The Rising of the Star

[claryce at ix.netcom.com]

Greetings from Aethelstan

There are several ways in which songs are altered in our society.

One of the methods is to change a few words to make the song more applicable 
to our SCA setting (i.e. gun to sword). Another method is for a gender-based 
song (i.e. a man singing to a lady, or vise-versa), a bard will usually 
change the gender to suit himself/herself.  These changes are fairly minor, 
and fairly expected, to make the song more pleasing to the listener (and the 
singer).  I believe this is the case Sir Lionel is referring to.

The situation that most performers encounter is of a much more subtle type.  
A person may learn a song from one teacher, and learn the song by rote.  
However, over the course of years the performer will naturally (and 
unconsiously) tend to subtly change the tune to suit his/her voice. 

The change in the text of a song is a very common occurence, and usually can 
occur when they forget the exact verse (i.e. improvisations, or "oh, my, 
god, I forgot the next word/line....") The latter usually occurs in front of 
a hall full of people. And as a wise man once said: "the show must go on", 
therefore, think quick, and find something that fits. And over the course of 
events, whenever you sing the song, you hit the same blank spot, and 
remember what you had sung the last time. Until you don't honestly remember 
what the original was. 

Between the subtle changes of the tune and the text, I find myself very 
startled when I try to sing with somebody who has learned the tune years 
before I did (i.e. Finn).  This normally leads to the discussion of "Why did 
you change the tune?", and Finn will reply: "That's how I taught it to you 
in the first place". "You did?" "Yes", "Hmmm.  I could have sworn you taught 
it to me this way?!?!" 

So, should you teach the "original" or "the newer version"?  How do you know  
"the original" was not "the new version" some time in the past?
I know, someone will now pipe up and say "I was there when so-and-so wrote 
thus-and-such song, this is how it went...."  :)

The next question is: as long as an original is written down in someone's 
dusty old bard book, do we really care what version is sung around the 
campfire at the end of the day? 

                                       One bard's opinion
                                         Aethelstan