Annotation:Betty Pringle's Pig (1)

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BETTY PRINGLE'S PIG [1]. Scottish, Reel. F Major (Cole, Ryan): D Major (Miller). Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. John Hartford says the first strain is similar to "Money Musk" and but the whole tune is the same as Ryan's "North End Reel." Ryan's/Cole's attributes the tune to the Scottish fiddler-composer Niel Gow, although there is no evidence to support this assertion. A rhyme called "Betty Pringle's Pig" appears in Willis P. Hazard's Mother Goose Melodies and goes:

Did you not hear of Betty Pringle's pig?
It was not very little nor yet very big;
The pig sat down upon a dung-hill,
And there poor piggy he made his will.

Betty Pringle came to see this pretty pig,
That was not very little nor yet very big;
The little piggy it lay down and died,
And Betty Pringle sat down and cried.

Then Johnny Pringle buried this very pretty pig,
That was not very little nor yet very big;
So here's and end of the song of all three,
Johnny Pringle, Betty Pringe, and little Piggy.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Cole (1000 Fiddle Tunes), 1940; p. 33. Miller (Fiddler's Throne), 2004; No. 120, p. 81. Ryan's Mammoth Collection, 1883; pp. 59 & 76.

Recorded sources:

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