Cheerful Folk Songs

24 Jun 05 - 10:10 PM (#1509174)
Subject: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Richard Bridge

Every so often some smart Alec says "play a cheerful song".

So, let's have some ideas please.

Some rules:

1. Cheerful

2. Folk songs or songs in the style of the tradition, not singer-songwriter or pop.

3. No hymns, no spirituals by request.

---

24 Jun 05 - 10:14 PM (#1509177)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: sixtieschick

The Big Rock Candy Mountain

---

24 Jun 05 - 10:32 PM (#1509189)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Richard Bridge

I'd think of BRCM as an enjoyable piece of contemporary Americana. Wouldn't suit me, although I've been known to add mandolin if Trevor Stephenson plays and sings it. Very much on the borderline of folk from my perspective, but thanks for the idea.

---

24 Jun 05 - 10:53 PM (#1509201)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Deckman

"How do you do", as sung by Rolf Cahn (sp?) Bob

---

24 Jun 05 - 11:21 PM (#1509213)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: YorkshireYankee

I Wish They'd do it Now
Martin Said to His Man
Drinking songs: John Barleycorn (well, it's cheerful at the end), Landlord Fill the Flowing Bowl, Drink Old England Dry, Whiskey in the Jar and many others
The Fox Hunt (unless you're worried about it not being PC)
The Irish Rover
The Wild Rover
John Blunt
Mairie's Wedding
I like to Rise When the Sun She Rises
Farmer's Boy
On Ilkley Moor Bah t'Hat
Come Write Me Down (as well as some other Copper family songs)
Harbour Le Cou

That's it for now -- just the ones I can think of straight away, more later (if I think of 'em)

---

25 Jun 05 - 02:40 AM (#1509266)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Liz the Squeak

Doesn't 'Come write me down' have a verse about being unfaithful? It always makes me smile when sung to newly engaged/wedded couples.....

LTS

---

25 Jun 05 - 04:23 AM (#1509299)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Richard Bridge

Yes, YY, some good ones there, and some I even do but never think of when put on the spot.

But surely in the Irish Rover the poor dog was drowned?

And Ilkley Moor is wholly about death and corruption.

And Whiskey in a Jar ends on the despairing note "If anyone can help me, it's me brother in the army..."

I suppose we could add "Fathom the Bowl", and "Byker Hill"

---

25 Jun 05 - 04:28 AM (#1509302)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Richard Bridge

Unncle Joe's Mint Balls

The Vicar Song

quite a range of DonT's repertoire (excluding most of the folk songs in it ;)   !

---

25 Jun 05 - 04:54 AM (#1509310)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: DMcG

I know the problem, Richard. I have a reputation that every song I sing is about death. I tried "When Spring comes In" from the Coppers ... and the daffy-down-dillies get it. "Daddy Fox" ... and the grey goose is dead. Of course, singing "Digging Graves is my Delight" doesn't necessary help.

---

25 Jun 05 - 09:24 AM (#1509399)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: *Laura*

Cheerful folk songs? Don't talk daft!

xLx

---

25 Jun 05 - 10:11 AM (#1509432)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

I posted one last night, the Gallant Hussar.
Daddy Fox.
Dance to Your/Thee Daddy.
A'Begging I Will Go.
Rattlin' Roarin Willie.
Prickle-Eye Bush.
Ramblin' Sailor.
Mad Tom of Bedlam.
Mr Froggie Went A-Courting.
Bonnie Ship the Diamond.
Whisky Your the Divil.
The Sow Took the Measles (yes, the sow dies, so?)
The Utah Iron Horse.
Monymusk Lads.
The Pirate Song.
Old Maid in the Garret.
The Grey Goose.
Hearts of Oak.
The World Turned Upside Down.
Tom Browne.
Captain Ward.

Whiskey in the Jar DOES NOT end on a despairing note, it's rather optimistic.
Why is BRMC borderline folk? It's a classic Hobo song!

---

25 Jun 05 - 10:15 AM (#1509438)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: JennyO

What about a cheerful song about death?

Isn't it Grand Boys.

