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O'er the Hills (and Far Away)

[ Roud 3098 , 8460 ; Ballad Index Arn017 ; trad.]

There are basically two related songs called Over the Hills and Far Away sharing the same tune, though the first is also known with other titles.

The first song (Roud 3098) is about being recruited to go a-soldiering. One version from Thomas d'Urfey's Wit & Mirth, or Pills to Purge Melancholy (1719-20) has the title The Recruiting Officer, or The Merry Volunteers and starts with the line “Hark! now the drums beat up again”. Martin Carthy sang it with the title O'er the Hills on his 1971 album Landfall. He commented in his sleeve notes:

The Bold Poachers and Here's Adieu to All Judges and Juries come from roughly the same time in history, being early 19^th century transportation songs from Norfolk and Sussex respectively. They convey, along with O'er the Hills (which hails from the late 17^th century), something within the simple factual almost journalistic framework of the writing, more than simple resentment at being forced to leave home, proving for me the truth of the maxim, that it's not what a song says, necessarily, but what it does that counts. Thousands of songs have very little apparent, but layers and layers underneath. O'er the Hills was taught to me by Geoff Harris at the Brentwood Folk Club.

Strawhead sang Over the Hills and Far Away in 1978 on their Traditional Sound album Fortunes of War. They commented:

The ultimate in effective recruiting songs, as its message is “volunteer now or be conscripted later”. The tune was the only one that Tom Tom the Piper's Son (of nursery rhyme fame) could play—but at last he'd picked a good one!

The complimentary reference to “Galloway” probably dates this variant to about 1706 but its inclusion in a 1719 collection points to its continuing popularity.
(Pills to Purge Melancholy, Vol. V)

The New Scorpion Band sang Over the Hills and Far Away in 2008 on their CD Master Marenghi's Music Machine. They noted:

This famous tune was first printed in Thomas d'Urfey's Wit and Mirth, or Pills to Purge Melancholy in 1706, under the title Jockey's Lamentation. An example of the ‘Scottish’ or ‘Northern’ tunes frequently called for by broadside ballads of the time, it quickly became very popular, appearing in several ballad operas, including John Gay's Beggar's Opera of 1728. From its text, our version dates from the same period as d'Urfey's, the reign of Queen Anne (1702-1714). Anne's time on the throne was dominated by the War of the Spanish Succession, during which the Duke of Marlborough gained his famous victories over Louis XIV's France. The tune has survived to the present day as the children's song Tom, Tom the piper's son.

Jon Boden sang Over the Hills and Far Away as the 18 February 2011 entry of his project A Folk Song a Day. He noted in his blog:

Popularised by John Tams in Sharpe, which I loved. But I heard this first from Carthy so it will always be Queen Anne for me.

This YouTube video show John Tams with Barry Coope singing Over the Hills and Far Away at East Grinstead's Chequer Mead Theatre on 16 November 2010:

The second song (Roud 8460) is about Tom the piper's son who only could play the tune Over the Hills and Far Away. Today the tune and title is mostly known as this children's song that cites the original song and has taken over its name. Shirley Collins sang it in the duet version from The Beggar's Opera on her 1967 album The Power of the True Love Knot. She commented in the album notes:

Tom the Piper. who supplied John Gay with such a super tune for The Beggar's Opera is more than a nursery rhyme figure. For Tom has been the Fool in mummer's plays for many centuries, and description show him traditionally in “a bonnet, red-faced, or turned up with yellow, something like red muffettees at his wrists. Over his doublet is a red garment, like a short cloak with armholes and with a yellow cape, his hose red, and garnished across and perpendicularly on the thighs with a narrow yellow lace.” The Beggar's Opera song is a duet between dashing highwayman MacHeath and winsome, trusting Polly Peachum (“Polly his passion requited”). They take one verse each in the hayloft, and in the duet the chorus should be superimposed over a reprise of the verse. Dolly's hurdy-gurdy arrangement with the melody “upside down” gives a hint of this.

Martin Carthy sang this version too, this time with Isla St Clair and chorus, on the 1979 video 70 Golden Nursery Rhymes. This recording was included in 2001 on the anthology The Carthy Chronicles. The latter's accompanying book commented:

Much adapted and adopted, this variant of the Pied Piper tale made its way into the first great literary work based on English traditional song, John Gay's The Beggar's Opera. Curiously that line about “the only tune that he could play” ended up as the denouement to several murder ballads including versions of The Two Sisters and The Elfin Knight.

Over the Hills and Far Away was also sung by Tim Hart on his album Drunken Sailor and Other Kids Songs. This track was later reissued on the CD Favourite Nursery Rhymes and Other Children's Songs (which is a compilation of most of his two nursery rhyme albums).

Lyrics

Links

Some other Over the Hills and Far Away pages:

http://www.contemplator.com/england/faraway.html
http://www.contemplator.com/england/overhls.html
http://www.btinternet.com/~Nick_Brooke/songbook/overhill.htm

Acknowledgements

Transcribed from Martin Carthy's singing by Garry Gillard.