Cruel Sister: Question for Brits and other Strange People
Faith Talman
'The Cruel Sister'. Hopefully someone can help you with the translation to
'lay the bairn tae the bonnie broom'. The song's about one cruel sister who
offs the good sister by pushing her into the sea. When the bones are
retrieved the men make harps out of the breast bones strung with locks of
golden hair. Pentangle did it about 25 years ago. According to OBD the song
may have been a Scottish ballad as it isn't exactly the Queen's English. It's
a bit macabre, but interesting.
Faith Talman
John Lane wrote:
> Greetings,
> There is a song called "Cruel Sister." The only version of it I know was
> recorded by a group called The Pentangle some years ago. Some kind soul
> here recently provided me with chords and lyrics. But I have a question:
> what do the words mean:
> "Lay the bent to the bonnie broom"?
> Also, is this song a traditional tune, or is it attributed to a particular
> person? Same question regarding the song "Lord Franklin," also recorded by
> The Pentangle? Thanks to all who might offer any help.
> Mark Lane
John Lane
PAULSBANJO
I can't be sure but it may orrigionally have had something to do with
"tying" a Broom (plant) to make a domestic (sweeping) broom. Just some idle
thoughts.
Paul (which would have been "one of the chores" for the sisters)
Desoto Joe
John Lane wrote in message <7a2ph4$j...@bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net>...
>Greetings,
>There is a song called "Cruel Sister." The only version of it I know was
>recorded by a group called The Pentangle some years ago.
I have the 1970 album & it is great! I also have Pentangle In The Round,
Live. This is good also! "Lay the bent to the bonnie broom"?
I have no idea.
Desoto Joe/The Record Man
alan_c...@my-dejanews.com
"John Lane" <mist...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> Greetings,
> There is a song called "Cruel Sister." The only version of it I know was
> here recently provided me with chords and lyrics. But I have a question:
> what do the words mean:
> person? Same question regarding the song "Lord Franklin," also recorded by
> The Pentangle? Thanks to all who might offer any help.
> Mark Lane
>
>
Bent is a kind of grass (Agrostis) which is rather stiff and probably good for
making brooms out of. I can imagine the ballad being sung by someone making a
brush, taking a bunch of grass for each verse and tying it.
The words of this repeated line have nothing to do with the plot. The same
applies to the other versions of this ballad as printed by Child. You can find
the following variants:
With a hie down down a downe-a
Hey Edinbruch, how Edinbruch
Binnorie, O Binnorie
Hey with a gay and a grinding O
Bow down, bow down, bow down
Oh and ohone, and ohone and aree
Make sense of those if you can!
Alan Crozier
Lund, Sweden
alan.c...@telia.com
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Jon-Jon
first album? It has the same tune as "Bob Dylan's Dream"
Peace,
Jon-Jon
Gerry Myerson wrote:
> In article <7a2ph4$j...@bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net>, "John Lane"
> <mist...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
> > Also, is this song a traditional tune, or is it attributed to a particular
> > person? Same question regarding the song "Lord Franklin," also recorded by
> > The Pentangle?
>
> I'm pretty sure Lord Franklin is trad. Recorded by Martin Carthy and,
> recently, by Eileen McGann (and by John & Liz Munro, but good luck finding
> *that* recording!).
>
> Bob Dylan learned the tune from Carthy & used it for Bob Dylan's Dream
> (While riding on a train going West/I fell asleep for to take my rest...)
>
> Gerry Myerson (ge...@mpce.mq.edu.au)
Gerry Myerson
Nigel & Nancy Sellars
additional verses as "Lady Franklin's Lament," which I have on an old
Paul Clayton sea shanty album. "Cruel Sister" exists in umpteen
versions and is also known as "The Twa Sisters" and, in an Appalachian
version, as "Oh, the Wind and the Rain," where the drowned girl's breast
bone becomes a fiddle and her finger bones the tuning keys. The chorus
is probably nonsensical, and most versions have wildly different lines.
The most understandable is an English version recorded by Pyewacket as
"By the bonny, bonny bowers of London," but that, too, has little to do
with the plot. Most versions end with the cruel sister merely exposed,
but an Irish version recorded by Clannad has her (apparently) boiled in
lead. Hope that helps.
Nigel Sellars
Gerry Myerson
<unic...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> Is that the same song as "Lady Franklin's Lament" which is on Margaret
> Cristl's first album? It has the same tune as "Bob Dylan's Dream"
I'm not familiar with Margaret Cristl, but, yes, "Lady Franklin's Lament"
is another name for "Lord Franklin".
It is a rather odd name for the song, at least for the version I know,
where the narrator is clearly a sailor & not Lady Franklin.
