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Lavender's Blue
English folk song
A 17th-century broadside version of the ballad
Catalogue	Roud 3483
Genre	Nursery rhyme
Published	English broadside (before 1680)

"Lavender's Blue" (sometimes called "Lavender Blue") is an English folk song and nursery rhyme dating to the 17th century. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 3483. It has been recorded in various forms since the 20th century and some pop versions have been hits in the US and UK charts.

Lyrics

There are as many as thirty verses to the song, and many variations of each verse. A typical version, described by James Halliwell in 1849, is:

Lavender's blue, dilly dilly, lavender's green,

When I am king, dilly dilly, you shall be queen:

Who told you so, dilly dilly, who told you so?

'Twas mine own heart, dilly dilly, that told me so.

Call up your men, dilly dilly, set them to work,

Some with a rake, dilly dilly, some with a fork;

Some to make hay, dilly dilly, some to thresh corn,

Whilst you and I, dilly dilly, keep ourselves warm.

If you should die, dilly dilly, as it may hap,

You shall be buried, dilly dilly, under the tap;

Who told you so, dilly dilly, pray tell me why?

That you might drink, dilly dilly, when you are dry.

Origins

The earliest surviving version of the song is in a broadside printed in England between 1672 and 1679, under the name Diddle Diddle, Or The Kind Country Lovers. The broadside indicates it is to be sung to the tune of "Lavender Green", implying that a tune by that name was already in existence. The lyrics printed in the broadside are fairly bawdy, celebrating sex and drinking.

According to Robert B. Waltz, "The singer tells his lady that she must love him because he loves her. He tells of a vale where young man and maid have lain together, and suggests that they might do the same". Waltz cites Sandra Stahl Dolby as describing this broadside version as being about a girl named Nell keeping the singer's bed warm.

Here is the first of ten verses:

Lavender's green, diddle, diddle,
Lavender's blue
You must love me, diddle, diddle,
cause I love you,
I heard one say, diddle, diddle,
since I came hither,
That you and I, diddle, diddle,
must lie together.

Both Waltz (citing Eloise Hubbard Linscott) and Halliwell have noted the song's association with Twelfth Night and the choosing of the king and queen of the festivities of that holiday.

"Lavender's Blue" emerged as a children's song in Songs for the Nursery in 1805 in the form:

Lavender blue and Rosemary green,
When I am king you shall be queen;
Call up my maids at four o'clock,
Some to the wheel and some to the rock;
Some to make hay and some to shear corn,
And you and I will keep the bed warm.

Similar versions appeared in collections of rhymes throughout the 19th century.

Revival

A version of the song, titled "Lavender Blue", was featured in the 1949 Walt Disney film So Dear to My Heart, where it was sung by Burl Ives. This version was nominated for Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1949 (losing to "Baby, It's Cold Outside" from Neptune's Daughter). This version of the song was credited to Eliot Daniel (music) and Larry Morey (lyrics). "Lavender Blue" was one of 400 nominees for the American Film Institute's "100 Years... 100 Songs" list of the 100 greatest film songs, which was presented on a television program of that name which aired on June 22, 2004, but it didn't make the final list. The appearance of "Lavender Blue" in the Disney film sparked a revival of interest in the song.

Ives' version was released as a record in 1949, and other recordings soon followed. Sammy Kaye also released a version in 1949 which charted at #5,, as did Dinah Shore (her version went to #1 on the Australian chart and was the title track of her album Lavender Blue) and Vera Lynn (B side of the 78 rpm single Again, backed by Bob Farnon's orchestra, which reached the Billboard magazine Best Seller chart on January 21, 1949, and lasted 3 weeks on the chart, peaking at #23. A decade later, in 1959, Sammy Turner released a rhythm and blues version produced by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller which reached #3 on the Billboard Hot 100.

