Here’s a rousing chorus for you and Jon says, “Again, there’s not much about Christmas in this one but definitely one of the high points of the Sheffield sings.” As far as I can see the lyrics were written by Edward Perronet in 1779 and they are sung to one of three tunes, in this case Diadem written by James Ellor in 1838. I understand it’s the favoured tune in Australia (!?) or for chorus singing. More curious perhaps is that the words were apparently first published anonymously, but then again later with an acrostic poem spelling out Edward Perronet.
You can buy the December digital album now from all good download stores.
Sorry to say, but I have never heard this song in Aus in a folk setting (though have heard a choral soc do it justice) , having been in SA NT and NSW over Christmas periods.
Cracking tune though and I will try and get this sung next weekend at the Adelaide Hills FC Christmas session…
Jointly & jolly well-sung hymn!
Often also known as the
National Anthem of Christendom.
Best known tunes are ‘Coronation’ and ‘Miles Lane.’
Others have also found some fame.
‘Diadem’ is Jon Boden’s choice, to give
Edward Perronet a choral voice. But I bet,
No more a carol than I’m a poet!
Jane, you are no poet/Look at your previous clips/stay with your old dad, Harry /and stick to Fish&chips!………….
Not the tune that I sang as a choirboy in the 40s, but one heck of a sing-a-long.
Fantastic – I grew up singing this one in church, so hearing it in a pub was a bit of a surprise, a pleasant one though!
In my childhood I only heard carols at school, in church or at home, it wasn’t until we moved from NE Kent to a Devon village that we came across a ‘proper’ carol singing tradition when locals, who were mainly drawn from the C of E as the low churches rarely sang outside of their chapels, would travel round the outlying farms over a couple of evenings, to sing and be invited in for drinks and eats. When we moved back to Kent the local C of E church had got round to organising visiting carol singing around our village but it was very hit and miss. Now we’re in a Wiltshire village the local Lions (I think, it might be Rotary) come round with a float with Father Christmas and blaring, recorded, music and the collecting bucket and on Christmas Eve morning the local churches have a session in the village square that usually draws a couple of handfuls of locals to join in. All pretty ordinary though, nothing nearly as exciting as what’s available here.
Anyone who can take on a big carol like this and give it a good belting-out (like this) is all right in my book!
One of my personal favourites from the “Dungworth” Tradition.
Lovely rousing hymn and well sung Jon! Oh, and sorry to burst your bubble Muzza, but Jane R has published a very decent anthology of poems, in my humble opinion!
@ Peter. Many thanks. To be fair, I was only the editor with one poem of my own in the anthology. Still, I can tell decent poetry when I read it!
@ Muzza. I did say it myself! I’m pushing my boundaries here all the time as the also-ran know-nothing, who can’t overburden the site all the time with mi’ local history! I might have done better if not constrained by the rather difficult subject matter to fit into the acrostic form, and at 2.31am! Oh, and sober; though I suspect if I hadn’t been, that would have been a better excuse!
As a non-practised social singer, you might prefer my poetry to song, if I ever manage to upload any kind of recording! I tried singing into my own mobile this morning. I wasn’t as impressed as I’d hope to be… hahahaha!
@ Muzza. Stick with Harry…wish we had…
The family anecdote is, Harry Ramsden asked my grandfather John Kershaw to go into partnership with him, but he said it would never work, went off to sell peanuts, and that’s what he got! Total coincidence that my mother then married a Ramsden further down the line, but even sadder that my aunt went out with Harry’s son for a while and declined to marry him for lack of love on her part. I said she could have tried harder, but she said he was too nice a man and it wouldn’t have been fair. Can’t argue with that…
I love this, not least because it’s huge fun to sing.
Yet another we swiped. sorry borrowed. except for the last chorus, which we should sw borrow.
JohnB
Really enjoyed this.
Fantastic! Thanks all!
Up to now this is the song I enjoy most of this month’s excellent crop. Thank you, Jon & all the others.
this has made my christmas
Crackin’ tune, solid in my Methodist roots.
