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From:
Gregg Camfield <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Mark Twain Forum <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Tue, 1 May 2007 13:51:58 -0700
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A very useful site to find lyrics.  Thanks.

I can't comment on the musical renditions across the board, but given how
WASPs treated the Irish in the 19th c., I'm a shade doubtful about this
rendition.  To check,  I just listened to part of one song, "Grafted into
the Army" by Henry Clay Work, which I do know.  I found the rendition to be
so far off the mark as to give the wrong idea of the song.  The tempo is
about half what it should be, making it sound like a real lament, rather
than the mockery intended.

Some of the songs seem to be done better, but since I don't know "Kathleen,
Mavourneen," I don't know if it, too, is supposed to mock the Irish for
their putative emotionality, or if it was meant seriously.  Either way, I'd
be amused to know if Twain sang it up tempo, or down.  It would be nice to
know if he was after a music-hall effect or bathos.

Anyway, there are some sites that give more info, but don't really help,
that much, in knowing how it was played in the US.  See
www.nls.uk/broadsides/broadside.cfm/id/16136 .  The only sheet music I can
find on the web in a quick search does not give enough detail to say if the
tempo notations are original or are modern interpretations, but I do see a
notation of _Andante e pensieroso_, which suggests Clemens pursued the
bathetic.

Gregg

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