Annotation:I Am a Poor Shepherd Undone

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I AM A POOR SHEPHERD UNDONE. AKA and see "The Distressed Shepherd," "Hey, Ho, My Honey," “Slaughter House,” "When my hero in court appears." English, Air (6/8 time). E Minor. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB. The melody appears in Playford's Dancing Master (1665, 1668 and all subsequent editions), Apollo's Banquet for the Treble Violin, Wit and Mirth: Pills to Purge Melacholy {vol. IV, 1720, as "The Distressed Shepherd"}, and John Gay's Beggar's Opera (London, 1729) {as Air IV "When my hero in court appears"}. Chappell (1859) notes numerous references to the tune, the earliest dating 1659. Kidson (1922) says the earlier name for the tune is "Hey, ho, my honey."

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Chappell (Popular Music of the Olden Times), vol. 2, 1859; pp. 14 15. Raven (English Country Dance Tunes), 1984; p. 67.

Recorded sources:




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