Jamie Moran - Jack Was Every Inch a Sailor

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Description

In collaboration with the Pouch Cove Heritage Society and the MUN School of Music, I am doing a project focusing on the songs in the third edition of Gerald S. Doyle's "Old-Time Songs of Newfoundland". Every Friday, I will post a performance of a song from the book here on YouTube and on Facebook. Here's a song from the book called "Jack Was Every Inch a Sailor" - enjoy!

For more, check out:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jamiemoranmusic/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jamie_moran_music/

About the song:
"Jack Was Every Inch a Sailor" is a loose retelling of the biblical Jonah story with a Newfoundland fisherman as the hero. Where the tune came from is not known, but it is believed that the lyrics are an adaptation of the text for the song “Every Inch a Sailor”. “Every Inch a Sailor” is a New York music hall song written in the early 1880’s as part of a burlesque (a work created to make fun of another work) of Gilbert and Sullivan’s comic opera H.M.S. Pinafore.

Besides being collected by Gerald S. Doyle, this song was also collected by Greenleaf and Mansfield in their book Ballads and Sea Songs of Newfoundland and recorded by Alan Mills on his 1953 record Folk Songs of Newfoundland. Some notable names that have recorded “Jack Was Every Inch a Sailor” include Omar Blondahl, Dick Nolan, and Mark Hiscock.