Utterly OT: Music to Reynardine?

Whistle
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Yes, I know there’s a theory that this is an Irish song. What makes my request utterly OT is that I want the music or TAB to Bert Jansch’s guitar arrangement of this song. Can anybody help?

I know that it was once commercially available in a tunebook of his arrangements—I saw it about 15 years ago. I didn’t buy it because I thought I’d taught myself by ear the arrangements to all the songs of his I wanted to know. Listening to his versions recently brought it home to me that I’d only based arrangements loosely on his and had forgotten how distant they were from the originals.

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Just bumping this back up in the hope of getting some kind of answer.

But wait a minute. This is the board on which I was reminded of the name of the erhu within two minutes of asking? What’s going on here?

Bert Jansch was the most significant figure in the London folk scene of the mid '60’s—the scene that spawned Andy Irvine, the Dubliners, Christy Moore and Johnny Moynihan and which ushered in the idea that Irish trad can enjoy something like mainstream popularity. He and most of the other creative leaders were Scottish—Davy Graham, Robin Williamson, Ian Campbell, John Martyn—or pretended to be—Ewan McColl, and, as we all know that means Irish on this board. The song—Reynardine—has been said to be Irish although I seriously doubt it. It’s amongst the half dozen best-known Jansch performances. Surely someone knows what I’m talking about.

[ This Message was edited by: Wombat on 2003-02-06 09:39 ]

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On 2003-02-06 00:09, Wombat wrote:
Bert Jansch was the most significant figure in the London folk scene of the mid 60s…

The 1860s? Seriously Wombat I don’t understand your surprise. There’s more than a few of us with enough grey hair to know who Bert Jansch is and even to have listened to his albums late at night on record players in bedsits under red light bulbs through a haze of smoke of various kinds. But this can hardly be equated with being able to come up with the guitar tab for one of his arrangements, or knowing what a Chinese one-string fiddle is called.

But since you have raised the subject, do you or does anyone know the origins of the song? Is it, like a number of the weirder British Isles songs, a corrupt form of some ancient ballad that spread across medieval Europe?

I know it from the Fairport Convention rendition on Liege and Lief, which I always found rather troubling, or at least spooky.

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On 2003-02-06 10:32, StevieJ wrote:


The 1860s? Seriously Wombat I don’t understand your surprise. There’s more than a few of us with enough grey hair to know who Bert Jansch is and even to have listened to his albums late at night on record players in bedsits under red light bulbs through a haze of smoke of various kinds. But this can hardly be equated with being able to come up with the guitar tab for one of his arrangements, or knowing what a Chinese one-string fiddle is called.

Well, I actually wasn’t being serious Steve. The sheet music was commercially available and, given the number of people who tried to copy Jansch, I imagine there are quite a few copies out there. I was just trying to goad one of the greying brigade into digging about in that trunk to find it for me since a search of the net failed to yield anything.

But since you have raised the subject, do you or does anyone know the origins of the song? Is it, like a number of the weirder British Isles songs, a corrupt form of some ancient ballad that spread across medieval Europe?

I’ve seen several theories. Briefly: French, English, Irish, don’t know, all of the above—that just about sums it up. One problem is that no two versions I’ve heard have the same lyrics. Fermoy gets mentioned in one version which is the only evidence that it might be Irish that I know of.

Some people even claim that it is a vampire song but this is almost certainly wrong. Much more likely is that the ageless theme of young maid being seduced by older, worldy wise, male is just getting another workout here. Vampires, Little Red Riding Hood, Reynardine: variations on a common theme. The ancient-ballad-that-acquired-different-local-characteristics theory sounds most likely to me.

I know it from the Fairport Convention rendition on Liege and Lief, which I always found rather troubling, or at least spooky.

I find this one spooky too. I actually don’t like it much. The backing is too unfocused. I have about 10 different versions and find that most miss, for one reason or another, something that’s central to the song—usually just the right sense of menace mixed with excitement.

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My guitar teacher had me learn Angie from those days.That’s all I remember about Bert Jansch. I think it had alternate tuning.

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On 2003-02-06 11:23, The Weekenders wrote:
My guitar teacher had me learn Angie from those days.That’s all I remember about Bert Jansch. I think it had alternate tuning.

I’d play Angi in standard tuning. I think Jansch plays Reynardine in drop D.