Annotation:Poor Robin's Maggot

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POOR ROBIN'S MAGGOT. AKA and see "Would You Have a Young Virgin (of Fifteen Years)." English, Air (6/8 time). B Flat Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). One part. This air with country dance directions ("Longways for as many as will") appears in all four editions of London publisher John Young's Second Volume of the Dancing Master [1] (1710-1728), Thomas D’Urfey’s Pills to Purge Melancholy (vol. 1, 132, 1719), and many ballad operas, including The Generous Freemason (1731) and John Gay's The Beggar's Opera (1728, where it appears under the title "If the heart of a man is deprest with cares"). Thomas D'Urfey wrote his song "Would You Have a Young Virgin (of Fifteen Years" for the last act of his work Modern Prophets (1709) and directed it to be sung to the air "Poor Robin's Maggot"; thus, "Poor Robin" is the older name for the tune. In the Dancing Master "Poor Robin's Maggot" is the alternate title, while "Wou'd You have a Young Virgin" is the main title. The tune appears with the titles reversed in John Walsh's Second Book of the Compleat Country Dancing-Master (London, 1719), with "Poor Robin's Maggot" as the main title. The word ‘maggot’ in this context means a 'trifle', or a 'plaything'; from the Italian maggioletta.

The tune received a boost in popularity in the next century, when it was incorporated as the third figure ("Native (La)") of the hugely popular set of dances "Lancers Quadrilles."

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Chappell (Popular Music of the Olden Times, vol. 2), 1859; p. 116.

Recorded sources: Idlewild Records, Dal Riada - "Tavern on the Moor" (2008).

See also listing at:
Hear Dal Riada's recording on youtube.com [2]