Recordings & Info 275. Get Up and Bar the Door
CONTENTS:
1) Alternative Titles
2) Traditional Ballad Index
3) Child Collection Index
4) Excerpt from The British Traditional Ballad in North America by Tristram Coffin 1950, from the section A Critical Biographical Study of the Traditional Ballads of North America
5) Folk Index
6) Mainly Norfolk (lyrics and info)
ATTACHED PAGES: (see left hand column)
1) Roud No. 115: Get Up and Bar the Door (97 Listings)
2) The "Silence Wager" in Ballad and Tale
3) A Texas Folktale Version of "Get up and Bar the Door"
Alternate Titles
Arise and Bar the Door
Arise and Bar the Door- O
Bar the Door O
The Old Man and the Door
Johnny Blunt
The Barrin' o' the Door
Bar Up the Old Door
Get Up and Bar the Door
John and Joan Blount
Old John Jones
Traditional Ballad Index: Get Up and Bar the Door [Child 275]
NAME: Get Up and Bar the Door [Child 275]
DESCRIPTION: Old man and old wife must bar the door; neither wants to. They agree that whoever speaks first shall bar the door. Thieves enter the house, and play tricks on the couple. At last the old (man) cries out; the (wife) orders him orders him to bar the door
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST_DATE: 1769 (Herd)
KEYWORDS: humorous robbery bargaining contest
FOUND_IN: Britain(England(South),Scotland(Aber)) US(Ap,MW,NE,So) Canada(Mar, Newf)
REFERENCES: (24 citations)
Child 275, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (3 texts)
Bronson 275, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (20 versions)
GreigDuncan2 321, "The Barrin' o' the Door" (4 texts, 3 tunes) {A=Bronson's #16, B=#11, C=#12}
BarryEckstormSmyth pp. 318-321, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (2 texts, 2 tunes) {Bronson's #17, #10}
Flanders-Ancient4, pp. 72-75, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text, 1 tune)
Ford-Vagabond, pp. 148-150, "The Barrin' o' the Door" (1 text, 1 tune)
Randolph 34, "Get Up and Shut the Door" (2 fragments, 1 tune) {Bronson's #20}
Gardner/Chickering 153, "Arise and Bar the Door" (1 text, 1 tune) {Bronson's #5}
BrownII 43, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (2 texts)
Davis-Ballads 44, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 fragment, possibly this song)
Creighton/Senior, pp. 92-93, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text, 1 tune) {Bronson's #4}
Greenleaf/Mansfield 18, "Joan and John Blount" (1 text)
Peacock, pp. 239-240, "Bar the Door O" (1 text, 1 tune)
Leach, pp. 657-658, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
OBB 172, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
Niles 58, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text, 1 tune)
Combs/Wilgus 38, pp. 128-129, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
JHCox 185, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
Hodgart, p. 77, "Get up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
DBuchan 62, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
TBB 40, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
HarvClass-EP1, pp. 87-88, "Get Up and Bar the Door" (1 text)
DT 275, BARDOOR* BARDOOR2 JHNBLNT BARDOOR4*
ADDITIONAL: James Kinsley, editor, Burns: Complete Poems and Songs (shorter edition, Oxford, 1969) #368, pp. 503-504, "Johnie Blunt" (1 text, 1 tune, from 1792)
Roud #115
RECORDINGS:
Mrs Thomas Walters, "Bar the Door O" (on PeacockCDROM)
ALTERNATE_TITLES:
The Old Man and the Door
Johnny Blunt
NOTES: Louis Untermeyer, in _The Golden Treasury of Poetry_, calls this "an old joke with its origins in the Orient." I am guessing that this is a reference to what Child calls "The Arabian tale of Sulayman Bay and the Three STory-Tellers," which is not really Oriental as most of us would mean the term. In any case, there is much dispute over whether this is truly the original of this piece. - RBW
