The song complex of The moonshine can : an integrated approach to the study of words and music in traditional song

Abstract

This thesis is concerned with the study of text-tune relations in the song complex of a Newfoundland local song, The Moonshine Can. The aim of the work is to examine the combination and re-combination of words and music in the complex, and to account for their interrelations. -- The song complex comprises the extant versions of The Moonshine Can, from both folk and popular traditions, and the other songs known to have been sung to its principal melody. The texts and tunes of these songs are analysed and compared within the framework of a diachronic model, incorporating consideration of the people, places, historical periods and events referred to in the songs, and the songs' composers and re-creators. A synthesis of the various levels of the model produces a life history of the song complex and a theory of the text-tune relations evidenced in it. -- Attention is directed towards the elucidation of the content of The Moonshine Can with reference to illicit distillation in general and the particular incident portrayed in the song. The manner of the song's composition and contexts and styles of its subsequent performance are also described and a detailed study made of its text and tune variants. The Newfoundland recompositions and re-combinations of The Moonshine Can are then presented and the nature of their relationship to the The Moonshine Can explored. This leads to an exposition of the life history of the song complex and the dynamics of its text-tune combinations.