Then there's these:

I Can Hew Boys (and its parody Ike and Hugh)
The Farmer's Toast
Widgegorara Joe
Ugly Dave
Sally Brown
Johnson Girls
Raise 'em
The Merry Ploughboy
Lachlan Tigers
The Apprentice Song
Summer is a'Comin' in
Track Linin' Song
Galway Races
Blaydon Races
The Bonny Black Hare
The Spotted Cow
Bound for South Australia
Jim the Carter Lad
The Jolly Wagoner
Fathom the Bowl
Three Drunken Maidens
The Rambling Rover
Go no more a Rovin' (with you fair maid)
Long Time Ago
Hurrah for the Black Ball Line
No Man's Mama Now
Jug Band Blues
Any Old Iron
What a Mouth
Don't Dilly Dally on the Way
(Going to the fair with) My Old Man
The Holy Ground


.....and that's just for a start.

---

25 Jun 05 - 10:16 AM (#1509440)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: ranger1

The Whistling Gypsy

---

25 Jun 05 - 10:23 AM (#1509447)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,leeneia

Mockingbird Hill
Spring has now unwrapped the flowers
Listen to the mockingbird
Polly wolly doodle
Camptown races
How can I keep from singing - Jesuit style
Seeing Nellie Home
Solomon Levi + Spanish cavalier

---

25 Jun 05 - 12:44 PM (#1509544)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T

I was going to suggest some of mine Richard.

The Prince and the Maiden
Oi!
The Little Weatherman.
Two Policemen.
Ernie Hook.
Awfully Well for the Shape That I'm In.


Before you ask, I'd be flattered.

Let me know if we need to get together on tunes. Better yet, buy my CD, now reasonably priced at £8.00. (grins)

Don T.

---

25 Jun 05 - 05:10 PM (#1509687)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Big Al Whittle

The Nightingale
the Cornish Nightingale
As I roved out
The tailors britches
Blow away the morning dew
Lincolnshire poacher
Creeping jane

---

25 Jun 05 - 06:15 PM (#1509731)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Polly Squeezebox

Martinmas Time - not so happy for men maybe, but I love the way she gets the better of the men's evil intentions and 'Gallops home a maiden'.

---

25 Jun 05 - 06:19 PM (#1509735)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Richard Bridge

Surely the Tailor's Breeches is very miserable. The poor little tailor is very embarrassed and swears off alcohol and women for ever.

---

25 Jun 05 - 06:26 PM (#1509740)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

Wouldn't call As I roved Out particularly cheerful either, when broken shells make Christams bells you and I might well get married?

---

25 Jun 05 - 07:44 PM (#1509792)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: The Barden of England

Some of my songs are happy Richard, but then again I don't suppose they can be called 'Folk Songs' - but

Round and around
My Lady in Green

However, certainly not

Refugees
Welcome to Hell
The likes of you and me

Which are 'Folk songs' of a sort. Perhaps I should sing them more often.
John Barden

---

25 Jun 05 - 09:38 PM (#1509887)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Hrothgar

How many of the cheerful ones are politically correct?

---

25 Jun 05 - 11:11 PM (#1509940)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: JennyO

Certainly not "Isn't it Grand Boys" :-)

Kitty, I only just saw your PM. I'll reply with some detail when I get time.

The Aussie ones in that bunch are:

Widgegoweera Joe (spelt it wrong before)
Ugly Dave
Lachlan Tigers
Bound for South Australia (? - well although it mentions Australia, it's more of a universal shanty.

I'll see if I can find tunes and lyrics for them.

Jenny

---

26 Jun 05 - 01:12 AM (#1509984)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: JennyO

Oh yeah - Chicken on a Raft.

---

26 Jun 05 - 03:35 AM (#1510032)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Big Al Whittle

well I always thought they were quite jolly - if you see it as searing indictment of the misuse of cockleshells - fair enough I suppose - we all take what we want from these things.

The little beggarman
chicken on a raft is of course cyril tawney's - I think they said they didn't want singer song writers on the list for some reason.

why, I wonder - I mean someone must have written evry song at some point, and they probably sung it. otherwise we wouldn't be singing it now. or is there a fault in that logic?

