Sing, Sally-O! (B) [389] (297)

Like the first version of "Sing, Sally-O!"/"Mudder Dinah"...
[see here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JSBT1gQk1E ]
...Hugill learned this one from Harding, who said it as also "used ashore in the West Indies for any job where a work-song was needed." While the first was supposed to be a capstan song, this one was for halyards. Still, it's structure and to some extent its rhythm is not the most typical for a halyard chantey. Because of this, and because I can find no extant versions connected to the oral tradition of this chantey, I was hard pressed to imagine what the tempo and "feel" of this might be. For instance, are the dotted rhythms, noted, really cues for a sort of swing-eighths feel (as they seem to be in some of Hugill's other notated chanteys)? Can we rely on the accuracy of the syncopated rhythm of the second phrase? It seems that syncopated (often West Indian) rhythms often gave trouble to Hugill's transcriber; they are the site of frequent errors. Also, the only other writer I find who prints this is Sharp in his ENGLISH FOLK CHANTEYS (1914), and his second phrase is entirely different (while the rest is basically the same as Hugill). No matter, I tried to go for what Hugill wrote, for its own sake.

Of course, there would be more, improvised verses to this. I basically used Hugill's with slight changes to a few.

Please check out the whole chanteys project playlist, at http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=58B55DD66F22060C

Category:

Music

Tags:

• sea
• shanties
• chantey
• mudder
• dinah
• sally
• halyard
• work
• song

[joelwhitson]

The more of these tunes I hear you do the more i want to record my own!

[hultonclint]

You really should.  Well... I suppose one of the challenges may be finding time and place to do it!