Annotation:Put on thy Smock on a Monday

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PUT ON THY SMOCK ON A MONDAY. AKA – "Put on Your Sark on Monday," “Put on Your Smock on Monday.” AKA and see "Pretty Nancy (1)". English, Country Dance Air (4/4 time {Chappell}, 6/4 time {Barlow, Barnes, Playford} or 6/8 time {Sharp}). G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). One part. The tune is mentioned in Thomas Heywood's play A Woman Killed With Kindness, performed in London in 1603, and is alluded to in Fletcher’s Love’s Cure (act ii, sc. 2). The title is tantalizingly close to "Pitt on Your Shirt on Monday,” a reel which does survive from an old MS, but they are melodically dissimilar and there is no way to ascertain whether they are in fact some way related.

The present tune was published as "Put on Thy Smock on a Monday" with dance instructions ("Round for six") in John Playford's Dancing Master [1], 4th edition (London, 1670, p. 45), and appears in a Cambridge University lute MS. (as "Pretty Nancy"). It was published in subsequent editions of the Dancing Master through the 8th edition of 1690, after which it was dropped from the long-running series.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Barlow (Complete Country Dance Tunes from Playford’s Dancing Master), 1985; No. 210, p. 55. Barnes (English Country Dance Tunes, vol. 2), 2005; p. 103. Chappell (Popular Music of the Olden Times, vol. 1), 1859; p. 234 (appears as “Pretty Nancy”). Sharp (Country Dance Tunes, Set VII), 1916; p. 1.

Recorded sources:



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