---

26 Jun 05 - 04:02 AM (#1510045)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,Nellie Clatt

The Last Of The Great Whales, well it makes me laugh.

---

26 Jun 05 - 04:45 AM (#1510056)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Richard Bridge

In order to avoid unnecessary dissension I am prepared to accept "in the style of the tradition" - and that lets many Tawney things in.

Chicken on a Raft of course is pretty damned miserable, about the sufferings of a submariner's life (as much of Tawney's output was), in this case the misery of Monday morning after the weekend on the booze, and the faithlessness of women, the only high point being the possibility of future adultery with sister from Maryhill.

My traditions, since I am English, militate against the inclusion of too much material from other traditions, and therefore I am likely to be less enthused about material from the American tradition, although I do do some (including "Fall RIver Hoedown, which is not traditional, but might be thought of as in the style of the American tradition). Hootchie Cootchie Man, for example, is quite alien to the English tradition, and somehting similar could be said about many of the usgestions of Janice from NJ (but thanks anyway). Quite a number of the American suggestions here I've never heard at all.

While I'm on that list, I'm puzzled by the inclusion of Santa Ana "Heave away, Santa Ana, they're killing your soldiers below...(etc)", and while I enjoy a bit of skiffle, I don't think Putting on the Agony or Rock Island Line really qualify (although I have a friend who does quite a lot of enjoyable material from the extended category of folk-meets-skiffle (sometimes dubbed "Fiffle")). Drunken Sailor is of course a list of the Navy's more unpleasant punishments: some idea of cheerful!

However, we do indeed have some cheerful traditional stuff, and I suppose one might add the Threshing Machine and Maids when you're Young, too, and quite a bit of consciously West Country Comic material from (for example) Adge Cutler.

From Australia I guess another possible would be "Rye Buck Shearer" if I could only carry all of the tune...

---

26 Jun 05 - 05:16 AM (#1510064)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Stu

Hal-An-Tow
Good Ale

---

26 Jun 05 - 05:55 AM (#1510077)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

Screw politicaly correctness.
The Keach in the Creel is another good one.
Would you allow Peter Bellamy? If so, I would add the Robber's Song.

---

26 Jun 05 - 06:13 AM (#1510084)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,Mrs Miggins

Who put you in charge Richard Bridge ?

I therefore suggest'Foggy Mountain Top' [ Carter Family ]

---

26 Jun 05 - 06:55 AM (#1510104)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

It's his thread, so I guess that does make him in charge.

---

26 Jun 05 - 07:12 AM (#1510112)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: gnomad

Gloucester Wassail
Candlelight Fisherman
Coffeepot Song (ok, not exactly trad, but getting there)
Quare Bungle Rye
The Cornstalk
Haul Away Joe
Keeper of the Eddystone Light
Farmer's Arms
Malloney Wants a Drink
Granny's Old Armchair
Old Dunn Cow
The Happy Man
While Gamekeepers Lie Sleeping
Pub With No Beer (tragic of course, but very cheerfully so)
Cottage Well Thatched With Straw

Interesting question, I'm surprised how many there seem to be, but then I'm one of the pessimists!

---

26 Jun 05 - 07:48 AM (#1510125)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: JennyO

Yes of course, Richard - how could I forget Ryebuck Shearer?

Then there's these:

Flash Jack from Gundagai
Lime Juice Tub
Jones's Ale
Four Little Johnny Cakes
Springtime Brings on the Shearing
Click Go the Shears

---

26 Jun 05 - 08:02 AM (#1510128)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Richard Bridge

This is getting good! Never let it be said again that folks songs are a competition to see who can kill the most people!

Now all I need to do is research the ones I don't know at all, and start learning! Actually, I'm surprised at how many on this list I either already do or at least sort of know and so could probably get up without too much difficulty (just a bit of time and diligence).