Child Ballad 275: Get Up and Bar the Door
Child --Artist --Title --Album --Year --Length --Have
275 Andrew Calhoun & Kat Eggleston John Blunt First Comes Love 1995 2:14 Yes
275 Annie Kidd The Barrin O Oor Door The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 Appalachian Green Parks Project Get Up and Bar the Door Appalachian Green Parks Project 2007 No
275 Art Singer Get Up and Bar the Door The Helen Hartness Flanders Collection No
275 Artus Moser Get Up and Bar the Door North Carolina Mountain Folksongs and Ballads 1974 2:52 Yes
275 Bell Duncan The Barrin O the Door The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 Betty Smith Get Up and Bar the Door With You Again 2002 No
275 Clutha The Barrin O the Door On the Braes 2001 2:42 Yes
275 Colleen Raney The Barring of the Door Linnet 2008 No
275 Dick Miles John Blunt <website> 2007- 2:30 Yes
275 Dick Miles John Blunt Windy Old Weather 2010 No
275 Dolly Gray Roxborough Castle + John Blunt Reluctant Sailor 1979 No
275 Ed McCurdy Get Up and Bar the Door The Ballad Record 1955 2:10 Yes
275 Ewan MacColl Get Up and Bar the Door The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (The Child Ballads) - Vol. 1 1956 No
275 Ewan MacColl Get Up and Bar the Door The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (The Child Ballads) - Vol. 2 [Reissue] 196? No
275 Ewan MacColl Get Up and Bar the Door Ballads - Murder Intrigue Love Discord 2009 3:51 Yes
275 Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger The Barring of the Door Two-Way Trip 1961 3:48 Yes
275 Frankie Armstrong John Blunt 'Till the Grass O'ergrew the Corn - A Collection of Traditional Ballads 1996 2:00 Yes
275 Frankie Armstrong & John Kirkpatrick John Blunt Landmarks - 30 Years of a Leading Folk Music Label 2006 1:58 Yes
275 Frederick Worlock & C.R.M. Brookes Get Up and Bar the Door Poetry of Robert Burns & Scottish Border Ballads 1959 No
275 Gwilym & Carol Davies John Blunt Folk Songs from Hampshire and Dorset 2005 No
275 Hermes Nye Get Up and Bar the Door Ballads Reliques - Early English Ballads from the Percy and Child Collections 1957 1:55 Yes
275 James Christie The Barrin O Oor Door (1) The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 James Christie The Barrin O the Door (2) The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 James Mason The Barrin O Oor Door (1) The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 James Mason The Barrin O Oor Door (2) The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 Jamie McMenemy There's Three True Gude Fellows (Johnie Blunt) The Complete Songs of Robert Burns, Vol. 5 1998 2:13 Yes
275 Jean Redpath The Barrin' O' Oor Door Skipping Barefoot Through the Heather 1962 2:27 Yes
275 Jean Redpath Barrin' O' the Door Maiden Voyage 2002 No
275 Jean Redpath Johnie Blunt The Songs of Robert Burns, Volume 1 & 2 1996 2:45 Yes
275 Jon Boden John Blunt A Folk Song a Day - April 2011 2:04 Yes
275 Karen Mackay Get Up and Bar the Door West Virginia Woman 2003 No
275 Kathleen Danson Read Get Up and Bar the Door Spoken Literature of Early English Ballads 1956 2:01 Yes
275 Linda Sigismondi Get Up and Bar the Door Appalachian Ballads and Songs for the Mountain Dulcimer Companion CD 2005 No
275 Maddy Prior & June Tabor (Silly Sisters) The Barring of the Door No More to the Dance 1988 3:29 Yes
275 Maddy Prior & June Tabor (Silly Sisters) The Barring of the Door The Definitive Collection 2003 3:32 Yes
275 Marjorie Edgar Get Up and Bar the Door The Library of Congress No
275 Martin Carthy John Blunt Shearwater 1972 3:25 Yes
275 Martin Carthy John Blunt Folkfestival '76 Dranouter 1976 No
275 Mrs. E.H. McKeen Get Up and Bar the Door The Helen Creighton Collection No
