Music And Movement

[ferlew]

Sat in bed last night unable to sleep, just gave my brain free reign.
Ended up recalling our "music lessons" at primary school some 64 years ago.
What on earth possessed that teacher to teach us songs like....
"Who is Sylvia, what is she"
"Kije was a Hussar bold, a Hussar bold was he"
"I shot an arrow into the air, it fell to earth I know not where"
"Oh there was a little drummer, and he loved a wall-eyed cook"
I thought of another last night, but it escapes me right now.
For goodness sake, we were 7 and eight years old, what were they thinking?

[maggiebee]

Think we all did this ferlew. I sang (as part of a choir) in our local civic hall. Must have been about 12 at the time.

Oh! Phadrig Crohoore was a broth of a boy,
And he stood in his stockings six feet eight,
And his arm was as thick as another man's thigh
'Tis Phadrig was great.

[mushroom25]

wow, one of those jogged a memory. in 1968 my school took part in the BBC Schools "making music" series, hosted by John Langstaff (who modern audiences will know from his sample used in Lemon Jelly's "nice weather for ducks"). anyway, the classical piece featured in that series was Prokoviev's Lieutenant Kije, which was animated in its entirety in episode 9 of the series. happy days.

[hc4361]

Wansdsworth, Shakespeare and a traditional English folk sang in your list, ferlew. I think your teacher chose well :)

[marval]

We used to sing "Who is Sylvia, what is she" as well.

Another two were "Morning Has Broken" and "Lord Of The Dance."

[ladyalex]

Cherry Ripe seemed to go on for ages .....come to think of it, how did the music teachers decide when to move on to the next ghastly song?

Cherry ripe, cherry ripe
Ripe, I cry
Full and fair ones
Come and buy

(always sung as cherry tripe, of course.)

Another one I can barely remember was about a hunting owl and had a chorus of toowoo-oo toowoo-oo.

What tosh.

[tamborine]

would luv this teacher ;)

[ferlew]

Thank you Ladyalex, Cherry Ripe was the one that was evading me :)

[kvalidir]

That sounds like some sort of LSD induced trip :) Awesome!

[gness]

I'd prefer those, Ferlew to the far too many hymns to the Virgin Mary that still go around in my head..... :-(

[Buenchico]

"You don't know where I'm going to hide your balls . . . "

"Dance lightly about, looking everywhere for your balls"

"Where your balls high up or low down?"

"Now dance round and toss them in the air and play with them"

Oh, this brings back memories ;-)

[carrot99]

I remember singing 'Kije was a Hussar bold' at primary school - turned out he was only an inkblot if I remember rightly.

I think it was from a radio programme we listened to each week.

[gness]

Oh, Chris!!!! That is just......???....well I won't find the word til I stop laughing.... :-)

[rowanwitch]

We had kookaburra sits, what shall we do with the drunken sailor, and soldier soldier will you marry me

[ferlew]

And the girls had to leap around looking for those balls with their dresses or skirt tucked into their knickers !!!!! Boys of course were ok.

[sunny-dave]

Thanks Chris - that was ... balltastic :)

[Georgiesmum]

Times were so different then. Only a few days ago I was thinking of the songs we used to sing at primary school too, songs like"Jimmy the carter lad" "Do you ken Elsie Marley?" and "Myt dame thath a lame tame crane" as well as many others

[RobNorth]

When I saw the title I thought this was going to be about Mrs May's moves in AFrica...
I can remember at Junior school singing "There is a tavern I the town"
This at the age of nine or ten and I remember thinking it a bit wierd at the time...