Re: The joy of FORTRAN

On Sun, 16 Mar 2025 18:19:55 GMT, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

There seems to be an unwritten rule in bluegrass that the more miserable
the lyrics, the happier the tune.  Everyone can be playing a mile a
minute while the singer goes on about how he has no job, no money, or no
girl (who he might have murdered but is now sorry for having done so).
As the saying goes, "If the girl ain't murdered by the second verse, it
ain't bluegrass."

It inherited that from old time ballads.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9F_19QtGwg

Sometimes it isn't so happy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cceCw_1pVK8

Van Rock added a verse to 'Silver Dagger' to increase the mayhem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmSj2jH0ZMM

and then there is the bluegrass version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEFyaGKZ21c

Like a lot of folk music there are different versions. The one Van Ronk
did is also known as 'Katy Dear'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jdwd0fu9e8

Parton's follows Baez's 1960 version. Her version veers away from the
dagger, grabs a verse from 'Fair and Tender Ladies' and a couple more from
someplace else.  She remarked that in the English ballads somebody always
gets killed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CL4rWdww1Aw

That's an obscure entry in Child's ballads. The tune lives on because the
wrong tune was used for Wliiy O' Winsbury (Child Ballad 100). 'Fause
Foodrage' is ballad 89. Then Fairport Convention used the melody with new
lyrics.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69sLI4n674s

For centuries music was FOSS; then came copyrights.