275 Mrs. Frances Kilbride Get Up and Bar the Door (1) The Helen Hartness Flanders Collection No
275 Patrick Gainer Get Up and Bar the Door Folk Songs of the Alleghenies 1963 No
275 Paul McNeill Mother Get Up, Unbar the Door Traditionally at the Troubadour 1966 No
275 Peter Christie The Barrin O Oor Door The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 Phyllis Marks Get Up and Bar the Door Folksongs and Ballads, Vol 2 1991 No
275 Raymond Crooke John Blunt <website> 2007 2:29 Yes
275 Raymond Crooke John Blunt Axis of Evil and Other True Stories 2003 No
275 Steve Gillette & Cindy Mangsen Get Up and Bar the Door The Light of the Day 1996 2:49 Yes
275 The Ian Campbell Folk Group & Dave Swarbrick The Barrin' O' the Door Ian Campbell and The Ian Campbell Folk Group with Dave Swarbrick 1969 3:15 Yes
275 The Yetties John Blunt In Praise of Dorset 1997 No
275 Tony Capstick John Blunt There Was This Bloke 1974 No
275 Tony Rose John Blunt Under the Greenwood Tree 1971 1:51 Yes
275 Tony Rose John Blunt Folk Festival [2] 1976 No
275 Unknown The Barrin O Oor Door The James Madison Carpenter Collection 1927-1955 No
275 Wench All John Blunt N'er a Penny O' Money 2005 1:53 Yes
Excerpt from The British Traditional Ballad in North America
by Tristram Coffin 1950, from the section A Critical Biographical Study of the Traditional Ballads of North America
275. GET UP AND BAR THE DOOR
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 318 / Brown Coll / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 147 / Cox, F-S South, 5x6 / Davidson's Universal Melodist, I, Z75 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 495 / Gardner and Dickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 371 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 41 / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / Randolph, Oz F-S, 1, 186 / SFLQ, XIII, 170 / Va FLS Bull, # 9 .
Local Titles: Arise and Bar the Door -O, Get Up and Bar the Door, John and Joan Blount, Old John Jones.
Story Types: A: A housewife is boiling pudding when a cold wind blows the door open. The husband tells her to bar the door; however, she is busy and refuses. They agree that the first one who speaks must shut the door. Two travellers, attracted by the light from the open door, enter the house. Getting no reply to any of their questions or remarks, they eat and drink
what they find. The husband and wife watch, saying nothing. One of the travellers proposes to take off the man's beard (and in some texts decides to use the hot pudding to soften it), while the other traveller plans to kiss the wife. This last proposal brings some words from the husband, and he has to bar the door.
Examples: Barry (A), Combs, Gardner and Chickering.
B: The story is essentially the same as that of Type A. However, the husband and wife get sleepy on home-brewed ale and go to bed forgetting to bar the door. The agreement is made, and the travellers come. They eat and drink downstairs and then go up and pull the wife out of bed and begin to kiss her on the floor. This freedom is too much for the husband. Examples: Greenleaf and Mansfield.
Discussion: The Type A texts follow the Child A and B story closely. However, Type B seems to be of a different sort from anything in Child. It resembles Child C in that the couple go to bed, there are three travellers, and the wife is laid on the floor, but the narrative is fuller and the door is not blown open, as in Child.
The fragmentary B version in Randolph's Oz F-S indicates that the men actually shave off the husband's beard.
Crude lyrics are easily and often inserted into this ballad. For other tales of the same sort see Child, V, 96 8. For a burlesque of the ballad see Delehanty and Hengler's Song and Dance Book (1874), 169.