Maybe there's a thought for a lawful use of Kazaalite. Everyone interested creates a "cheerful folk song" folder, and puts a simple version of relevant songs (performed by the creator of the folder, of course) in said folder. Would have to be limited to non-copyright arrangements of non-copyright songs. Then permit Kazaa access to that folder only. What a splendid learning resource.

---

26 Jun 05 - 08:51 AM (#1510164)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

Have a listen to Spiers & Boden's "Prickle-Eye Bush" and "Ramblin' Sailor".
Spiers & Boden

---

26 Jun 05 - 09:13 AM (#1510184)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Janice in NJ

In response to Richard's statement:

While I'm on that list, I'm puzzled by the inclusion of Santa Ana "Heave away, Santa Ana, they're killing your soldiers below...(etc)", and while I enjoy a bit of skiffle, I don't think Putting on the Agony or Rock Island Line really qualify (although I have a friend who does quite a lot of enjoyable material from the extended category of folk-meets-skiffle (sometimes dubbed "Fiffle")). Drunken Sailor is of course a list of the Navy's more unpleasant punishments: some idea of cheerful!

You have a different song in mind from the Heave Away, Santy Ano that I listed. The song I refer to is not about the Battle of the Alamo, but is about the California gold rush. It is very cheerful indeed:

There's plenty of gold, so I've been told,
Heave away, Santy Ano!
Plenty of gold, so I've been told,
We're bound for Californ-I-O!

Both Putting on the Style, as we call it in the USA, and The Rock Island Line are considered traditional folk songs on this side of the Atlantic. The former may have derived from a 19th century pop song, and the latter may have been composed by Huddie Ledbetter (at least the version we are all used to), but they are both accepted as in the North American tradition.

Yes, The Drunken Sailor describes some rather nasty punishments, but it is always sung tongue-in-cheek with a rollicking humor. The good cheer comes from imagining how the sailor got so piss ass drunk in the first place. But technically you are right.

---

26 Jun 05 - 09:21 AM (#1510186)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,TonedeafDave

Brigg Fair
Short Jacket and White Trousers (unless you're the captain)

and all those stupid broken token songs which end in happily ever after - I personally would have advised her to kick him in the (deleted) and stuffed my half of the token where the sun never shines - but I suppose standards of behaviour were different in those days.

---

26 Jun 05 - 09:21 AM (#1510188)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

Not quite sure about that. Ships work by teams, someone is so selfish as to screw his mates and get drunk, deserves what he gets. This is about getting drunk on watch, not shore leave. There is also quite a bit of jealousy, I think.

---

26 Jun 05 - 10:10 AM (#1510228)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,Reveler!

Jolly Ploughboys
Now is the Month of Maying
Padstow May Song
Oh How Lovely is the Evening (in a round)
Sumer is Icumen In

---

26 Jun 05 - 10:44 AM (#1510256)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,Nellie Clatt

Minnie the Moocha.

---

26 Jun 05 - 05:58 PM (#1510533)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Janice in NJ

Minnie the Moocher was written by Cab Calloway to the tune of a traditional song called Willie the Weeper. Willie the Weeper is not a particularly cheerful song. It's about a drug addict who is destined to die of an overdose.

---

27 Jun 05 - 01:46 PM (#1511059)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST

All the best trad. songs are miserable so I've decided just to go with the flow.
My theory is that there are so many miserable songs because the people who made them tended to live a miserable, dirty, dangerous, painful hand-to-mouth existence. My suspicion is that we'll all find out about this soon enough when the oil runs out, the sea rises, the bomb drops, the super volcano goes off, the asteroid collides with us, the bird 'flu pandemic arrives, the developers build on every scrap of land so there's nothing left to grow food on etc., etc., etc. and this whole absurd house of cards comes crashing down around our ears!
Right, I'm off for my tea before any of the above happens...perhaps after tea I'll write a song...

---

27 Jun 05 - 10:26 PM (#1511339)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: frogprince

"Wild Rose of the Mountain", by Si Kahn.

---

27 Jun 05 - 11:42 PM (#1511383)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,Seonaid

Re above: Copper Family are *so* positive, so often --
even "Spencer the Rover" ends happily, after dealing with homelessness and probably mental illness!

