-ley oten boten good bye Sue!"

    or something to that effect.


    It's likely some old scat singing phrase.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Lisa
Date: 31 Jan 09 - 08:38 PM

Here's my version of this little ditty when I was back at camp about 40 years ago:

Flea (this word as well as each line is repeated)
Flea fly
Flea fly flow
Vista

Coomalata Coomalata Coomalata Vista
Oh, no no no no no vista

Eenie meenie deci meenie
Oo watch a walla meanie
Exa meanie solla meanie
Oo watch a wha

Big billy oten doten
Bo bo ba deeten dotten
Shhhhhhhhh (and you'd put your hands together and make a fish motion)

40 years later, I still say it every once in a while. It brings a smile to my face.

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 13 May 08 - 11:30 AM

Laying the obnoxious dialect aside, do the words follow proper grammar, or is it just infitives?
I go house, anyone?
" "Shool-a-run" actually comes frae th' Irish Gaelic (forgie me for wrichtin' Scots Gaelic an' omittin' accents, I dinnae hae th' Irish wairds printit oot) wairds "Siubhal"--meanin' travel-- an' "Run" meanin' someane verra dear. So th' narrator's nae babblin' like an' eejit, she's lamentin' th' fact that her love maun gae travellin' aff, an' possibly sayin' sumpit tae th' effect o' "sure, gae aff an' leave me, I'll jist sit here on ma hill wi'oot ma spinnin' wheel an' SUFFER..." "

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Mr Happy
Date: 13 May 08 - 04:19 AM

<>i'Chip Chow Cherry Chow...' sounds a bit Chinese!

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Wincing Devil
Date: 12 May 08 - 03:43 PM

I always thought the translation was either "Fa la la la la" or "Chip Chow Cherry Chow folyy rolly diddle dow"

};-(

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 12 May 08 - 12:13 PM

"Hi Diddle Diddle," of course, once referred to personal relations accomplished in trees, then was used by "Mother Goose" (whose very name should elicit shudders from caring parents)in the well-known nursery rhyme. There's just no telling where these nonsense phrases can lead...

Subject: RE: meaning - musha ring dumma do dumma da
From: Mr Happy
Date: 12 May 08 - 09:22 AM

Translated to Japanese, then back to English gives:


The father of ma which thing cannot be earlier description in regard to ma which the gruel cannot be ring thing earlier description is done