Folk Index: Get Up and Bar the Door [Ch 275]
Rt - Barring of the Door
Rm - Johnnie Blunt
Buchan, Norman (ed.) / 101 Scottish Songs, Collins, poc (1962), p 72
Johnson, James & Robert Burns (eds) / Scots Musical Museum, Amadeus, Bk (1991/1853), #300 [1790]
Leach, MacEdward / The Ballad Book, Harper & Row, Bk (1955), p657
Bone, Lavinia. Randolph, Vance / Ozark Folksongs. Volume I, British Ballads and Songs, Univ. of Missouri, Bk (1980/1946), p186/# 34B [1930/05/12] (Get Up and Shut the Door)
Clevenger, Sarah. Cox, John Harrington (ed.) / Folk-Songs of the South, Dover, Sof (1967/1925), p516/#185 [1924/09] (Old John Jones)
Cooper, Frank G.. Moore, Ethel & Chauncey (ed.) / Ballads and Folk Songs of the Southwest, Univ. of Okla, Bk (1964), p122/# 51 [1940s]
Gainer, Patrick. Folk Songs of the Alleghenies, Folk Heritage, LP (1963), trk# A.03
Gillette, Steve; and Cindy Mangsen. Light of Day, Compass Rose CRM 7, Cas (1996), trk# B.01
MacColl, Ewan. MacColl, Ewan / Folk Songs and Ballads of Scotland, Oak, Sof (1965), p37
MacColl, Ewan. English & Scottish Popular Ballads, Vol. 2, Washington WLP 716, LP (1963/1956), trk# B.01
MacKay, Karen. West Virginia Woman, West Virginia Woman 101, LP (1983), trk# 2
Marks, Phyllis. Folksongs and Ballads, Vol 2. Phyllis Marks, Augusta Heritage AHR 008, Cas (1991), trk# 2.08
McCurdy, Ed. Ballad Record, Riverside RLP 12-601, LP (1955), trk# A.04
Moser, Artus M.. North Carolina Mountain Folksongs and Ballads, Folkways FD 5331, LP (1974), trk# 4
Niles, John Jacob. Niles, John Jacob / Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles, Bramhall House, Bk (1961), p307/N 58 [1900s] (Old Man and the Door)
Salswell, Angela. Morris, Alton C. / Folksongs of Florida, Univ. Florida, Bk (1950), p320/#171 [1934-39]
Wilbur, Marie. Randolph, Vance / Ozark Folksongs. Volume I, British Ballads and Songs, Univ. of Missouri, Bk (1980/1946), p186/# 34A [1930/05/12] (Get Up and Shut the Door)
Barring of the Door
Rt - Get Up and Bar the Door
Silly Sisters. No More to the Dance, Shanachie 79069, LP (1989), trk# A.02
Johnnie Blunt
Rm - Get Up and Bar the Door
Johnson, James & Robert Burns (eds) / Scots Musical Museum, Amadeus, Bk (1991/1853), #365 [1792]
Redpath, Jean. Songs of Robert Burns. Vol. 1, Philo 1037, LP (1976), trk# B.03
Mainly Norfolk: John Blunt / Get Up and Bar the Door
[Roud 115; Child 275; Ballad Index C275; trad.]
Ewan MacColl sang the comical domestic tale with a ring of Aesop, Get Up and Bar the Door, in 1956 on his and A.L. Lloyd's Riverside album The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Volume I. It was reissued with his other songs in this series in 2009 on the Topic CD Ballads: Murder—Intrigue—Love—Discord.
Tony Rose sang this song as John Blunt on his 1971 album Under the Greenwood Tree. He commented in his sleeve notes:
John Blunt has this same wry sense of humour [as Basket of Eggs on the same album -ed]. The song occurs frequently in Scots' versions as The Barring of the Door. It is one of the very few songs to acknowledge the social significance of black puddings—usually goes down well in Bury!
Martin Carthy sang John Blunt on his 1972 album Shearwater and a few years later live at the Folkfestival '76 Dranouter. He commented in the original album's sleeve notes:
Lord Randall and John Blunt must be among the more widespread story-ideas in the folk consciousness, the stories remaining more or less the same and varying according to locale and-or the individual imagination of whoever sings them. Variations on the idea of John Blunt range from the Arabian tale where the new husband wins the argument with his bride when she pleads for his life as he is about to be executed for insolence in refusing to answer police questions, to another which has hemp-eating tomb robbers arguing over who shall shut the gate of the vault in which they habitually gorge themselves. Nothing quite so extreme here, but would-be rapists and burglars might take note.
The Silly Sisters (Maddy Prior and June Tabor) sang this in 1988 as The Barring of the Door on their second album, No More to the Dance. They were accompanied by Dan Ar Braz, guitar, Huw Warren, keyboards, and Patsy Seddon & Mary Macmaster (a.k.a. Sileas), clarsachs.
And Frankie Armstrong sang John Blunt accompanied by John Kirkpatrick in 1996 on her ballads album Till the Grass O'ergrew the Corn. The sleeve notes commented:
The characters who inhabit ballads are a notably wilful lot. In this “domestic” ballad, we are a world away from castle and greenwood, from heroines with milk-white skin and heroes on berry-brown steeds. Yet still the protagonists are involved in a titanic struggle of wills on that most unforgiving battle field of all: married life. Sung by Mrs Seale in Dorchester Union in December 1906, where maybe she had little but her songs to keep her warm. Those who see folksongs as pretty relics from a vanished rural Arcadia should be sobered by how many were collected in workhouses.
