> Folk Music > Songs > Raking the Hay
Haymaking Courtship / Raking the Hay / Joy After Sorrow
[
Roud 855
; Master title: Haymaking Courtship
; Ballad Index ReSh040
; Bodleian
Roud 855
; trad.]
Sam Larner sang Raking the Hay in a recording made in his home in Winterton, Norfolk in 1958/59 by Philip Donnellan for the BBC. It was published in 1974 on his posthumous Topic album A Garland for Sam.
Phoebe Smith sang Raking the Hay in a recording made by Mike Yates in 1975-76. This recording was published in 1977 on their family's Topic album The Travelling Songster: An Anthology from Gypsy Singers. and in 2001 on her Veteran CD The Yellow Handkerchief. Cecily Taylor commented in the first album's booklet:
Several English folksongs deal with the theme of rural seduction—or attempted seduction. Sung such as The Barley Raking, Lovely Joan, The Aylesbury Girl and Raking the Hay enjoyed a widespread popularity in the late 1700s and early 1800s and many no doubt stem from a sophisticated bawdry on the type that Henry Playford included in his drollery collection Wit and Mirth or Pills to Purge Melancholy (1698-1714). The songs reappeared over and over again on broadsides and, in the mouth of countless folksingers, have become gems like the one that Phoebe sings here.
The House Band sang this song with the title Joy After Sorrow in 1987 on their Topic album Pacific.
Andy Turner learned Raking the Hay from live performances by Martin Carthy, John Kirkpatrick and Howard Evans in 1980/81 and from Sam Larner's album. He sang it as the 11 August 2012 entry of his project A Folk Song a Week.
Lyrics
Sam Larner sings Raking the Hay | Phoebe Smith sings Raking the Hay |
---|---|
Oh a sailor gay walked out one day |
As I walked out on a bright summer day |
“Good morning to you, maid so fair, |
“Ada dear, what have brought you here |
“What would my master say to me |
“No kind sir, that will never do |
Now with kisses sweet and words so kind |
Words were kind and kisses sweet |
Now six long months were gone and past |
Nine long months being gone and past |
But eleven moths gone and twelve months past |