I can still remember the first time I heard the song "Weila Waila" as performed by the Dubliners. The lyrics perplexed me, as they sounded like essentially "murder lyrics" in spite of having a beautiful play on words (the chorus is "A Weila Weila Waila" which is ancient Gaelic for "a way by the waters").
I was too young at the time to know that this was one of the Child Ballads -- stories of crime and punishment -- that served the purpose of telling the general populace, in a gruesome reminder, that crime does not pay. Today, we have "crime dramas" that serve the same purpose: "Law and Order" and its many spinoffs provide that same reminder, alongside numerous other social issues that the creators wanted on the public conscience. Like the Execution Ballads, these were never "scientific" in execution. They were art. But they were a very utilitarian device educating the public.
One aspect of your article that intrigues me: the focus on issues other than realism. I know the execution ballads lacked a lot of that, and now, thanks to your article, I know why. Yet I would argue the same is actually true today: even "Law and Order" never shows police breaking certain rules, planting evidence, or refusing to go after political allies, for instance. They often include "moralizing" elements, and *certain* rule-breakers are allowed -- but they are usually sympathetic or glorified. Producer Dick Wolf has spoken highly of the NYPD, for example, and his work does get lots of procedure and courtroom politics correct -- but certain issues that are rampant within today's precincts are largely absent from his works.
I have looked for modern police literature in recent years, and honestly, the genre itself is often rather lacking, focusing on authors who tout their own experiences in law enforcement, or "thriller" writers who are more focused, as you say with the Execution Ballads, as first-person accounts of horrors that, again, aren't so much realistic as capable of providing shock and entertainment for readers.
It's a peculiar consistency, now that I compare them. And honestly: if it hadn't been for your article, here, I probably would not have even realized it.
Singer/songwriter Steve Earl wrote a sad, gripping pair of songs , one from the viewpoint of a prison guard, the other from the viewpoint of a young man being put to death in prison for murder. They are Billy Austin, and Ellis Unit One, from Steve Earl The Definitive Collection. I think that Steve Earl turned the idea of the traditional execution ballad upside down with these songs, though. He deliberately sides with the humanity of the characters in these two songs, and masterfully so. But all without losing sight of the loneliness and terror of his characters, and the underlying duplicity of society's attitude , allowing for even more violence. You will not forget those songs. There is great songwriting and playing on this whole cd, as well.
While others have made excellent and more germane comments, I think we should acknowledge some of the very best murder ballads in contemporary music: Springsteen's Johnny 99 and Nebraska. Excerpts:
Now, judge, judge, I got debts no honest man could pay
The bank was holdin' my mortgage and takin' my house away
Now I ain't sayin' that made me an innocent man
But it was more than all this that put that gun in my hand
Well your honor, I do believe I'd be better off dead
And if you can take a man's life for the thoughts that's in his head
Then won't you sit back in that chair and think it over, judge, one more time?
And let 'em shave off my hair and put me on that execution line
-and-
Now, the jury brought in a guilty verdict, and the judge he sentenced me to death
Midnight in a prison storeroom with leather straps across my chest
Sheriff, when the man pulls that switch, sir, and snaps my poor head back
You make sure my pretty baby is sittin' right there on my lap
They declared me unfit to live, said into that great void my soul'd be hurled
They wanted to know why I did what I did
Well, sir, I guess there's just a meanness in this world
I am a tour guide at Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia. Nearly every tour that I do ends at the gravesite of David Bispham, an American opera singer who died in 1921. While he is largely forgotten, in his day he was most famous for singing "Danny Deever", a pre-execution ballad based on a poem by Rudyard Kipling. The lyrics describe an army officer explaining to a young soldier what he will see when he witnesses the hanging of a comrade the next morning. Bispham sang the song for an audience at Theodore Roosevelt's White House, despite the protestations of First Lady Edith Roosevelt, who found the song disturbing. Bispham sang it anyway and, according to the singer's memoir, "Its conclusion brought the president upstanding to his feet, and with hands outstretched he came forward, saying 'By Jove, Mr. Bispham, that was bully! With such a song as that you could lead a nation into battle!'" I tell this story at Bispham's grave and play an excerpt from his 1906 recording of "Danny Deever", which was released as a 78 rpm record that year.
This was very interesting. I knew ballads were sung on street corners in Georgian London but I didn’t realize that there were execution ballads. Doing some research on that period, I have read that the “last words” of criminals about to be hanged were often sold outside Newgate and at Tyburn. I realize now that these “last words” must have been the ballads that you discuss.
