Titles of Songs (Song of Songs, Song of All Songs, Song of Song Titles)

DESCRIPTION: Lyrics composed of titles or pieces of other songs, e.g. "Mickey O'Flannigan he had a Bull Pup, Down Where the Pansies Grow, Don't You Leave Your Mother, Tom, For Mary Kelly's Beau."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1863 (Foster's sheet music)
KEYWORDS: lyric nonballad parody
FOUND IN: US(MW,So)
REFERENCES (12 citations):
Randolph 515, "Titles of Songs" (4 texts, 1 tune)
Randolph/Cohen-OzarkFolksongs-Abridged, pp. 380-381, "Titles of Songs" (1 text, 1 tune -- Randolph's 515A)
Brown/Belden/Hudson-FrankCBrownCollectionNCFolklore3 234, "Working on the Railroad" (1 text plus two unrelated fragments, the "B" and "C" fragments probably belong with "Roll on the Ground (Big Ball's in Town)"; the "A" text is a jumble starting with "Working on the Railroad" but followed up by what is probably a "Song of All Songs" fragment)
Dean-FlyingCloud, p. 131, "Reminiscences" (1 text)
Spaeth-ReadEmAndWeep, pp. 45-46, "The Song of All Songs" (1 text)
Saunders/Root-MusicOfStephenCFoster-Vol2, pp. 339-342+450, "The Song of All Songs" (1 text, 1 tune)
Wolf-AmericanSongSheets, #2181, pp. 146-147, "The Song of All Songs" (7 references); probably also #2182, p. 147, "The Song of All Songs, No. 2" (10 references); #2183, p. 147, "Song of All Songs. No. 3" (2 references); #2188, p. 147, "Song of Many Songs" (3 references); #2189, p. 147, "Song of Many Songs" (2 references)
Dime-Song-Book #13, pp. 34-35, "Tony Pastor's Combination Song" (1 text)
ShillingSongBook3, pp. 48-49, "Tony Pastor's Combination Song" (1 text)
WhosBeenHereSinceIveBeenGoneSongster, pp. 40-42, "The Latest Song of Songs" (1 text, this particular Song of Songs to be sung to "The Young Man from the Country")
Archy-Hughes-George-the-Charmer-Songster, p. 10, "Combination Song" (1 text)
ADDITIONAL: Leslie Shepard, _The Broadside Ballad_, Legacy Books, 1962, 1978, p. 144, "The Chaunt Seller, Or, a New Batch of Ballads" (reproduction of a broadside page)
Roud #7598, 7599
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Songs of Old Ireland" (theme)
cf. "Scotch Medley (II)" (theme of song titles)
cf. "O! They Marched Through the Town (The Captain with His Whiskers)" (tune of some texts, according to broadsides)
NOTES [259 words]: There are actually several pieces which go under this title (Randolph's A, B, and C form one group, his D another; Dean-FlyingCloud's a third, specifically of Irish songs; Stephen Foster with Tony Pastor produced the piece printed by Spaeth in 1863 and cited by Wolf-AmericanSongSheets, though Saunders and Root note that the lyrics are not by Pastor or Foster, and suggest John F. Poole as the writer). The Shepard broadside is particularly interesting, because it appears to be a Song of All Songs made into a street cry -- the seller is hawking the broadsides he sells!
All these songs have a common mechanism, however, and since it is often hard to tell one from another, I am lumping them here.
There are others of this type, e.g. BillyMorrisSongs, pp. 10-13, is a song by Arthur Lloyd, "Billy Morris's Combination Song; Or, Song of Songs," which begins, "'I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls,' With 'The dark girl dressed in blue.'" This has, of course, no relation to the Song of Songs (Song of Solomon, Canticles) in the Bible. For one thing, the Biblical book is erotic (arguably obscene), while this is clean.
SImilarly the "Song of All Songs" on p. 37 of JennieEngelsDearLittleShamrockSongster, credited to Fred Shaw: "As you walk through the streets, you will see as you go, In music store windows lots of ballads in a row... There was sweet Annie Lisle and Billy Barlow, Going to Limerick, where kissing's all the go, Give us bak our old Commander, with the Sword of Bunker Hill, Kissing goes by favor with the lass of Pattie's (sic.) Mill." - RBW
Last updated in version 7.1
File: R515

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