Why is May the month for folk songs?
Who actually knows?
But if you do please enlighten me!
So many traditional songs start with:
"One May morning....."
"As I roved out one May morning....."
"One morning in May....."
etc etc ad infinitum!
Out of all the months May is surely the one with the most songs and for this I LOVE it. It is also the most beautiful month for plants too. Everything is blooming and coming alive.
Look at all the late spring flowers and the trees unfurling their leaves right now!! In fact most of the songs mentioned below contain flowers, plants, trees and nature. 💚
Here are some of my favourites :
Searching for Lambs
"As I marched out, one May morning, one May morning betide..." (this first version below is a very classical sounding version and not so folky but is still based on the original folk song as collected by Cecil Sharp and arranged by Vaughan Williams here).
And here is my version, complete with actual sheep and lambs…
The Birds in the Spring
by the Copper Family
"One May morning I chanced for to roam and strolled through the fields by the side of the grove..."
Gathering Rushes by Anne Briggs
"A fine young girl all in the month of May, was gathering rushes just at the break of day....."
and my version (interrupted by a random horseman who appears out of nowhere which often used to happen in my old village!). You have no doubt see this before as it was on my March album and I write about it probably on here…
Barbara Allen
"'Twas in the merry month of May, the green buds were a swelling...."
One Morning in May
"One morning in May as I carelessly did stray, to view the green meadows and the lambs sport and play..."
As I Roved Out
"As I roved out on a bright May morning, to view the meadows and flowers gay...."
These ones are both sung here by the wonderful Irish singer Niamh Parsons. They are particularly poignant songs and represent the often fickle nature of love. In fact I admit I may well have shed the odd tear singing the first one as I wrote this!
I sang the latter song back in 2005 (!) at the National Folk festival for the singers competition and ended up winning it! (And barely told a soul at the time, so I am telling you all now 20 years later!!!)
I learnt it off a recording from good old Kate Rusby - a lovely folk singer from Yorkshire who was my first favourite singer back then. I learnt a ton of her songs off her CDs.
And yet there are yet more......
The Bonny Black Hare
(warning... this song contains possibly the most blatant euphemisms used in a folk song!)
"On the fourteenth of May at the dawn of the day..."
Here is a marvellous version on a banjo
& my version (part of the song anyway - too embarrassed to sing the rest!)
And finally... of course there are rather a few May Day songs too (maybe I should have started off with these but it seems like too long ago now since the start of the month)
May Song
"Winter time has gone and past-o,
Summer time has come at last-o.
We shall sing and dance the day
And follow the 'obby 'orse that brings the May........
......Blue bells they have started to ring-o,
And true love, it is the thing-o.
Love on any other day
Is never quite the same as on the First of May!"
And finally the beginning of the month at the end:
Hal-an-Tow
That's all for folks - now go and sing!!
Oh and PS I launched a podcast on May 1st 2020 - you can listen to it here and I think also somewhere on this very Substack!
One Morning In May - Album by Julie Russell | Spotify
Bookmarking this post so I can play all the songs!
Lovely version of a very old song.