Playground song study.

From the Guardian:

The new lottery scheme will be organised by Malcolm Taylor, an expert in colloquial rhyme from the English Folkdance and Song Society, founded in 1911 by folklore revivalist Cecil Sharp. The project aims to encourage creativity and monitor the way in which songs have altered down the ages. Next year Taylor plans to return some of the society's archive recordings to the areas of Britain where they were originally made.

How cool would it be to be an "expert in colloquial rhyme"?  Pretty dang cool.

Still searching for my copy of Greasy Grimy Gopher Guts.  It's got to be around here somewhere.

Comments

[Emily]

My favorite collection of colloquial rhymes from America is at CocoJams. It's a collection of rhymes from black culture, but the rhymes will probably be familiar (at least in bastardized forms) to just about everyone. Remember "down down baby, down by the roller coaster ..."

[Emily]

My favorite collection of colloquial rhymes from America is at CocoJams. It's a collection of rhymes from black culture, but the rhymes will probably be familiar (at least in bastardized forms) to just about everyone. Remember "down down baby, down by the roller coaster ..."

[cc]

I LOVE the Teletubbies rhyme! My fave is still "Miss Mary Had a Steamboat."

[Naomi]

I always thought it was Miss Lucy. I've also heard Miss Susie.

I remember reading a webcomic that suggested that no one knows where playground songs come from or who wrote them because they were all written by a secret tribe of subterranean mole people. I could almost believe it.

[Leila]

I've always been partial to On Top of Old Smokey -- the bit that goes, "I went to her funeral, I went to her grave, some people threw flowers, but I threw grenaaaaades."