Other ideas:

Galway Shawl
Rambles of Spring
Blow ye Winds Westerly (Fish of the Sea)
Little Brown Jug
A Farmer Boy for Me (Beers Family)
Bandon Blarney Stone (Margaret Barry)

---

27 Jun 05 - 11:48 PM (#1511389)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Cat in Plymouth

John Barleycorn - oysterband, the big session (it's about beer... how can it not be cheerful?)*grin*

---

28 Jun 05 - 02:28 AM (#1511434)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Muttley

Here's a selection:

Drink Down The Moon
One Misty, Moisty Morning
Hail The Ball
The Railway Porter Song
Battle of New Orleans
Coat of Many Colours
King of the Road

Australian Songs:
Across the Western Plains

---

28 Jun 05 - 02:44 AM (#1511441)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Muttley

Sorry: hit the wrong button and accidentally suffered "pre-posticulation" I'll re-do the list.

One's from the earlier posting

Drink Down The Moon
One Misty, Moisty Morning
Hail The Ball
The Railway Porter Song
Battle of New Orleans
Coat of Many Colours
King of the Road

Australian Songs:
Across the Western Plains
Billy of Tea
Blame it on the kellys
Click Go The Shears (even though I HATE this one)
Flash Jack From Gundagai (already mentioned, I think)
Gold In The Ground
Home Among The Gumtrees ('chintzy' but cheerful)
The Lachlan Tigers (Again, already mentioned, I think)
Lime Juice Tub
Aussie Barbecue (modern folk)
Poor Ned (triumphant at the end)
Ryebuck Shearer
and (if you're desperate) Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport

Banjo Patterson poems put to music:
Been There Before
It's Grand
The Man From Ironbark
Mulga Bill's Bicycle
Reverend Mullineaux

John Williamson Songs:
Big Bad Bushranger
The Budgie Song
Chain Around My Ankle
Charters Towers
Cracker Night
A Flag of our Own
Malle Boy
Old Man Emu
Station Cook
When We Were Kids
Why They Call Him Sundown
and another one called
Teach Me To Drive - but I don't have the chords for that one.

---

28 Jun 05 - 03:25 AM (#1511453)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

The Galway Shawl? But it always sounds so miserable.

---

28 Jun 05 - 09:08 AM (#1511595)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Snuffy

Battle of New Orleans is not a happy song - we lost!!!

---

28 Jun 05 - 09:14 AM (#1511599)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,Barrie Roberts

Folksongs aren't meant to be cheerful. When you're feeling good you just get on with it. It's only when you're revolution's failed, your hero's been hanged, your lover's left you or the train has left you behind that you write songs about it.

That said, I used occasionally to give audiences a little relief with a thing called 'The Poor Young Girl'. I admit with shame that I can't recall the writer. iT went to the tune of 'The Poor Young Boy', thiswise:

Oh, there was a poor young girl
Who left her country home
And went into the city to seek employment.
She was forced to leave her home
Because the wolf was at the door,
And her father had fallen down and hurt his knee.

BNefore she went to the city,
Her sweetheart (whose name was Jack)
Said, 'When you're in the city I fear you'll not be true to me',
So before she boarded the train,
She had to faithfully promise him,
That every night at eight o,clock she would burst into tears.

She arrived in the city
And she was riding upon an omnibus,
When a gentleman got up to offer her his seat.
She refused his offer with scorn,
Because she saw that he wore a ring
And she did not know if he might be a married man.

Then up sprang the Conductor,
Saying, 'I knew you would be true!'
And tore off his false whiskers and it was Jack,
And that day she got a letter
To say her father's knee was much, much better,
And her Aunt had died and left her about fifty-eight million pounds.

Now, isn't that the happiest ending you ever heard of?

---

28 Jun 05 - 09:41 AM (#1511613)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Le Scaramouche

I disagree. Some folk songs are ment to be cheerful or humourus, some aren't.

---

28 Jun 05 - 10:39 AM (#1511648)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,noddy

surely that is an oxymoron.

