Dance to the Tune of Elsie Marley!

Last updated on: September 12, 2014 at 8:00 am by willduquette

Dance to the Tune of Elsie Marley! 2014-09-11T22:59:48-05:00 willduquette

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I have met at least two folk songs that speak in their lyrics of dancing “to the tune of Elsie Marley”: the song “Byker Hill“, which I blogged some while back, and Steeleye Span’s “Harvest of the Moon”:

So my son asked at breakfast today whether I’d ever heard the tune of Elsie Marley, and did it have words? Youtube is your friend; and it turns out that it does:

Di’ ye ken Elsie Marley, honey
The wife that sells the barley,honey
She lost her pocket and all her money
A-back o’ the bush in the garden, honey

Elsie Marley’s grown so fine
She won’t get up to serve the swine
But lies in bed till eight or nine
And surely she does take her time.

Elsie Marley is so neat
It’s hard for one to walk the street
But every lad and lass they meet
Cries “Di’ ye ken Elsie Marley, honey?”

Elsie Marley wore a straw hat
But now she’s getten a velvet cap
The Lambton lads mun pay for that
Di’ ye ken Elsie Marley, honey?

Elsie keeps rum, gin and ale
In her house below the dale
Where every tradesman, up and down
Does call and spend his half-a-crown.

The farmers as they cum that way
They drink with Elsie every day
And call the fiddler for to play
The tune of Elsie Marley, honey.

The pitmen and the keelmen trim
They drink Bumbo made of gin
And for to dance they do begin
To the tune of Elsie Marley, honey.

The sailors they do call for flip
As soon as they come from the ship
And then begin to dance and skip
to the tune of “Elsie Marley,” honey.

Those gentlemen who go so fine
They’ll treat her with a bottle of wine
And freely they’ll sit down and dine
Along with Elsie Marley, honey.

So to conclude those lines I’ve penn’d
Hoping there’s none I do offend
And thus my merry joke does end
Concerning Elsie Marley, honey.

The verse about the “pitmen and the keelmen” also appears in “Byker Hill”, at least as I’ve heard it sung.

And here’s the tune, which you can dance to if you like:

And here’s a recording that puts the two together, by a group somewhat misleadingly called “Naked Opera”:

Woof Guide to Popular Music

elsie marley

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