Mid-Hudson Song and Verse

Abstract

HE SONGS and verses in this collection were gathered for the most part between I920 and I930 by various members of the college class in folklore from natives or old residents of Dutchess, Ulster, and Columbia counties in New York on the mid-Hudson. They were taken down as recited from memory or copied from manuscript versions preserved in the family, and the tunes were in every case sung from memory and either noted directly from the singer or reproduced from a phonograph record on an old style Edison which we have found useful for fieldwork. Most of these last tunes were recorded by Constance Varney, Vassar '2I. The Dutch songs and some eight others were taken down by Harriet Stocking, Vassar '26, later Marston fellow in music at Vassar. A few were read from phonograph records by Gertrude Brown, formerly instructor here in musical theory. The notation has been checked by Professor George S. Dickinson of the department of music at Vassar, to whose cordial cooperation, as also to that of President MacCracken, we are particularly indebted. . . . The Dutch nursery songs, all too few of which are still current here on the Hudson . . . have been kindly prepared for us through the courtesy of the Netherland-America Foundation by Dr. A. J. Barnouw, Queen Wilhelmina Professor at Columbia University. Our sincere thanks are here extended to all those who have contributed so generously to the bringing together of this regional miscellany of popular verse and melody.