Annotation:Female Sailor (The)
X: 1 T: Female Saylor, The O: Playford 1706 R: jig Z: 1997 by John Chambers <jc:trillian.mit.edu> N: Playford Ball N: Barnes N: Recüeil de Contredances (Feuillet) M: 6/8 L: 1/8 F:http://jc.tzo.net/~jc/music/abc/England/jig/MastersInThisHall_Gm.abc K: Gm |: "Gm"G2d "D7"d2c | "Gm"B3 "Cm"c3 | "D7"d2c B2A | "Gm"B2A "D7"G2^F | "Gm"G2d "D7"d2c | "Gm"B3 "Cm"c3 | "D7"d2c B2A | "Gm"G6 :| |: "Gm"b2a "D7"g2^f | "Gm"g3 d3 | "Gm"b2a "D7"g2^f | "Gm"g3 "(G7)"d2=f | "Cm"e2c "D7"d2A | "Gm"B2G B2c |1"D7"d2d ^f2f | "Gm"g3 "D7"a3 :|2 "D7"d2d B2A | "Gm"G6 |]
FEMALE SAYLOR/SAYLER/SAILOR, THE. English, Country Dance Tune (6/8 time). G Dorian. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB (Barnes): AABB' (Johnson). Originally French ("La Matelote"), the tune and dance were adopted by the English for a longways country dance in the first decade of the 18th century. The melody was composed by French composer Marin Marais for his opera Alcyone (1706, AKA Alcione), which premiered at the Palais Royal in Paris. The public response was immediately enthusiastic and it was to be Marais’s greatest triumph. The melody "Female Sailor" appears as "Marche pour les Matelots" (Act III Scene 6). The tune was set to a dance by Raoul-Auger Feuillet in his Recüeil de contredanses (1706), and Feuillet's volume was reprinted in a translation by John Essex entitled For the Further Improvement of Dancing, published in London by the firm of Walsh & Randall in 1710.
Around the year 1860 William Morris (1834-1896) employed the melody for his Christmas carol "Masters in this Hall," is still heard in holiday caroling repertory.