The Georgians, though, were fascinated fascinated by all things criminal. Executions were public spectacles. Bleachers were set up at Tyburn so that the wealthy could watch comfortably for a shilling; the poor stood around or sat on crates. They were very blasé about executions as well. Eighteenth-century politician George Selwyn once said that in England “we hang at eight and breakfast at nine.” There were “Lives” written about highwaymen--the most famous, I guess, would be about Johnathan Wild, written by Henry Fielding, no less. The “Lives” were told from the highwayman’s point of view, and were often thinly-disguised satiric social commentary (which was known as “biting the biter”). There was even fascination with the slang that the criminal class employed. Dictionaries of cant were published as early as 1699.
There are still plenty of murder ballads around. The difference may be that the crimes they describe are personal. It sounds like the old ones focused on crimes against the social order and were designed to reinforce that order. So could we use some graphic school shooting songs now?
Popular music tends to be all about evoking some strong emotion, and that's determined by which emotions are acceptable to the society and its authorities at a given time. In the current era, the emotion evoked usually has something to do with love or sex, but in more prudish or oppressive societies, it may be some other emotion. Ages ago I had a Chaldean girlfriend from Iraq who told me that a large percentage of popular music in the Middle East is "for cry". According to her, and to students I had from the same region, it's not acceptable to arouse someone's erotic impulses there, so a lot of the music is intended to evoke tears.
When we were teenagers circa 1970, an old lady across the street died, and she had an immense collection of 78 rpm records dating back as early as 1914. Her heirs let my musician sister take as many as she could scoop up, so we spent a lot of time listening to music from the very early years of music platters until about the 1930s. The era before the 1920s was rather puritanical, and an amazing number of the records had to do with tragic, violent topics, such as the story of two pretty little girls who died in a building fire, probably drawn from the headlines. There were hits of this tragic sort all the way up to about 1962 in the form of the teenage automotive death ballad, and that seems to have been the end of death songs.
'Hang down your head, Tom Dooley........'
I can still remember the first time I heard the song "Weila Waila" as performed by the Dubliners. The lyrics perplexed me, as they sounded like essentially "murder lyrics" in spite of having a beautiful play on words (the chorus is "A Weila Weila Waila" which is ancient Gaelic for "a way by the waters").
I was too young at the time to know that this was one of the Child Ballads -- stories of crime and punishment -- that served the purpose of telling the general populace, in a gruesome reminder, that crime does not pay. Today, we have "crime dramas" that serve the same purpose: "Law and Order" and its many spinoffs provide that same reminder, alongside numerous other social issues that the creators wanted on the public conscience. Like the Execution Ballads, these were never "scientific" in execution. They were art. But they were a very utilitarian device educating the public.
One aspect of your article that intrigues me: the focus on issues other than realism. I know the execution ballads lacked a lot of that, and now, thanks to your article, I know why. Yet I would argue the same is actually true today: even "Law and Order" never shows police breaking certain rules, planting evidence, or refusing to go after political allies, for instance. They often include "moralizing" elements, and *certain* rule-breakers are allowed -- but they are usually sympathetic or glorified. Producer Dick Wolf has spoken highly of the NYPD, for example, and his work does get lots of procedure and courtroom politics correct -- but certain issues that are rampant within today's precincts are largely absent from his works.
I have looked for modern police literature in recent years, and honestly, the genre itself is often rather lacking, focusing on authors who tout their own experiences in law enforcement, or "thriller" writers who are more focused, as you say with the Execution Ballads, as first-person accounts of horrors that, again, aren't so much realistic as capable of providing shock and entertainment for readers.
It's a peculiar consistency, now that I compare them. And honestly: if it hadn't been for your article, here, I probably would not have even realized it.
"We don’t really sing about violence anymore."
We don't? What about gangsta rap?
Singer/songwriter Steve Earl wrote a sad, gripping pair of songs , one from the viewpoint of a prison guard, the other from the viewpoint of a young man being put to death in prison for murder. They are Billy Austin, and Ellis Unit One, from Steve Earl The Definitive Collection. I think that Steve Earl turned the idea of the traditional execution ballad upside down with these songs, though. He deliberately sides with the humanity of the characters in these two songs, and masterfully so. But all without losing sight of the loneliness and terror of his characters, and the underlying duplicity of society's attitude , allowing for even more violence. You will not forget those songs. There is great songwriting and playing on this whole cd, as well.
While others have made excellent and more germane comments, I think we should acknowledge some of the very best murder ballads in contemporary music: Springsteen's Johnny 99 and Nebraska. Excerpts:
Now, judge, judge, I got debts no honest man could pay
The bank was holdin' my mortgage and takin' my house away
Now I ain't sayin' that made me an innocent man
But it was more than all this that put that gun in my hand
Well your honor, I do believe I'd be better off dead
And if you can take a man's life for the thoughts that's in his head
Then won't you sit back in that chair and think it over, judge, one more time?