"Lavender's Blue" continued to be recorded by pop artists throughout the rest of the 20th century and into the 21st. Jazz pianist Jack Pleis recorded Lavender's Blue for his 1955 album Music from Disneyland. Tommy Bruce made a single of it in 1963, and The Fleetwoods recorded a version in 1965. In 1975, the song was interpreted by Leon Russell and Mary Russell for their Wedding Album, and the next year the British early music revival group The City Waites recorded the original 17th-century bawdy broadside version of "Lavender's Green, Lavender's Blue" on their album Pills to Purge Melancholy. In 1988, Broadway singer Barbara Cook recorded a version for her release The Disney Album. In 1991, The Wiggles included this song on their albums The Wiggles and Pop Go The Wiggles,

In the 21st century, Laura Wright recorded a version for her 2011 album The Last Rose, Alyse Black recorded her rendition of the Sammy Turner version with her band 'Night, Sweet Pea on their 2012 album A Little Line of Kisses, and Reinhard Mey recorded a version for his 2016 album Mr. Lee.

In 2015, Disney revived "Lavender's Blue" as a signature song for another film, Cinderella". It's sung to Cinderella by her mother when she is a child, and reprised during the movie's climax, and is a motif of the orchestral score throughout.

Other works have incorporated the song or parts of it, or used it as a motif. Benjamin Britten wrote Lavender's Blue into his 1954 opera The Turn of The Screw, where it is sung by the two children, Miles and Flora, and in Brad Fraser's 1989 play Unidentified Human Remains and the True Nature of Love, lyrics from the song are repeatedly sung by the character Benita. And the song was a prominent motif in M.M. Kaye's 1980 children's novel The Ordinary Princess.

"Lavender's Blue" gave the title to the song "Lavender" by the British band Marillion. Released on their 1985 album Misplaced Childhood, the lyrics and melody of "Lavender's Blue" are woven through the song, which was a number 5 hit on the UK singles chart. Other works titled from "Lavender's Blue" include the 2016 film Lavender (where a sinister version of the song forms a motif), Andre Norton's 1975 novel, Lavender-Green Magic, Kathleen Lines' and Harold Jones's 1954 collection of nursery rhymes and songs Lavender's Blue, and many other books.

References

1. ^ Halliwell, James Orchard (1849). Popular Rhymes and Nursery Tales. London: John Russell Smith. pp. 237–238. ISBN 978-0370012551. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
2. ^ Robert B. Waltz & David G. Engle. "Lavender Blue". Traditional Ballad Index. California State University, Fresno. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
3. See also here
4. (Traditional) (1674–1679). "Diddle, Diddle (or The Kind Country Lovers)". Traditional Music Library. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
5. ^ Opie, Iona; Opie, Peter (1951). The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes. Oxford University Press. pp. 265–7. ISBN 9780198691112.
6. "100 Greatest Songs in American Movies: 100 YEARS...100 SONGS - The 400 Nominees". Filmsite. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
7. "AFI's 100 YEARS...100 SONGS". American Film Institute. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
8. "Billboard Best Sellers Chart History – "Lavender Blue (Dilly Dilly)" by Sammy Kaye 1949". Song Database. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
9. "Song artist 62 - Dinah Shore". The World's Music Charts. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
10. Dinah Shore ‎– Lavender Blue at Discogs (list of releases)
11. "Lavender Blue (Dilly Dilly) by Vera Lynn". Second Hand Songs. Retrieved April 11, 2021.
12. "Billboard Hot 100 Chart History – "Lavender-Blue" by Sammy Turner 1959". Song Database. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
13. "Sammy Turner Top Songs". Music VF. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
14. "Lavender's Blue" at Discogs
15. Discogs
16. Susan Wloszczyna (March 11, 2015). "9 Surprising Facts about Disney's 'Cinderella' and One about 'Frozen Fever". Indie Wire. Retrieved April 23, 2021.
17. Philip Rupprecht (11 February 2002). Britten's Musical Language. Cambridge University Press. pp. 157–. ISBN 978-1-139-44128-5.
18. "Lavender, Marillion Lyrics.com
19. Simply Eighties

External links

• Media related to Lavender's Blue at Wikimedia Commons

• 17th-century songs
• English folk songs
• English nursery rhymes
• Burl Ives songs
• Dinah Shore songs
• The Fleetwoods songs
• Disney songs
• Number-one singles in Australia
• Year of song unknown
• Songwriter unknown
• English children's songs
• Traditional children's songs