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An unusual and delightfully bawdy offering from the irrepressible Lucie Skeaping and her collaborators The City Waites.

Today we think of a jig as simply a dance, but in late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century England the word was used to describe a short musical farce featuring songs, dancing and slapstick comedy. By 1590 Jigs were thoroughly established in the London theatres as the standard ending or Afterpiece to more serious theatrical fare; they could be satirical, sentimental, libellous, riotous and often downright obscene, offering a shameless and frequently subversive antidote to the plays which preceded them. The characters include cuckolded husbands, adulterous wives, country bumpkins, milkmaids, whores, city wide-boys, muggers and thieves, the plots often taken from folk tales but updated for city audiences with slapstick and comic twists of fate.

These jigs all appear here in their premiere recordings. In committing these works to disc for the first time, Lucie Skeaping has given us a unique and tantalising glimpse of theatrical history. Artfully presented and recorded, they contain all the quick-fire banter, robust language and delight in linguistic play that marked the age, all set to some of the
most delightful popular tunes England has ever produced.

An entertaining cameo from Catherine Bott is among the many uproarious performances.

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Contents and Reviews

The Black Man ANON, probably before 1633 [21'45]
1 QUOTH JOHN TO JOAN Sweet Susan, remember [2'40] 2 THE INDIAN QUEEN Y’are well overtaken [1'51]
3 PRITHEE LOVE TURN TO ME Come Sweetheart [1'20] 4 WALSINGHAM As ye came from Walsingham [3'03]
5 JOG ON Jog on, jog, on, my pretty Susan [1'19] 6 PRINCE RUPERT’S MARCH In this same plight [1'33]
7 GREYS INN MASK Come buy a brush [2'16] 8 HEARTSEASE Oh woe is me [1'38] 9 THE GELDING OF THE DEVIL Black do I cry [1'30]
10 GRIM KING OF THE GHOSTS Man Forbear this place [2'15] 11 PEG A RAMSEY Our sentinel keeps well [2'18]

12 The Merry Wooing of Robin and Joan Sellengers Round ANON, before 1656 [6'21]

Singing Simpkin WILL KEMP, by 1595 [9'17]
13 THE CROST COUPLE Blind Cupid hath made [1'54] 14 PRINCE RUPERT’S MARCH There is a Royster at the door [7'22]

15 The Bloody Battle at Billingsgate The Orange / Hit and Miss ANON, c1665 [6'10]

The Cheaters Cheated THOMAS JORDAN, published 1664 [34'22]
16 THE FRIAR AND THE NUN Good morrow fellow Filcher [3'28] 17 UPON A SUMMERS DAY / KEMP’S JIG Our Taunton den is a dungeon [3'45]
18 THE FRIAR AND THE NUN The rainbow never knew [1'57] 19 JACK A LENT Quick let us share [1'50]
20 THE CARMAN’S WHISTLE Soldiers fight [1'55] 21 STINGO / HALF HANEKIN I can dance and I can sing [6'01]
22 THE GELDING OF THE DEVIL Oh wo, wo, wo [2'19] 23 ARGEERS We shall ne’re have lucky minuit [2'36]
24 CAVALILLY MAN Now farawel Lungeon [7'41] 25 UPON A SUMMERS DAY Ch’ave overcome my voes [2'46]