Hey Nonny Nonny and Blood All Over The Walls: Forensic Traditional Music Appreciation Poll!

[marnanightingale]

So, angevin2 and I are having a small dispute, with which you may assist us. We are unable to agree about the cause of death in St James Infirmary.
ETA: angevin2 has an interesting and informative post about Unfortunate rake variants here.

Here, therefore, are links to two versions of St James Infirmary (and one of its older sisters, "When I Was on Horseback", just for fun), though not to its Western sister Streets of Laredo, because a) I don't have it and b) that one was a gunshot wound, and a request for your opinions on this delicate and urgent matter.

St James Infirmary, YouSendIt link, Roger McGuinn, I think.

St James Infirmary, YouSendIt link, Arlo Guthrie, as well, because I can't actually decide which one I like better. And if I'd been able to find my Louis Armstrong I'd upload that too...

ETA: hafren asked for lyrics.

I went down to the St James Infirmary
Saw my baby there
Stretched out on a long white table
So sweet...so cold...so fair

Let her go...let her go...god bless her
Wherever she may be
She can look this wide world over
But she'll never find a sweet man like me

When I die want you to dress me in straight-lace shoes
I want a boxback coat and a stetson hat
Put a twenty dollar gold piece on my watch chain
So the boys'll know that I died standing pat

Now you've heard my sad story
Now hand me another shot of that booze
And if anyone should ask you
Tell 'em I got the St James Infirmary Blues

I went down to the St James Infirmary...

When I Was on Horseback, YouSendIt link, Steeleye Span.

When I was on horseback, wasn't I pretty?
When I was on horseback, wasn't I gay?
Wasn't I pretty when I entered Cork City
And met with my downfall on the fourteenth of May?

Six jolly soldiers to carry my coffin,
Six jolly soldiers to march by my side,
It's six jolly soldiers take a bunch of red roses
Well for to smell them as we go along.

Beat the drums slowly and play the pipes lowly
Play up the dead march as we go along,
And bring me to Tipperary and lay me down easy
I am a young soldier that never done wrong.

When I was on horseback, wasn't I pretty?
When I was on horseback, wasn't I gay?
Wasn't I pretty when I entered Cork City
And met with my downfall on the fourteenth of May?

[Poll #903280]

We thank you. Also you should now go vote in angevin2's poll, in which she attempts to ascertain who shall be declared England's Quintessential Big Gay King.

Comments

[hafren.livejournal.com]

Well, if the query is about lyrics it might be better to post a link to the lyric, rather than to some sound file I can't play.... Plus I'd have thought the first five causes kinda all came under the umbrella of the sixth --- rich folk can be alcoholics etc but they don't usually have to die of it.

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

I can post lyrics! I meant to, and then I forgot.

And, true, but I mean "Immediate cause of death". Though also I think both song are pre-antibiotics, etc, so.

[hafren.livejournal.com]

There's a long discussion of the lyric's possible antecedents here (http://www.robwalker.net/html_docs/letterthirteen.html)

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I saw that while lyric-hunting; it's very cool. I collect Unfortunate Rake variants; it's a sick compulsion of mine, really. :)

[hafren.livejournal.com]

My favourite Unfortunate Rake would be The Newry Highwayman (http://www.traditionalmusic.co.uk/folk-song-lyrics/Newry_Highwayman.htm), who was obviously so much less wild and wicked than he liked to think.

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

I just did a post about it here, too... :)

[hafren.livejournal.com]

re the Big Gay King, I didn't see William of Orange in there?

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

... that's what Macauley said!

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

Was he gay (or, more accurately, did he or was he thought to have it off with other men on occasion, given that he predates conceptions of sexual orientation)? I'm an early modernist who spends a lot of time hanging out in the Middle Ages, so I did not know about this...

[hafren.livejournal.com]

They do say so (though in the experience of a Belfast academic friend of mine it is unwise to do so in a Shankill Road pub). Wikipedia has "During the 1690s rumors of William's homosexual inclinations grew and led to the publication of many satirical pamphlets. He had several male favourites, including a Rotterdam bailiff Van Zuylen van Nijveld, and two Dutch courtiers to whom he granted English dignities: Hans Willem Bentinck became Earl of Portland, and Arnold Joost van Keppel was created Earl of Albemarle." Now of course Wikipedia can be so much rot, but the speculation surfaces in all his biographies.

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

Well! You learn something every day. :)

[o-bunny.livejournal.com]

The *original* original St. James Hospital was in England, and was a lepers' hospital. Henry VIII knocked it down, as I recall.

The horseback rider -- haven't the foggiest.

[cleverthylacine]

I vote abortion for bachelorette #1 and war for bachelor #2.

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

Damn, I never thought of "botched abortion". Oh well, one always misses SOMETHING.

[damned-colonial.livejournal.com]

See, my guess was something sexual in a vague way, but I hadn't figured out what. If this had been an option I might've strongly considered it.

[rosiespark.livejournal.com]

I love the Louis Armstrong version of St James Infirmary! I can upload it if you can't find yours.

I voted for Narrative Necessity, Part II for the pretty young soldier - but based on the lyrics, I'm wondering if the 14th of May is a significant date. These dates are either too early or much too late. Or maybe "May" is just there for rhyming purposes?

There's a mistake in the final link, BTW - it leads to the first St James Infirmary download again. So I haven't actually heard pretty gay soldier song...

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

There's a mistake in the final link, BTW - it leads to the first St James Infirmary download again. So I haven't actually heard pretty gay soldier song...

