Songs Of My Callow Youth

I suppose today you need to be officially in Choir at school in order to get the chance to sing in your wondrous croaky voice with your fellow students.  We actually had time carved out in the day for music and singing throughout elementary school.

I, of course, thought my voice was beautiful as a child, and I sang songs I learned in school all the time, mercilessly pelting my family with the tunes. 

 I joined high school choir for a heady year till they started using recording equipment, and every once in awhile you'd hear some off key high note trailing behind the rest, and you could see the choir director was horrified and determined to figure out who it was. I knew of course.  It was me.  Oops.

 Despite My Failure at the Choir Cave, I was able to remember and sing some of these tunes to my tiny newborn son at 3 am when he was all new hoping to lull him to sleep.  It didn't work, but holding a baby and singing them songs is one of the best things in life, truly.

Songs and snippets just stick in your head, particularly if you heard them in your earlier years, before your head becomes crammed with too much stuff, and all you recall are commercial jingles.  I'll be minding my own business, and some days, out of the blue, I'm singing these tunes:


The Erie Canal (Somewhere on my blog is a video clip of me singing this, two beers to the wind)

I've got a mule,
Her name is Sal,
Fifteen years on the Erie Canal.
She's a good old worker
And a good old pal,
Fifteen years on the Erie Canal.
We've hauled some barges in our day
Filled with lumber, coal and hay
And ev'ry inch of the way I know
From Albany to Buffalo.

Low Bridge, ev'rybody down,
For it's Low Bridge,
We're coming to a town!
You can always tell your neighbor,
You can always tell your pal,
If you've ever navigated
On the Erie Canal.
Low Bridge, ev'rybody down,
For it's Low Bridge,
We're coming to a town!
You can always tell your neighbor,
You can always tell your pal,
If you've ever navigated
On the Erie Canal.

Sweet Betsy From Pike  (While looking this one up, I was annoyed to find most referred to "her lover Ike" instead of "her husband Ike" as I knew it should be.  These also all had the chorus "wrong".  It should be toorali oorali oorali ay.  And it should start "Oh say have you heard of Sweet Betsy From Pike", in my memory.

Oh, Did you ever hear of
Sweet Betsy from Pike,
Who crossed the wide prairies
With her husband, Ike,
With two yoke of cattle
And one spotted hog
A tall Shanghai rooster
And an old yeller dog?

Singing toorali, oorali, oorali ay
Singing toorali, oorali, oorali ay

The alkali desert
Was burning and bare
And Ike cried in fear,
"We are lost, I declare!
My dear old Pike County,
I'll go back to you."
Said Betsy, "You'll go by yourself,
If you do."

Singing toorali, oorali, oorali ay
Singing toorali, oorali, oorali ay

They swam the wide rivers
And crossed the tall peaks
They camped on the prairie
For weeks upon weeks
They fought off the Indians
With musket and ball
And reached California
In spite of it all

Singing toorali, oorali, oorali ay
Singing toorali, oorali, oorali ay

There Stands A Little Man In the Deep Dark Wood  (Of all the songs I sang to my son as a baby, this one stands out in his memory)

There stands a little man in the deep dark wood
he wears a purple cloak
and a small black hood
can you see him standing there
silently
without a care
can you see him standing
in the deep
dark woods.

Sleep My Little One

Sleep my little one,

sleep my pretty one,

float on a starry stream,

worlds of all loveliness,

wonderful worlds.,

Filling your magical dreams.

 
White Sheep

White sheep, white sheep,
On a blue hill,
When the wind stops,
You all stand still.
When the wind blows,
You walk away slow.
White sheep, white sheep,
Where do you go?

Drill Ye Tarriers Drill

Every morning at seven o'clock
There's twenty tarriers a drillin' at the rock
The boss comes along and he says: "Keep still
And come down heavy on the cast-iron-drill!"
And drill, ye tarriers, drill!
Drill, ye tarriers, drill!
Oh, it's work all day
For the sugar in your tay
Down behind the railway!
Then drill ye tarriers, drill!
And blast
And fire!


My Home's In Montana (I recall this as "I come from Montana, I wear a bandana...and something about roaming wide prairies, but my memory could be wrong, or some variation was in our little school songbook)

My home's in Montana
I wear a bandana
My spurs are of silver
My pony is gray
While riding the ranges
My luck never changes
With foot in the stirrup I'll gallop away

When valleys are dusty
My pony is trusty
He lopes through the blizzards
The snow in his ears.
The cattle may scatter
But what does it matter
My rope is a halter for pig-headed steers

When far from the ranches
I chop the pine branches
To heap on the campfire
As daylight grows pale
When I have partaken
Of beans and of bacon
I'll whistle a merry old song of the trail

My home's in Montana
I wear a bandana
My spurs are of silver
My pony is gray
While riding the ranges
My luck never changes
With foot in the stirrup I'll gallop away
Halloween (Actually all I ever remember of this one are the first two lines, but I'm glad to have found the rest)


Blue Bonnets   (Such a pretty one, and the class sang it in harmony with altos, sopranos and whatever the other one is :)

Blue, blue, bonnets oh so blue.
Your bright eyes are shining, through the silvery dew.

I know you’re a dolly, offered for the rain.
I know you’ll return again, to Texas in the spring.



Halloween, The Witch Is Riding High

"Hallowee-ee-een, the witch is riding high.
Have you see-ee-een her shadow in the sky?
So beware don't you dare to even boast or a ghost
To your dismay will hear you say
That you don't care, say a prayer
Or it may come and pull your hair

There's a big, black cat a crossing in our way.
Now you've heard of that, bad luck they always say.
Weren't you scared when it stared with eyes aglow
Hear that crow?
There's a thump near the pump
Let's hurry home or a gnome
Will thump a lump upon your dome."