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Description: | Verse 1: 'My father has forty good shillings, Ha. Ha! good shillings! And never a daughter but I; My mother she is right willing, Ha! ha! right willing! That I shall have all when they die. And I wonder when I'll be marry'd Ha! ha! be marry'd! My beauty begins to decay; It's time to catch ha'd o' somebody Ha! ha! somebody! Before it be a' run away. And I wonder when I'll be marry'd.' 'Ha'd' in this sentence is an abbreviated form of 'haud' which means 'to hold'.
The 'Scots Musical Museum' is the most important of the numerous eighteenth- and nineteenth-century collections of Scottish song. When the engraver James Johnson started work on the second volume of his collection in 1787, he enlisted Robert Burns as contributor and editor. Burns enthusiastically collected songs from various sources, often expanding or revising them, whilst including much of his own work. The resulting combination of innovation and antiquarianism gives the work a feel of living tradition.
Several similar melodies all fit the lyrics to this song - 'I am a poor shepherd undone', 'The maiden's sad complaint for want of a husband' and 'Hogh, when shall I be married'. The lyrics to the piece display characteristics prevalent in the oral tradition. The repetition of the same phrases at regular intervals in the song not only means the words can be easily remembered but also allows the listener to follow the structure over an extended period. The line 'my father has forty good shillings' is also common to a lot of folksongs and was a motif which was probably manipulated to fit different moral stories. | License: | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0 | Publisher: | National Library of Scotland | Temporal: | 1787-01-01 - 1803-12-31 | Source: | Burns Scotland | Identifier: | Volume V, song 453, page 465 - 'My fathe | Go to resource |
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