First came across the Christmas link with the Watersons version, and more recently Coope. Boyes & Simson – as played on Mike Harding – today! – about 38 minutes in
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b00wnw61/The_Mike_Harding_Show_22_12_2010
@Jane (Ted) Ramsden…’mother married a Ramsden’…
classic chat up line “your plaice or mine”
Sorry Simon & Ted …I have resisted adding that for 14Days but finally cracked.
Not sure whether the same words but definitely this tune was sung at the recent reprise performance I attended of ‘1611: The Word In The Beginning’ in Manningham Mills. Great night, and special-treatment-tea was served to table by my lovely cousin, Ashley! He has promised the same if I go to their carol concert this coming Saturday. I cannot remember how many decades it must be since I went to a carol concert.
@ Muzza: You were floundering about for a fish tale last year! This year’s is news of the sad demise of Harry Ramsden’s fish and chip restaurant as posted by Martin Wainwright in the Northerner Blog of The Guardian 30 November:
“The best-known fish-and-chip shop in the UK faces closure by its parent company after 83 years of serving up skinless haddock and mushy peas to millions of punters. (My note: We don’t do skin on fish in Yorkshire, save at the seaside!)
Harry Ramsden’s at White Cross in the Leeds suburb of Guiseley is expected to shut its doors after Christmas with the loss of 24 jobs. The move does not affect the rest of the group.
The Yorkshire icon has long lost the supreme reputation built up by Ramsden who constructed an unprecedented palace for the consumption of the ‘people’s food’. A series of takeovers and franchises diluted the unique atmosphere and other restaurants challenged successfully for the crown…
The haven of chandeliers and plush furniture at White Cross, which traditionally had a permanent queue at the restaurant door, was built in 1931, replacing a small wooden hut where Ramsden started frying in 1928. He chose his site cannily, at the junction of two roads leading from Leeds and Bradford to the workers’ playground of the Yorkshire Dales.
His original hut survives at the back of the restaurant (My note: Good job I have a recent photo!) whose sale is under discussion by the company.
The business made the Guinness Book of Records when seating reached 250 and made the building the largest chippy in the world. But it consistently tapped into local roots, including piano recitals by Harry Corbett, the creator of Sooty, who was a nephew of Ramsden and originally from Guiseley. (My note: Not a lot of people know that!)
In 1952, the White Cross junction was a solid sea of customers as Ramsden celebrated the restaurant’s 21st anniversary by serving 10,000 portions in a day, at the original 1931 prices.”
Ted says, ‘T’is a tra-vest-y!’
I await Diana’s comments on this one eagerly; the tune today is ‘DI-adem’ after all!
Just to explain, for those squinting to see what it is, Jane’s latest avatar is a picture of the original Harry Ramsden hut that liees behind the Guiseley restaurant earmarked for closure. I snapped it on the day a certain bear trea-Ted me to a birthday fish and chip nosh up! Yes Muzza; that was the plaice…
A lovely jolly tune – really enjoyed it.
Now Peter, I hope I don’t DI-sappoint you too much but DI-vested was so easy to respond to, whereas DI-adem is a little harder. Anyway after in-vest-igating and putting some thought into it I came up with adem-ption which as there is no legacy to take is immaterial. Still perhaps this will be a little DI-version for you as you DI-gest this little note. I DI-gress now as I see Jane is still back on the vest theme with tra-vest-y.
Well done Diana, never thought of ‘ademption’! Half expected something along the lines of ADEM and Eve…
Don’t encourage Janie to pursue the ‘vest theme’ or it might lead her on to ‘nighties’ and then there’ll be no stopping her, hahaha!
I have re-read last year’s comments…….
how could I have been so cruel ref Jane’s poetic talents…
I am hanging my head in shame….however, I have a new phrase in my life……….
If I get miffed at something..I take a deep breath and say to myself
“TIME TO LET LOOSE THE RAMSDEN!” and heaven help anything that gets in the way!
@ Peter….Thanks for the pic of Jane’s house…not enough room to swing one cat.
