I wrote about "When You Hear a Cannon" nearly five years ago, wondering how there could be so little information online about this simple round.  I searched again recently and found nothing new.  So I decided to put up a version on YouTube and to write the sheet music.  Nothing too fancy for either effort. 

First, the video:

Second, the sheet music:

Please chime in on the comments if you know this song.

Wha Saw the 42nd sheet music

As mentioned in my last post, "Wha Saw the 42nd" has attracted more interest than any other song on this blog to date.  The variation we sing at Camp Ajawah has slightly different words and melody than what I find elsewhere online.  Most of what's available is a version for bagpipes, and the other traditional versions I have found mention nothing about singing it as a round.

So I created sheet music for Ajawah's version. We sing the song three times through, with each group starting the song two beats after the prior group.  You can sing it with any number of groups.  While the audio on my last post may not be clear enough, perhaps you can hear how it starts with "wha saw... wha saw... wha saw" as each group joins in.  And as each group finishes, the song ends with "bramble briar... bramble briar... bramble briar."

If you end up singing our version, please let me know in the comments.

Wha Saw the 42nd revisited - with video

Of all the songs I've written about on this blog, the one that received far and away the most comments was "Wha Saw the 42nd," Song #20 (to read them, click on the song's title in the list at the right side of this page).  And the comments have come regularly every few months for 5-6 years.

Last week I recorded the girls at Camp Ajawah in Minnesota singing "Wha Saw."  They use it as a round in the Mess Hall following meals.  I missed the first second or two, and once you have nine tables of eight singing along, it's hard to make out the words and melody.  The occassional loud bang you hear is girls keeping beat by banging their fists on the table at the start of a measure.

Donkeys are in Love with Carrots - Song #36

I am not finding a lot of info about this song at first glance - it's a simple song with silly lyrics. And that's about it.

Donkeys are in love with carrots

carrots aren't in love at all

Hee haw hee haw

Listen to their braying call

Anyone know any more than this?

More music alone

To follow up on my previous post, here are three versions of "Music Alone Shall Live":

1 - A guy singing all the parts himself through the magic of recording technology - charming:

This is also a good place to point out that another term for a round is a simple canon. There are other types of canons where the original melody is not repeated exactly - can be a variation, or reversed, or at an interval, etc. But that's a bit complicated for our purposes.

2 - I love this version, though it's not sung as a round. 1970 reggae:

3 - And finally, in the original German, more or less, by a guy and girl who look like they are at a camp similar to Ajawah:

Music Alone Shall Live - Song # 35

Back to my list of rounds... next up is another classic example, one with a very simple lyric that is easy to learn and sing. It's on the lovely side, rather than the rowdy.

Here is a link to sheet music, though the first line is a slightly different melody than the one I know:

http://www.8notes.com/scores/5637.asp

Also, I see that many places have the words as "all things shall vanish," but I prefer the way we sing it at Camp Ajawah: "All Things Shall Perish." Not sure what the closer translation is from the original, which is German:

Himmel und Erde mussen vergehn;
Aber die musici,aber die musici
Aber die musici, bleiben bestehn.

Put the first line in babelfish and it outputs :"Heaven and Earth mussen vergehn." Hmmm. I am guessing it means "must vanish" but let me try another online translator... and I get "Heaven and Earth must pass away." Which sounds more like "perish" than "vanish." Not that it really matters.

More on this round in my next post...

When You Hear a Cannon - song #33

Making the rounds with rounds... one of the songs I mentioned in my last post is a good example of why rounds are useful for group singing: they're easy to learn. Due to the repetitive nature of these songs, you only need to learn one chorus. You sing it over and over. Three times is the norm. And the melodies are likewise generally easy to pick up.

And WYHAC takes simple lyrics to an extreme:

When you hear a cannon it goes bang bang

When you hear a cannon it goes bang bang bang bang

Bang bang bang bang bang

The percussive sound of all those "bangs" is fun to sing. And as the subgroups finish one by one, the sound gradually transforms from raucous to simple.

A funny thing happened when I googled "When you hear a Cannon" - the only references I can find online are from Camp Ajawah related posts, other than one from the Delhi Girl Scouts. Is it really that obscure? I tried searching various permutations and still found nothing.

The origins of who taught any given song and when at Ajawah can be lost to the fog of time, since the camp has been around 80+ years and has distinct girls' and boys' halves. So if anyone reading this knows the song but is not from Camp Ajawah, please let me know in the comments.

Of, if you are from Ajawah and know anything about the origins of "When You Hear A Cannon," I would love to hear from you as well.

Rounds

I thought I would start posting lists occasionally, breaking down the big list of camp songs into smaller groupings. This could be useful if someone's looking for a specific type of song. Let's get right to it with our first list: rounds.

A round is a song that can overlap with itself and create interesting rhythms and harmony.

Chairs to Mend

Donkeys are in Love with Carrots

Hi Ho (Nobody Home)

Kookaburra

Little Tommy Tinker

Make New Friends

Music Alone

Oh How Lovely is the Evening

One Dark Night

Our Paddles

Rose

To Stop the Train

Wha' Saw the 42nd

When You Hear a Cannon

Did I forget any? Are there any that you like that are not part of the Camp Ajawah list on the home page?

Boy(s) Meet Girl(s)?

I was doing some research on a round sung at the girls' sessions at Camp Ajawah titled "Rose, Rose." A slow, haunting tune seemingly about a medieval young woman's betrothal plans, but it turns out no one has been able to trace it back any further than the 1900s.

But I learned a lot of camps and groups sing it along with a song we sing at the boys' sessions, "Hey Ho, Nobody Home," which indeed has a similar melody. We always sung it as if we were hiking.

So maybe at Ajawah this summer they should try the combo platter - here is one version I found, along with another verse or two thrown in from elsewhere:

rose, rose, rose, rose,
will I ever see thee wed?
I shall marry at my will,
sire, at my will.

ding, dong, ding, dong,
wedding bells on an April morning,
carve thy name on a moss-covered stone,
on a moss-covered stone.

Hey ho, nobody's home,
meat nor drink nor money have I none,
still I will be very merry,
hey ho, nobody's home.

Mother, Father, dig my grave,
dig it with a golden spade,
bring some friends and a morning dove,
to show my die for love.

Au poor bird,
take thy flight,
high above the sorrows,
of this cruel dark night.

Should make the campers all cheerful for bedtime, eh? And a note: many of the versions of Rose have the line as "at thy will" instead of "at my will." I seem to remember our version being "as I will" which sounds better, I think (as well as being more feminist than "at thy will").