The Unfortunate Rake

The story is basically this: a soldier is dying, evidently of venereal disease he contracted from a young woman, and he requests a funeral. Hear how this story has been spun over centuries into a whole collection of similarly themed songs, the earliest possibly dating to 1790. In this recording we are essentially witnessing the evolution of the Anglo-Saxon ballad tradition.

Track Listing

101	The Unfortunate Rake	A. L. Lloyd and Alf Edwards	02:59
102	The Trooper Cut Down in His Prime	Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger	04:30
103	The Young Sailor Cut Down in His Prime	Harry Cox	01:57
104	Noo I'm a Young Man Cut Down in My Prime	Willie Mathieson	02:17
105	The Bad Girl's Lament	Wade Hemsworth	02:49
106	One Morning in May	Hally Wood	02:36
107	Bright Summer Morning	Viola Penn	02:24
108	The Girl in the Dilger Case	D. K. Wilgus	01:08
109	The Cowboy's Lament	Bruce Buckley	02:39
110	Streets of Laredo	Harry Jackson	04:59
201	St. James Hospital	Alan Lomax	03:33
202	Gambler's Blues	Dave Van Ronk	02:44
203	I Once Was a Carman - I Once Was a Carman in the Big Mountain Con	Guthrie T. "Gus" Meade	01:12
204	The Lineman's Hymn	Rosalie Sorrels	01:49
205	The Wild Lumberjack	Kenneth S. Goldstein	01:51
206	A Sun Valley Song	Jan Brunvand and Ellen Stekert	01:28
207	The Ballad of Bloody Thursday	John Greenway	03:44
208	Streets of Hamtramck	Bill Friedland, Mark Newman, and Morris Howarth	02:23
209	The Ballad of Sherman Wu	Pete Seeger	02:07
210	The Professor's Lament	Roger Abrahams	03:25