Fixed!

[rosiespark.livejournal.com]

Yay! Which album is this from? The only one I have is Time. I don't suppose you'd be an angel and upload some more SS?

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

Ten Man Mop or Mr Reservoir Butler Rides Again, and sure. Any particular requests, or shall I pick?

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

I picked :)

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

Also, YES PLEASE LOUIS! *loves you*

Whot She Wrote

[carbonelle.livejournal.com]

I had the same response reading the Pretty Young Soldier: "cork city" and "the 14th of May" made me wonder if this mightn't have something to do with the Irish Troubles.

In which case it would truly be an odd turn for the Unfortunate Rake to take, unless you consider V.D. to fit into the roughly the same category as rebellion: "This rarely ends well"

Cavalier googling, however, got me nothing.

Ah ballads.

One day I'll have to write up the story of How She Made her Reputation as a Library Goddess thanks to a misspent ballad-singing youth.

[katallen.livejournal.com]

The two versions I know of both make it a venereal disease, but the words are very different from the ones here... less subtle... so I've no idea what these poor fools died of :)

[lalouve.livejournal.com]

Any narrator claiming that his girl will never find anyone who'll treat her better than he did is automatically suspected of having murdered her.

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

Yup.

[moon-custafer.livejournal.com]

Never thought of that, though I always considered that verse a bit odd - if she's already dead, is she likely to look for another 'sweet man?'

I had it pushed on me so many times that all these songs are about syphilis I never thought of a non-disease cause. I do still think St Jame's may be about something communicable but not airborne, since the narrator seems to anticipate his own impending death - of course if he killed her, he might be planning suicide out of guilt, or something.

[benet.livejournal.com]

That's what I figure too. Also, the narrator speaks of his own imminent demise, implying that he's either going to kill himself next, or be executed.

[lalouve.livejournal.com]

And with either execution or suicide he seems to have an unhealthy preoccupation with his funeral.

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

I had a weird idea that "St James Infirmary" was only actually used as such during the Civil War, and thought the lady was a casualty of the war.

As regards the second song, "met with my downfall on the fourteenth of May" sounds like something more sudden and violent than VD. I wouldn't have thought the average young soldier with syphilis would be a able to suggest an exact date for infection.

[damned-colonial.livejournal.com]

It sent me googling for dates in Irish history, at any rate. I assume either rebellion-and-bloodshed, or previous-rebellion-and-later-unjust-execution, the dates of which are the sorts of things that tend to go down in folk song history. Syphilis infection dates? Not so often recorded.

[wychwood]

*sporfles*

I went for "Too Young Not To Die", but I would also guess that the date was somehow relevant if one knew the local history.

Also you just made me dig out my copy of Ten Man Mop, or, Mr Reservoir Butler Rides Again (best album title ever *g*).

[moon-custafer.livejournal.com]

Unless he caught it from the person he lost his virginity to -- ooh, Tragic Irony!

[kgkofmel.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't be the first time, or the last.

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

Well, in HIS case it was clearly the last... yeah. I did consider that option. One would tend to remember the date, in that case, I think.

[hafren.livejournal.com]

I did wonder briefly if this young soldier was anything to do with the Irish Gaelic song "Yellow-haired Donough", in which case it was a political hanging, but according to Yeats he was hanged in Galway, not Cork.

[lasergirl.livejournal.com]

I think I'd like the woman to die of tuberculosis.

[gryphons-lair.livejournal.com]

"Cork City" and "14th of May" say "Irish Rebellion" to me, for no reason I can put my finger on. So he died in the rebellion, thus in battle.

[moon-custafer.livejournal.com]

Sort of OT - first off, The Dying Cub Fan's Last Request (http://sniff.numachi.com/pages/tiDYCUBFAN.html) (1983) is a rather charming contemporary parody of this genre, and secondly, does anyone think the tune to Squeeze Me sounds awfully like Infirmary but in a major key?

[idiotgrrl.livejournal.com]

I always thought the sweetheart in "St. James Infirmary" died of tuberculosis, which was a huge problem at the turn of the century.

[con-girl.livejournal.com]

Me too, if not just that vague, ill-defined "consumption" which may well be the same illness.

[bookslibretti.livejournal.com]

Based on the Brothers Four version (http://www.lyricsmania.com/lyrics/brothers_four_the_lyrics_8264/brothers_four___bmoc_lyrics_27686/st_james_infirmary_lyrics_303011.html), I vote illicit abortion for #1.

A few minutes' Googling also netted me a blog with way too much (http://lfno.blogspot.com/2006/03/roundup-of-other-red-hot-jazz-archive.html) information (http://lfno.blogspot.com/2006/01/alternate-lyrics.html) on various versions (http://lfno.blogspot.com/2006/05/buyers-guide.html) and history (http://www.bestofneworleans.com/dispatch/2005-06-14/cover_story.php).

My #2 vote is the comparatively boring choice of wounds received in a mysterious battle.

[dragon-moon.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the opportunity to hear some fabulous music! I love When I Was on Horseback, but part of that is because I absolutely adore The Streets of Laredo. ;D

*happy sigh*

[melieltathariel.livejournal.com]

The most direct predecessor of "Streets of Laredo" is "Pills of White Mercury", which is about syphilis. *shrugs*

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, and also in The Unfortunate Lass.

But in Laredo it's a gunshot wound. Just about every version of "The Unfortunate Rake" seems to have a different cause of death, if it's specified at all, hence the poll.