Solas Market

DESCRIPTION: "Me sell me akee, go Solas Market, Not a quatty would [or "quatty-worth"] sell, Send me out, I go Solas Market, Not a quatty would sell. Why not a light, not a bite, Not a quatty would sell. Why not a light, not a bite, Not a quatty would sell."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1941 (recorded from Edith Perrin)
KEYWORDS: commerce food hardtimes Caribbean
FOUND IN: West Indies(Jamaica)
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Warner-FolkSongsAndBalladsOfTheEasternSeaboard, p. 50,"Solas Market" (1 short text)
Roud #16397
RECORDINGS:
Edith Perrin, "Solas Market" [excerpt?] (on USWarnerColl01)
NOTES [158 words]: There appear to be only two sources for this: The Edith Perrin recording made by the Warners, called "Solas Market," and a text in Jekyll's Jamaican Song & Story entitled "Linstead Market." Apart from the details of place, the choruses are similar, but there is almost no text to let us know what the songs are about (unless the Warners had more from Edith Perrin which they did not publish).
To make matters worse, the Perrin recording is very noisy -- almost unintelligible. It supplies the text quoted in the description, but I have had to reconstruct based in part on the Warner notes, and it must be considered uncertain. The Warners themselves, in Warner-FolkSongsAndBalladsOfTheEasternSeaboard, gave a different transcription.
According to the Warners, Perrin was a Jamaican (they called her a "colored" -- argh) who for a while looked after the Warners' son Jeff. So although she was from Jamaica, the song was recorded in New York. - RBW
Last updated in version 4.2
File: RcSolMar

Go to the Ballad Search form
Go to the Ballad Index Song List

Go to the Ballad Index Instructions
Go to the Ballad Index Bibliography or Discography