{"id":12377,"date":"2021-08-29T09:08:24","date_gmt":"2021-08-29T09:08:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/?page_id=12377"},"modified":"2023-06-29T13:07:44","modified_gmt":"2023-06-29T13:07:44","slug":"starry-night-for-a-ramble-a","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/index.php\/starry-night-for-a-ramble-a\/","title":{"rendered":"Starry night for a ramble, A"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
AKA<\/strong><\/td>Kiss and never tell
The ploughboys song<\/td><\/tr>
First Published<\/td>1870<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Writer\/composer<\/td>Samuel Bagnall<\/td>Roud<\/strong><\/td>RN972<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Music Hall Performers<\/strong><\/td>Sam Bagnall, Louise Austin, JW Rowley<\/td><\/tr>
Folk performances<\/strong><\/td>Collected from the singing of:<\/strong>
Beverley, Mr; England : Lincolnshire : 1905
Stroud, Mrs. E.; England : Hampshire; 1905
Fish, Lena Bourne USA : New Hampshire : c1940
Byrnes, Tom; Australia : New South Wales : 1955
Tritton, Duke; Australia : New South Wales : 1955c
Halsey, Bill England : Sussex : 1957 – 60
Leahy, John Canada : Ontario : 1961
Jenkins, Mrs.; Australia 1967
Kydd, Jessie; England : Lincolnshire : 1970
Ford, Amy; England : Somerset : 1974
Train, Bill; England : Devon : 1976
Modern performance<\/strong>s
The Beers Family<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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From Hopwood and Crew sheet music (personal collection)<\/strong>\n\nI like a game of croquet or bowling on the green, \nI like a little boating to pull against the stream, \nBut of all the games that I love best to fill me with delight,\nI like to take a ramble upon a starry night.\n \nA starry night for a ramble,\nIn a flowery dell\nThro' the bush and bramble, \nKiss and never tell.<\/em>..\n\nTalk about your bathing or strolling on the sands,\nOr some unseen verandah where gentle zephyr fans,\nOr rolling home in the morning, boys, and very nearly tight.\nCould never beat a ramble upon a starry night\n\nI like to take my sweetheart, \"Of course you would,\" said hhe \nAnd softly whisper in her ear, \"How dearly I love you.\"\nAnd when you picture to yourselves the scenes of such delight,\nYou'll want to take a ramble upon a starry night.\n\nSome will choose velocipede, and others take a drive,\nAnd some will set and mope at home, half dead dead and half alive,\nAnd some will choose a steam boat, and others even fight,\nI'll enjoy a ramble upon a starry night.\n<\/pre>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Sam Bagnall<\/a> the one-time Shakespearean comic and prolific songwriter wrote, composed and presumably performed this song in the 1870s, though a variety of lesser known female performers also seem to have sung it at that time, including Louise Austin. It was performed in pantomime at Nottingham in the winter of 1870\/71. H Chance Newton recalls that \u00a0JW \u201cOver\u201d Rowley<\/a> regularly performed A starry night<\/em> in the late 1880s and 1890s. Contemporary newspaper reports also suggest that a song called A starry night<\/em> was one of Rowley’s most popular numbers and he was regularly expected to encore with the song. However, it’s unclear whether Rowley was singing this song, or another Bagnell song A starry night and a beautiful girl<\/em>.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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 June 19, 1870; The Era <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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 Dec. 21, 1870; The Daily Telegraph <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
There are hints that the tune became just as popular as the song . It is regularly mentioned in late Victorian fiction, where you can find descriptions of it drifting from barrel organs in fictionalised London, young couples courting as the band played it on a romantic moonlit evening in New York, or played on the piano by ladies of the saloon in romanticised descriptions of the old American South.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The song was widely printed in cheap street literature on both sides of the Atlantic, on sheet music and in several music tutors. It was collected from the singing of a wide range of traditional singers, it seems to have been particularly popular in Australia. Early 20th century collectors like Percy Grainger and Cecil Sharp collected versions of it in England.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can hear a substantially modernised version of the song as commercially recorded in 1905 by the Hayden Quartet at the library of Congress website<\/a> and a version collected from the singing of Amy Ford by Bob and Jacqueline Patten on the British Library Sounds site.<\/a>  (Do check out what the folk process does to the unseen verandas where gentle zephyrs fan<\/em> in the Amy Ford version).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Katie Howson describes how the song has become more widely known as a dance tune on her excellent website<\/a>. Here is an example of it being played as a contra dance tune by the Paint Creek Country Dance Orchestra:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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