Annotation:Sleepy Bodie

Find traditional instrumental music

Back to Sleepy Bodie


X:2 T:Sleepy Body M:6/8 L:1/8 R:Jig S:McGibbon – Scots Tunes, book III, p. 62 (1762) Z:AK/Fiddler’s Companion K:A A | ce2 caf | Te>dc Bcd | (c/d/)ef caf | {f}Te3A2 :| |: (f/g/) | a>gf edc | d(e/d/c/d/) B2 f/g/ | a>gf e<ce | a3 e2f/g/ | a>gf edc | d(e/d/c/d/) {c}TB2A | (c/d/e)f caf | Te3A2 :| |: A | ce2 c/(e/f/g/a/)f/ | e/f/e/d/c/d/ (Bc)d | (c/d/e)f c/(e/f/g/a/)f/ | {f}Te3A2 :| |: (f/g/) | a>gf ef/g/a/c/ | d/f/e/d/c/d/ B>ef/g/ | (a/b/a/g/)(a/f/) ec/d/e/c/ | Ta3 e2f/g/ | (a/b/a/)g/a/f/ (e/d/e/)(c/d/e/) | d/(f/e/d/)c/d/ {c}TB2A | c/B/c/d/e/f/ caf | {f}Te3A2 :|



SLEEPY BODIE. Scottish, Air and Jig (6/8 time). F Major (Gow, Thomson): A Major (McGibbon). Standard tuning (fiddle). AB (Thomson): AABB (Gow): AABBCCDD (McGibbon). "Sleepy body, drowsy body" is a poem in Allan Ramsay's The Tea-table Miscellany; or, Pills to Purge Melancholy (1721), in which the first verse is first given in Latin. It may be the Latin verse was first, for Ramsay marked the song as an old one, to which he added material. The music to the song was printed in Scottish singer and collector William Thompson's [1] (c. 1695-1753) in his Orpheus Caledonius, vol. 2 (1733). There are only two stanzas to the song, as printed by Ramsay and Thomson, and later by David Herd (Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs, 1775):

O sleepy body, and drowsy body,
O Wiltuna waken and turn thee:
To drivel and draunt, while I sigh and gaunt
Gives me good reason to scorn thee.

When though shouldst be kind,
Thou turns sleepy and blind,
And snoters and snores far frae me,
Wae light on they face, thy drowsy embrace,
Is enough to gar me betray thee.

See also the cognate duple-time Annotation:Merry Plowman (The) for more.

Additional notes

Source for notated version: -

Printed sources : - Carlin (The Gow Collection), 1986; No. 377. Gow (Complete Repository, Part 3), 1806; p. 6. McGibbon (Scots Tunes, book III), 1762; p. 62. William Thomson (Orpheus Caledonius, vol. 2), 1733; p. 50.

Recorded sources: -



Back to Sleepy Bodie