Gerry Myerson (ge...@mpce.mq.edu.au)
Joe Felsenstein
Gerry Myerson <ge...@mpce.mq.edu.au> wrote:
>I'm not familiar with Margaret Cristl, but, yes, "Lady Franklin's Lament"
>is another name for "Lord Franklin".
>
>It is a rather odd name for the song, at least for the version I know,
>where the narrator is clearly a sailor & not Lady Franklin.
Mostly, yes, but in the last verse ("And now my story it gives me pain ...")
the narrator, who is willing to give 10,000 pounds for news of Franklin,
has pretty cleary mutated into Lady Franklin. She did indeed go to great
lengths to discover what had happened to her husband.
Perhaps we could have the name of the song be "Lord Franklin", but have it
slowly change into "Lady Franklin's lament" as one sings it ...
--
Joe Felsenstein j...@genetics.washington.edu
Dept. of Genetics, Univ. of Washington, Box 357360, Seattle, WA 98195-7360 USA
Barry Cole
versions of it were collected by Francis James Child [I believe it was
Child#10]. Child only collected the words because he was interested in the
oral tradition only as poetry. Fortunately, Betrand H. Bronson published four
encyclopedia sized volumes with lots of music attached. I have the later
Bronson single volume paperback compendium, which has about 20 variants of this
song, but not the exact Pentagle version. I believe their version is
traditional.
"Lay the bent to the bonnie broom" would probably translate in current
language to "put your back into the job of sweeping the floor". It is
unrelated to the story line, but allows for a hypnotic answer to a lead
singer's lines. It most likely came from a corruption of Scot's Galllic.
Barry.
John Lane wrote:
> Greetings,
> There is a song called "Cruel Sister." The only version of it I know was
> recorded by a group called The Pentangle some years ago. Some kind soul
> here recently provided me with chords and lyrics. But I have a question:
> what do the words mean:
> "Lay the bent to the bonnie broom"?
> Also, is this song a traditional tune, or is it attributed to a particular
> person? Same question regarding the song "Lord Franklin," also recorded by
Jacey Bedford
>In article <36C7AB70...@earthlink.net>, Jon-Jon
><unic...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>> Is that the same song as "Lady Franklin's Lament" which is on Margaret
>> Cristl's first album? It has the same tune as "Bob Dylan's Dream"
>
>is another name for "Lord Franklin".
Almost:
Lady Franklin's lament has 12 verses. Lord Franklin seems to be a
truncated version. Lady Franklin's Lament doesn't have the "Eskimo in
his skin canoe" verse, but has all the others and more.
We don't sing it now, in concert, but we used to do it to the
traditional tune collected in the north of England by Frank Kidson. It's
related to the common Lord Franklin tune.
Jacey
--
Jacey Bedford art...@artifact.demon.co.uk
ARTISAN www.artifact.demon.co.uk
10 Park Head, Birdsedge, Huddersfield, HD8 8XW. UK
Phone UK 01484-606230 Fax UK 01484-606290
John Lane
Mark
Jacey Bedford wrote in message ...
Jacey Bedford
<mist...@worldnet.att.net> writes
>Thanks, Jacey. Is the song on any of your albums?
>Mark
No, we never got round to it. It was recorded by Brewhouse music for
release on a compilation of songs collected by Kidson, and planned for
vinyl release just as the bottom dropped out of the vinyl market in the
UK. I've still got the white lable test-pressing but they pulled the
pressing and never got round to releasing it on CD. Eric at Brewhouse
probably still has the master tapes.
Cheers
Tony Fisk
John Lane wrote in message <7aklac$g...@bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net>...
>Thanks, Jacey. Is the song on any of your albums?
>Mark
>
>>In article <gerry-16029...@abinitio.mpce.mq.edu.au>, Gerry
>>Myerson <ge...@mpce.mq.edu.au> writes
>>>In article <36C7AB70...@earthlink.net>, Jon-Jon
>>><unic...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Is that the same song as "Lady Franklin's Lament" which is on Margaret
>>>> Cristl's first album? It has the same tune as "Bob Dylan's Dream"
>>>
>>>I'm not familiar with Margaret Cristl, but, yes, "Lady Franklin's Lament"
>>>is another name for "Lord Franklin".
>
Point of moderate interest - A Southampton-based band called The New
St.George (not the New England outfit of the same name) recorded the
'eskimo'-inclusive version on a cassette entitled 'The Mourning After',
(Codpiece Tapes, COD 002) but I suspect it was only available at gigs and by
post from the band. It was recorded between July 87 and Feb 88, and the
line-up included Oren Stone, Mike Clarke, Steve Shrimpton, Barry Lockyer,
and John Witcher, so you may be able to turn one of those names up
somewhere. I don't think the band is still operating as such, but I have
this tape if you need a lyric transcription or the like.
Tony Fisk