And let 'em shave off my hair and put me on that execution line
-and-
Now, the jury brought in a guilty verdict, and the judge he sentenced me to death
Midnight in a prison storeroom with leather straps across my chest
Sheriff, when the man pulls that switch, sir, and snaps my poor head back
You make sure my pretty baby is sittin' right there on my lap
They declared me unfit to live, said into that great void my soul'd be hurled
They wanted to know why I did what I did
Well, sir, I guess there's just a meanness in this world
I am a tour guide at Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia. Nearly every tour that I do ends at the gravesite of David Bispham, an American opera singer who died in 1921. While he is largely forgotten, in his day he was most famous for singing "Danny Deever", a pre-execution ballad based on a poem by Rudyard Kipling. The lyrics describe an army officer explaining to a young soldier what he will see when he witnesses the hanging of a comrade the next morning. Bispham sang the song for an audience at Theodore Roosevelt's White House, despite the protestations of First Lady Edith Roosevelt, who found the song disturbing. Bispham sang it anyway and, according to the singer's memoir, "Its conclusion brought the president upstanding to his feet, and with hands outstretched he came forward, saying 'By Jove, Mr. Bispham, that was bully! With such a song as that you could lead a nation into battle!'" I tell this story at Bispham's grave and play an excerpt from his 1906 recording of "Danny Deever", which was released as a 78 rpm record that year.
And what about one of my favorite songs? Long Black Veil by The Band.
"Hangman, hangman, hold it a little while
Think I see my friends coming
Riding a many mile"
This was very interesting. I knew ballads were sung on street corners in Georgian London but I didn’t realize that there were execution ballads. Doing some research on that period, I have read that the “last words” of criminals about to be hanged were often sold outside Newgate and at Tyburn. I realize now that these “last words” must have been the ballads that you discuss.
The Georgians, though, were fascinated fascinated by all things criminal. Executions were public spectacles. Bleachers were set up at Tyburn so that the wealthy could watch comfortably for a shilling; the poor stood around or sat on crates. They were very blasé about executions as well. Eighteenth-century politician George Selwyn once said that in England “we hang at eight and breakfast at nine.” There were “Lives” written about highwaymen--the most famous, I guess, would be about Johnathan Wild, written by Henry Fielding, no less. The “Lives” were told from the highwayman’s point of view, and were often thinly-disguised satiric social commentary (which was known as “biting the biter”). There was even fascination with the slang that the criminal class employed. Dictionaries of cant were published as early as 1699.
British first-person execution ballads...such as:
Mama, I just killed a man
Put a gun against his head,
Pulled my trigger, now he's dead
Mama, life had just begun
But now I've gone and thrown it all away
excellent one, Ted.
Just one precision: France abolished death penalty in 1981, not 2007.
Early one mornin' while makin' the rounds
I took a shot of cocaine and I shot my woman down
I went right home and I went to bed
I stuck that lovin' .44 beneath my head
There are still plenty of murder ballads around. The difference may be that the crimes they describe are personal. It sounds like the old ones focused on crimes against the social order and were designed to reinforce that order. So could we use some graphic school shooting songs now?
Popular music tends to be all about evoking some strong emotion, and that's determined by which emotions are acceptable to the society and its authorities at a given time. In the current era, the emotion evoked usually has something to do with love or sex, but in more prudish or oppressive societies, it may be some other emotion. Ages ago I had a Chaldean girlfriend from Iraq who told me that a large percentage of popular music in the Middle East is "for cry". According to her, and to students I had from the same region, it's not acceptable to arouse someone's erotic impulses there, so a lot of the music is intended to evoke tears.
When we were teenagers circa 1970, an old lady across the street died, and she had an immense collection of 78 rpm records dating back as early as 1914. Her heirs let my musician sister take as many as she could scoop up, so we spent a lot of time listening to music from the very early years of music platters until about the 1930s. The era before the 1920s was rather puritanical, and an amazing number of the records had to do with tragic, violent topics, such as the story of two pretty little girls who died in a building fire, probably drawn from the headlines. There were hits of this tragic sort all the way up to about 1962 in the form of the teenage automotive death ballad, and that seems to have been the end of death songs.
If it hasn’t already been mentioned, Bessie Smith “Send me to the ‘lectric chair”.
Folsom Prison Blues
They’re Hanging Me Tonight on Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs by Marty Robbins.