Скачать или смотреть Lady Nancy / Lady Diamond (Child 269) - Aunt Molly Jackson

Lady Nancy / Lady Daisy / Lady Dysie / Lady Eliza / Lady Diamond (Child No. 269) - Sung by Aunt Molly Jackson (Mary Magdalene Garland Stewart Jackson Stamos) (1880–1960) of Clay County, Kentucky. She learned songs from her great-grandmother, Nancy MacMahan, at an early age and was also known to write her own songs and arrange ballads from print. Recorded by Alan and Elizabeth Lomax in New York on May 27, 1939.

Note by Kevin W.:
Aunt Molly Jackson's "Lady Nancy" is a version of Lady Diamond (Child 269). She arranged it from print. Child 269 is rare in oral tradition and has never been found outside of Scotland.

Aunt Molly Jackson was known to arrange songs from a copy of Francis James Child's ballad books she was given by folklorist Tillman Cadle and his wife Mary Elizabeth Barnicle sometime before the Lomaxes recorded her. She made her own version of "The Birth of Robin Hood" (Child 102) because she liked and could identify with the Robin Hood character. She adapted it from Child 102, Version B, from Peter Buchan's "Ballads of the North of Scotland" (1828). She sang many genuine folk songs that agree with other Kentucky versions, mind you, but the ones that haven't been collected from other singers in America are likely to be her own creations which she was open to admit to Alan Lomax. She told him she composed the songs based on texts from a ballad book.

A traditional version of Child 269 can be heard here:
   • Lady Daisy (Child 269) (Noise Reduced) - M...  
Lady Daisy, sung by Mary Stewart Robertson, a Traveller of New Deer, Aberdeenshire, Scotland for James Madison Carpenter in 1932. She learned the song from her mother.

Song transcription:

There was a king in olden times
A king of wealth and fame
He had one child, a beautiful girl
And Nancy was her name.

This king he had a kitchen boy
And William was his name
He fell in love with the King's young daughter
And brought her body to shame.

When the nightingale sang in the tree
And the beasts lay down to rest
This kitchen boy lay between Lady Nancy's [thighs]
And her head lay on her breast.

When he went into Lady Nancy's room
They pulled her curtains down
Then they both did lay in Lady Nancy's bed
To sport and play around.

Lady Nancy went out in the garden one day
To take a walk alone
Her father saw [by his lovely daughter's form]
She walked in a [familiar] way.

Oh Nancy my child come tell me true
Who done this thing to thee
Was it some lord in London town
Or a baron of high degree?

It was no lord in London town
Or no baron of high degree
It was fair Willie your kitchen boy
I've no cause to lie to thee.
For I love bonnie William he's all my heart
And I know that he loves me.

I shall kill this fair bonnie boy, he said
For doing this thing to thee
Oh do not kill my bonnie fair love
Before you first kill me.

Then the King took out his kitchen boy
And killed him on the plain
His hair was like the strands of gold
His eyes like crystal stream.

Farewell, farewell, Lady Nancy
Farewell, farewell, said he
Our love has caused us much pain
Farewell my love to thee.

Then the King cut out fair William's heart
And put it in a cup of gold
Take that to Lady Nancy's [room then]
For she is careless and bold.

[Spoken: For she is careless and bold?]

Then she washed her true love's heart with tears
That fell from her deep blue eyes
Then all the town's folk gathered all around
To hear her fearful moan/cries.

Oh fare you well my father the King
You destroyed my pride and joy
Since he died for me I shall die for him
This bonnie young kitchen boy.

I have made cruel the King he said
My child, your love to blame
For there's never been such a beautiful boy
As the boy that I've just now slain.

There never has been such a fair young man
As the man I've just now slain
There is nothing too cruel for a King to do
When madness turns his brain.

You should burn for this, my father the King
For taking my love from me
For he was the father of my unborn babe
You have destroyed all three.
For I'm going to curse my painful heart
For I'm going to curse my painful heart
Then my babe will die in me.

Then she stepped into her own bedroom
And quietly closed the door
Saying farewell my cruel old father, the King
My voice you should hear no more.

Then she picked up her own penknife
And pierced it through her heart
Saying go bury me in the arms of my own true love
Do not bury us apart.

Then the King called his servant men
And told them what to do
Bury Nancy and William breast to breast
And their baby 'tween the two.

[Spoken: Where'd you learn that song? I learned it from the English Poems book about the Kings of England and things like that and I composed the song from the words, from the story.]

(The words in brackets I wasn't certain on)