An aside

[tigerfort]

Busily not-posting about important stuff seems on the verge of leading to me not posting at all, so I shall see if I can manage some largely (or entirely) inconsequential bits and pieces over the next few days. Starting with this: I recently mentioned to a friend that it's possible to sing both "Amazing Grace" and "House of the Rising Sun" to the tune of "Ilkley Moor". To which his response was "What's Ilkley Moor?", which frankly floored me. If I had poll-posting facilities, I might well put up a poll asking whether you, dear reader

1. shared his boat


2. had shared his boat at some point later than, say, leaving primary school, but were no longer in it


3. knew all about Ilkley Moor but find it reasonable that some other people don't


4. can't understand how anyone can reach their twenties, growing up entirely in the UK, without knowing Ilkley Moor in some form


5. had lost your parents (or hamster, or indeed hamper) in a remarkable, but nonetheless regrettable, folk-singing-related incident


6. had lost your parents (or hamster, or indeed hamper) in an unremarkable, or perhaps less than entirely regrettable, folk-singing-related incident

Comments

[damerell]

d)

[tree_and_leaf]

c) The knowledge of traditional music is abysmal in the UK. I blame the schools for some of it (since primary schools seem to tend to use naff material written specially to tie in with the National Curriculum), and generally, the fact that so few people actually sing anymore.

[lnr]

It is also apparently possible to sing Ilkley Moor to the tune of I'm gonna run to you (by Bryan Adams) and I am only sad that I missed the family occasion on which this was discovered.

Or indeed to adapt it for a hypothetical moor near Heraklion where one catches one's death of sunstroke instead of cold (the ducks there, if you include them, play tennis).

I guess I'd be somewhere between c and d, at least marginally surprised that someone didn't know it.

[lnr]

FWIW Mike apparently never knew it until I started singing it at him :)

[crazyscot.livejournal.com]

I think I learned of Ilkley Moor when a teenager. If not before, I certainly did at 18 at uni.

[emily-shore.livejournal.com]

I'd say B, not having had the advantage of being brought up in England. I think I learned about it via Taruithorn filk, and then a bit later via a friend who lives in Otley. I might also select D, but it seems a bit hypocritical to reproach people for not knowing something that I didn't know, whatever the accident of national background.

[pellegrina.livejournal.com]

Ditto here, except it was Arthsoc and not filked, I think.

[emily-shore.livejournal.com]

The songs that I clearly remember having learned via Arthsoc are "Matty Groves" and "Perverts' Trousers." In fact my first memory of Arthsoc was getting into a minibus filled with lots of people singing "Perverts' Trousers." This says a great deal about the society.

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

I'd go for C.

One of my Morris teams frequently sings House of the Rising Sun and While Shepherds Watched (and occasional other one-off songs) to the tune of Ilkley Moor. This is fairly acceptable. Singing Ilkley Moor and While Shepherds Watched to the tune of House of the Rising Sun earns us pains looks and empties pubs. The Wild Rover to the tune of the Banana Boat Song in another good one.

[atreic.livejournal.com]

While Shephards Watched has a good claim to be the original words to the tune, so that one's not so surprising.

http://www.msgr.ca/msgr-2/on_ilkley_moor_bar_tat%202.htm - danger, plays the tune. Earwormed now!

[emperor]

Ilkley Moor is, allegedly, the tune to which "While Shepherds Watch" was originally meant to be sung.

d.

[segh.livejournal.com]

D. But G is C.

[crouchinglynx.livejournal.com]

c. On the grounds that my father is a long-distance-walking type, and the whole family had been there, done that and bought the LDWA jumper - but you could have given your friend a fighting chance by mentioning the important, distinctive third word of the song's title.

[woodpijn.livejournal.com]

b. I hadn't heard of Ilkley Moor until some time after I'd graduated.

[ceb.livejournal.com]

I do not remember a time when I didn't know Ilkley Moor.

Also not I have a House of the Rising Ilkley Moor earworm...

[kargicq.livejournal.com]

I'd go for Option C.

And there's probably a reason that it's called "Common Meter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_metre)" :)

[kargicq.livejournal.com]

(Or even metre...)