Wonderful ! I imagine this was the final song of the evening for Jon and his ensemble as I do not see how they could follow it. However, they will probably prove me wrong over the next few days.
I am enjoying these songs this month, a good antidote to the wall to wall John Rutter served up elsewhere at this time of year. (Oops, that will ruffle some feathers !!)
@ Muzza: My forté is prose. I am not a poet, so worry not. *Sob* I am used to the cruelty *Sob, sob, sob* HAHAHAHAHAHA!
‘Time to let loose the Ramsden’ has the ring of mythology about it as in what my father used to say when I was a baby – “The kraken awakes.” He was partial to a bit of John Wyndham. I was not quiet even then… why are ye not surprised?
I used to have 2 mottos for when things were not going well. One of my mother’s – ‘You will come again’ – and one of Michael Caine’s – ” Use the difficulty.” Of course, as he said, it is better to avoid the bl@@dy difficulty in the first place but, if you can’t, take what advantage from it you can!
Nowadays it is more ‘nil desperandum’ and ‘keep calm and carry on… regardless…’ I find it is the best way… especially when peeps rubbish yer poetic manglings! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
As the Pythons used to say………..”nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition”…
and blow me…change of avatar……….from the ‘Little house on the privvy’ to
The Cardinal wakes……..or rides again…..can’t get rid of the Mike Harding thought!
As for mottos…….I am a….”If at first you don’t succeed-Give up!” type of fellow….
my epitaph will be……
“He slept beneath the moon-he dozed beneath the sun-he lived a life of ‘going to do’ and died with nothing done”
A lovely jolly carol and love the chorus singing.
@Diana..ready for that pop group………..water frozen in my bedroom basin this morning……….everybody has this problem.?………….Oh- just me then.
Roll on winter equinox……suppose it will get even colder then!
Poor you Muzza – no wash for you this morning then. It was a fraction warmer than yesterday here. The frost did not descend until early morning unlike the previous evening when here by 8 pm.
@Jane Ramsden, Sorry to intrude on your conversation but I love your family anecdote!! I am Harry Ramsdens great granddaughter, I stumbled accross this conversation while trying to look up something else online. Its funny the things you learn by accident. Thanks for that you made me smile. 🙂
Three years on…….If only I’d asked Shona to marry me I would be related to Jane by anecdote!
This post makes a lot of sense indeed and I appreciate the work
Being an ethical vegetarian ……….all this talk about Harry Ramsden fish & chips is making me salivate.
Biblically….(so I’m told) thinking about it is as bad as doing the deed but, as one with no religion, I do not have that constraint……however, with my luck, I will be eaten by a shark whilst browsing the fish counter at Morrisons!.
I have sung the first verse and then the words to “I thought I saw a pussy cat,” since sometime in 1968.
Very rousing, but will still not make an appearance in the Classic FM Christmas Day countdown of the nation’s favourite carol, I fear, as voted for by listeners in the run up to the day. I have voted for tomorrow’s offering, ‘The Holly & The Ivy.’
@Shona O’Regan: I was delighted at your comment, which I have missed until now. (Thank you, Muzza, for bringing it to my tardy attention.)
That is a true story about my maternal grandfather. It may have been perversely fortunate for Harry Ramsden that he did not go into partnership with my grandfather, whom I never knew, because he died young leaving my grandmother (a nurse, whom he met whilst in hospital & decided that she was the woman he was going to marry) with 3 small daughters.
My aunt was the youngest but, as with the best anecdotes we go full circle, she is still with us & I took her to ‘Harry Ramsden’s’ (now the Wetherby Whaler) for tea on her 89th birthday (6 Dec) this week. The restaurant still has the crystal chandeliers & the fish & chips are still the best locally. My aunt was able to reminisce with the waitresses about coming to ‘Harry’s’ for over 60 years, as I practically can! I occasionally tell staff the Ramsden family anecdote, as a shame to be lost. They are all as pleasant today as they have always been. The place is part of our family history.