Jon Boden learnt John Blunt from the singing of Martin Carthy and sang it as the April 12, 2011 entry of his project A Folk Song a Day.
Lyrics
Tony Rose sings John Blunt
There was an old couple lived under a hill,
And Blunt it was their name o.
And they had a good beer and ale for to sell
And it bore a wonderful name o.
John Blunt and his wife drank free of this ale
Till they could drink no more o;
Then up to bed the old couple went
But forgot to bar the door o.
So they a bargain, bargain made,
They made it strong and sure o:
That which of them should speak the first word
Should go down and bar the door o.
And there came travellers, travellers three,
Travelling through the night o.
And no house, no home, no fire had they,
Nor yet no candlelight o.
They came straightway to John Blunt's house
And quickly opened the door o,
And the devil of a word the old couple said
For fear who should bar the door o.
They went to his cellar and drank up his drink
Till they could drink no more o;
And they went to his cupboard and ate up his meat
Till they could eat no more o.
It's first they'd eaten the white puddings
And then they'd eaten the black o.
The old woman she listened and said to herself,
“May the devil slip down with that o.”
Then quickly they procured a light
And quickly went upstairs o,
And then they threw the old woman out of her bed
And they laid her on the floor.
Up spoke John Blunt, “You've eaten my meat,
And laid my wife on the floor o.”
“You spoke the first word John Blunt, she said,
Go down and bar the door o.”
Martin Carthy sings John Blunt
There was an old couple lived under the hill,
Blunt it was their name o.
They had good beer and ale good to sell
And it bore a wonderful fame o.
John Blunt and his wife they drank of the drink
Till they could drink no more o;
They both got tired and they went up to bed
But forgot to bar the door o.
So they a bargain, bargain made,
Made it strong and sure o:
The first of them should speak the first word
Should get up and bar the door o.
So there came travellers, travellers three,
Travelling in the night o.
No house, no home, no fire had they,
Nor yet no candlelight o.
They went to his cellar, they drank up his drink
Till they could drink no more o;
But never a word did the old couple speak
For fear who should bar the door o.
They went to his larder, they ate up his food
Till they could eat no more o;
But never a word did the old couple speak
For fear who should bar the door o.
They went upstairs, they went to his room,
They broke down the door o;
But never a word did the old couple speak
For fear who should bar the door o.
They hauled his wife all out of the bed,
Laid her out on the floor o;
Then up got poor John Blunt in his bed
For he could stand no more o.
Said, “You've eaten my food and drunk all my drink,
Laid her out on the floor o.”
“You spoke the first word John Blunt, she said,
So go down and bar the door o.”
Silly Sisters' The Barring of the Door
It fell about the Martinmas time
And a gay time it was then o
That our good wife had puddings to make
And she boiled them in the pan o.
The wind blew cold from east and north
And blew into the floor o,
Quoth our good man to our good wife,
“Get up and bar the door o.”
“My hand is in my hussyfskap,
Good man, as you may see o.
If it should be barred this hundred years
It'll not be barred by me o.”
They made the pact between the two
They made it firm and sure o:
Whoever should speak the very first word
Should rise and bar the door o.
Then by and came two gentlemen
At twelve o'clock at night o,
And they could see that in the house
There was coal nor candle light o.
“Oh, have we here a rich man's house
Or have we here a poor o?”
But never a word would the old couple speak
For the barring of the door o.
So first they ate the white puddings
And then they ate the black o;
And muckle thought the good wife herself
But ne'er a word she spoke o.
Then one unto the other did say,
“Here man, take ye my knife o.
Do you take off the old man's beard
And I'll kiss the good wife o.”
“But there's no water in the house
And what shall we do then o?
What ails ye at the pudding broth
That boils in yonder pan o.”
Oh, up then started our good man
And an angry man was he o,
“Well ye kissed my wife before my eyes
And scald me with pudding broth o.”
Oh up then started our good wife,
Gave three skips on the floor o,
“Good man ye have spake the very first word:
Get up and bar the door o.”
Note: hussyfskap (Scottish) = household chores
Acknowledgements
Martin Carthy's version transcribed by Garry Gillard.