Daddy Be Gay- Nye (OH) 1937 REC John Lomax
[Captain Pearl R. Nye, born in 1872, sang a version of the Farmer's Curst Wife that John Lomax titled, "Old Woman Under the Hill" when he made his 1937 recording of Nye. "Daddy Be Gay," however, was the title Nye gave the song which he learned from his father certainly back in the 1800s when Pearl Nye was a youngster. Nye is apparently the source for the ballads with the "Daddy be Gay" refrain. The first verse is familiar as the Mother Goose nursery rhyme, "Old Woman Under the Hill." He sounds like he sings: So Daddy, be gay and be gandy. (It appears: So Daddy, be gay and eat candy.)
The song (as titled: O Daddy Be Gay) was covered by Burl Ives 1953 songbook and Judy Collins' 1961 album, Man of Constant Sorrow. It also appeared in Alan Lomax's Folk Songs of North America titled, Old Man Under the Hill. ]
Excerpt from: An Informant in Search of a Collector: Captain Pearl R. Nye of Ohio
By Rebecca B. Schroeder
Captain Nye demonstrates, as perhaps no other informant yet studied does, these factors in the survival and transmission of traditional oral literature. His family constituted a homogeneous group in itself. Born on the boat, "Reform," on February 5, 1872, he was one of eighteen children, the 15th child, the 9th boy.
His father's boat, he reports, was known up and down the Canal as "Bill Nye's Circus" or "Bill Nye's Orphan Home," and it was a boat on which singing was a common pastime, both within the family group and at Canal gatherings. His parents sang to entertain the children, using "song and music as a mind developer," he commented. There were "Singing Bees" and "jollifications," and he often noted that one or another of the many songs he wrote out was popular on the Canal and much called for at get-togethers. [He died in 1950].
AFS L 51: The Ballad Hunter, Parts V and VI.
"Two Sailors: Sea Shanties and Canal Boat Ballads"
"Old Woman Under the Hill", sung by Captain Pearl R. Nye ("Daddy Be Gay")
OLD WOMAN UNDER THE HILL ("Daddy Be Gay")- Sung by Capt. Pearl R. Nye at Akron, Ohio, 1937. Recorded by John A. Lomax.
There was an old woman who lived under the hill,
Oh, daddy, be gay.
There was an old woman who lived uder the hill,
If she hasn't moved away, she's living there still,
So Daddy, be gay and be gandy. (So Daddy, be gay and eat candy.)
One day she sent her old man to plough
Oh, daddy, be gay.
One day she sent her old man to plough,
And when got there he didn't know how,
So Daddy, be gay and eat candy.
He hadn't gone a round or two,
Oh, daddy, be gay.
He hadn't gone a round or two,
He spied the devil came into view,
So Daddy, be gay and eat candy.
He
[upcoming]