---

29 Jun 05 - 08:18 AM (#1512370)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: *Laura*

Five Foot Flirt!!!
I KNEW one would come to me eventually! :o)

xLx

---

29 Jun 05 - 08:50 AM (#1512394)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Muttley

Reply to Snuffy:
I'm an Aussie so I can be objective about the whole thing.

Besides which, as a Bill Cosby afficionado I LOVE his take on the Revolutionary War in his sketch "A Toss of the Coin"

He starts off explaining how each football match starts with a toss of the coin between the two opposing captains.
He follows up with an imaginary coin toss between two captains and then postulates: "What would happen if they tossed a coin at the start of every war? Lets go to the Revolutionary War........"

"Captain XXXXXXXX of the Settlers this is Captain YYYYYYYY of the British. Captain YYYYYYYY of the British, this is Captain XXXXXXXX of the Settlers. Call the toss Brits. British call 'heads': It's 'tails' you lose the toss, Settlers win; what're we gonna do Settlers?
OK Captain XXXXXXXX of the Settlers says that during the war, they can wear any colour clothes that they want to, shoot from behind the rocks and trees and everywhere: Says that you and you're boys Must wear red and march in a straight line!"

His rendition of the coin toss prior to "the Battle of Little Big Horn" between Captain Custer and Captain Sitting Bull is an absolute riot.

Wonder if we could make a good cheerful song outta Cosby's sketches?

Mutt

---

11 Aug 05 - 04:21 PM (#1540375)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: PoohBear

Drovers Dream
Wallaby Stew
Sydney Harbour Ferry Boat
Lazy Harry's

---

11 Aug 05 - 05:23 PM (#1540446)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,Arkie

The Fox
Dame Durden
Game of Cards
Get Up And Bar The Door
No, John, No
Tennessee Stud
Wee Cooper of Fife
Devilish Mary

---

30 Jun 11 - 11:55 PM (#3179496)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,hobart hobbit

Hi

Noticed "awfully well for the shape I'm in listed. Been trying to find this song. Couldn't post who sang it, could you Don?

---

01 Jul 11 - 01:12 AM (#3179526)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: open mike

funny--this cheerful folk songs link was on a mother earth news page i was looking on for info about wood burning water heaters....why?

---

01 Jul 11 - 09:31 AM (#3179680)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Snuffy

"Awfully Well for the Shape That I'm In."

I don't know that one, but a similar line appeared in "Bernardine" which was a hit for Pat Boone in the mid-50s

I can tell by the dimple in your chin
You're in beautiful shape for the shape you're in
And I'm in shape for Bernardine

Sorry I couldn't be more help

---

01 Jul 11 - 10:26 AM (#3179708)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: RobbieWilson

I've been trying to get my daughters to sing "the maid of Fyvie'o".
The only person who dies is the arrogant soldier who deserves no better.

A jolly tune, a good story and as politically correct as you like.

---

01 Jul 11 - 10:47 AM (#3179720)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST

I think the jolliest song I know, and with absolutely one of the jolliest tunes is 'I've Got Sixpence'.

---

01 Jul 11 - 11:11 AM (#3179726)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Max Johnson

'I've Got Sixpence' guy was me.
There's a great rendition http://www.archive.org/details/berlin_airlift_TNA, sung by RAF Sunderland crews during the Berlin airlift. If you want to watch this, you should know that it helps if you like aeroplanes.

---

01 Jul 11 - 11:13 AM (#3179728)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Max Johnson

Nothing works. Nothing.

The link might be HERE


Or it might not.

---

01 Jul 11 - 11:13 PM (#3180081)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: GUEST,mg

Let's review Peggy of Fyvio. Why did the captain deserve to die? He was courting Peggy and asked the colonel to delay for a day to see if she would marry and the colonel shoots him. How does that deserve shooting?   How was he arrogant? mg

---

02 Jul 11 - 02:13 PM (#3180279)
Subject: RE: Cheerful Folk Songs
From: Bert

The Barley Mow
Beer, glorious beer (More music hall than folk)
The Lincolnshire Poacher
and it's derivatives - The Chandler's Wife & The Thing
The Keeper

---