Geoff Duncan

Greensleeves

A few months ago, the folks over at the RMMGA newsgroup started up another arrangement project. The basic idea, originally spearheaded by noted guitarist El McMeen, is that the collective picks a not-too-difficult public domain or other out-of-copyright tune, and anyone who wants to participate creates and records their own arrangement of the piece to share with the group just for hoots and grins.

There are no height nor age requirements, nor are there prizes. Similarly, the RMMGA folks don't discriminate on the basis of skill or recording quality—in fact, some of the more memorable efforts have come from amateurs recording into their MiniDisc's condenser mic in their living room. The only real rule is that the arrangements at least feature acoustic guitar in some way. The most recent arrangement project centered on Stephen Foster's 1855 tune "Hard Times Come Again No More" (and I even recorded a version!). Previous projects centered on Wayfaring Stranger and Shenandoah.

This time around, the RMMGA collective, after much debate, settled on the traditional Elizabethan tune "Greensleeves," often known as "What Child is This" and widely attributed to Henry the VII of England and/or Thomas Cutting. We'll probably never know where the melody came from, and it's been set to varying lyrics over the years: about all we know for sure is that it was well-known under more-or-less the current name in Shakespeare's time—he mentions it in The Merry Wives of Windsor.

As much as I like the idea of these arranging projects, I planned to stay out of this one. As a child, I liked the oddly sad tone of the Greensleeves melody, but the charm faded in later years as the tune took on increasingly cliché connotations and religious associations. Was this secular music, or religious music? And one often hears it around the end-of-year holidays: is the song now in that category of not-quite-religious "holiday" music? I couldn't figure it out. Further, although the simple harmony and structure of traditional arrangements of the tune make it a good exercise for beginners on almost any instrument, those arrangements can get stale quickly. I didn't just want to contribute effluvia to an already-homogeneous pot.

But at some point, I was putting new strings on a guitar and started dinking around with the tune, recalling bits of what I believe was Kenny Burrell's arrangement. But, as is my wont, such positive musical influences were swiftly defenestrated or shown the door, and the piece assumed a new, mutated, perhaps unrecognizable and possibly unlistenable form.

Greensleeves

It's just live, solo acoustic guitar. There are no overdubs or punches (can't you tell from the flubs?!), although it does combine elements from two separate takes.

I'll eventually list this version over on the Tunes page, and I'll keep trying to post to the RMMGA newsgroup and let them know about the recording. However, my Usenet provider recently "upgraded" their servers, leaving my preferred news client inoperable, and the system now rejects anything I post as spam. I'm hopeful the situation will eventually sort itself out.