Annotation:Highland Laddie (1)

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X:1 T:Highland Laddie as danc'd by Aldridge M:C| L:1/8 B:McGlashan - A Collection of Scots Measures (c. 1781, p. 16) Z:AK/FIddler's Companion K:Bb V:1 clef=treble name="1." [V:1] B2|FGBc dBBd|eccd eccd|FGBc egfe|dBBc dB B:| |:b|gfgb gfed|eccd eccb|gfgb gfce|dBBc dBB:|]

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HIGHLAND LADDIE(, THE ORIGINAL) [1]. AKA – "Hielan Laddie." AKA and see "Bonny Laddie," "Clashing at Her," "Cockleshells," "Donkey Riding," "High Caul'd Cap," "I Have Two Yellow Goats" (Ireland), "Lass of Livingstone (The)," "Six Yellow Goats," "Tom and Jerry (4)," "Wilt thou play me fair play?" Scottish, English, New England; Scotch Measure, Quickstep, March, Polka, or Country Dance Tune (cut time). England, Northumberland. D Major (Gunn, Kerr, Raven): F Major (Johnson): G Major (Miller & Perron, Vickers): A Major (Emmerson, Gow, Morison). Standard tuning (fiddle). AB (Morison, Raven): AABB (Emmerson, Kerr, Seattle/Vickers): ABCD (Johnson): AABBCCDD (Gow, Gunn). Mention of the tune appears in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1750 that "The Highland Laddie written long since by Allan Ramsay, and now sung at Ranelagh and all the other gardens; often fondly encor'd, and sometimes ridiculously hiss'd," for, as Emmerson (1971) points out, the rising of 1745 of Bonnie Prince Charlie was fresh in the minds of many at the time. However, by the end of the century that memory had dimmed to the extent that Gow noted in his Repository (Part Second, 1802) "The Quick step (sic) of the gallant 42nd Regiment (The Royal Highlanders, or, more popularly, The Black Watch). It was performed when the Regiment was reviewed by His Majesty at Ashford, May 7, 1802. David Murray (Music of the Scottish Regiments, Edinburgh, 1994, p. 178) writes: "A journalist at the 1845 Queen's Birthday Parade commented that the Scots Guards marched past to 'The national, but mediocre melody 'Will ye go to Inverness?'-there are several versions of the song-and he compared it unfavorably with the splendid music played by the Coldstream Guards. The same, it must be said, holds good today. Consisting as it does of two simple eight-bar phrases, each repeated, 'Highland Laddie' can become monotonous when, for instance, a battalion in column or route has to be played past." Still, it has the ability to stir: a piper led the British invasion of Normandy's Sword beach playing the "Highland Laddie." It is still played on ceremonial occasions. In the 19th century "Highland Laddie" was the march-past in quarter-column of all the Highland regiments in the British army.

A version of the melody appears in the Drummond Castle Manuscript (in the possession of the Earl of Ancaster at Drummond Castle), inscribed "A Collection of Country Dances written for the use of his Grace the Duke of Perth by Dav. Young, 1734." John Glen (1891) finds the earliest printing of the tune by this title in Robert Bremner's 1757 collection (p. 47, see "Highland Laddie (5)" for David Young and James Aird's tunes). A variant appears under the title "Cockleshells" in Playford's Apollo's Banquet (London, 1690) and the Dancing Master of 1701. Highland Laddie is also the name of a simple step dance that used to be taught to children, and is the name of a Scottish country dance. The tune was entered into the 1840 music manuscript collection (p. 111) of multi-instrumentalist John Rook of Wigton, Cumbria.

Numerous sets of words exist to the melody. This was often sung to the pipe tune version:

Where ha' ye been a' the day?
Bonnie laddie, Hielan' laddie
Saw ye him that' far awa'
Bonnie laddie, Hielan' laddie
On his head a bonnet blue
Bonnie laddie, Hielan' laddie
Tartan plaid and Hielan' trews
Bonnie laddie, Hielan' laddie

David Murray, in his Music of the Scottish Regiments (Edinburgh, 1994) remarks that "a street song to the tune of 'Highland Laddie' was popular with Scottish urchins when a Pipe Band passed, began:

A' the bumbees kickin' up a row,
Herrin' Jennie, six a penny. (p. 182)

Barry Finn reports that the melody was used as a capstan and a 'stamp and go' shanty, and (without the grand chorus) was also used as a halyard shanty. It was popular on the Dundee Whalers, then later used (c. 1830's and 40's) as a work song for stowing lumber and cotton in the Southeastern and Gulf ports of the United States. An older Dundee version goes:

Where have ye been all the day, Bonnie Laddie, Hieland Laddie
Where have ye been all the day, my Bonnie Hieland Laddie

Chorus:
Way hay & away we go, Bonnie Laddie, Hieland Laddie
Way hay & away we go, my Bonnie Hieland Laddie

I did see ye down the glen, Bonnie Laddie, Hieland Laddie
I did not see ye near the burn, my Bonnie Hieland Laddie

Chorus

No, I was not down the glen, no, I was not near the burn
I joined a ship & went a sailing, sailed far north & went a whaling

Shipped on board of a Dundee whaler, shipped on board as a whaling sailor
Bound away to Iceland cold, found much ice but not much gold

Greenland is a cold country, it's not the place for you and me
We caught some whales and boiled their blubber, oil and fat choked every scupper

I'll be glad when I get home, I'll give up this whaling game.

A later shanty called "Donkey Riding" was derived from the tune:

Was you ever in Quebec, moving timber on the deck
Where you nearly break your neck, riding on a donkey.

Finn thinks the shanty probably goes back at least to the 1820's or earlier when the Scottish whalers out of Dundee, Peterhead, & Aberdeen were in their Greenland Fisheries hay-days, chasing the right whale. Source for notated version: Bowie Manuscript, c. 1789 [Johnson].

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