Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2011 December 18

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

December 18

Earlaye in the morning

In the song "What Shall We Do With The Drunken Sailor", "early" is in every Youtube version I heard sung like "earl-I" instead of "earl-E". Why? Joepnl (talk) 01:59, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

It is usually sung in an Irish accent. This is probably the reason. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 02:07, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, misunderstood your question. These will be modern versions of the song, probably. Misunderstood the question again! Really I prefer IPA... KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 02:09, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

I suspect that sea shanties were often sung in a west-country accent, which would possibly tend to stress the end of the word more than is found in other English dialects. Maybe it is sung like that more for effect (and emphasis) though. AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:11, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

The song is notorious as a sort of practical joke. It has bizarre and changing time signatures throughout the song (probably varying depending on the group that sings it), and the joke is to get the rooks singing along, except they keep making "mistakes" because they can't predict the next time change. Whether that has anything to do with the pronunciation, I can't say. --Trovatore (talk) 02:21, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

In an English school, it was "earl-aye in the morning" sounds like "aye" as in aye-aye (pr: eye-eye) cap'n. By the way, that version went, What shall we do with a drunken sailor? and something that sounded like "ho-ro" or "yo-ro and up she rises..." which could have been related to Irish language but heard by a little kid as that. Manytexts (talk) 02:54, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

My dad was a sailor so we used to sing it all the time when we were kids (Liverpool-Irish). This is probably why I'm used to hearing it in an Irish accent. We pronounced the 'early' as Maytexts above says, too, on occasion. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 03:06, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

Article Drunken Sailor... AnonMoos (talk) 13:43, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

The pronunciation of /i:/ as /aɪ/ in certain songs is a well-established (and much parodied) custom of English folk-singing. I've been looking for an example, and I haven't managed to find a good one, but if you search YouTube for "FBB Archive East suffolk chorus cup" (I can't link to it as it's blacklisted) - in the chorus of the 1987 recording you will hear "marry-I-ed to a merm-I-aid", which is not quite the same phenomenon, but takes it one step further.

--ColinFine (talk)

Then of course there's "Californ-eye-ay" [kælɨfɔrnaɪeɪ] in the Beach Boys' song... AnonMoos (talk) 15:57, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Deanna Durbin and the cast from Can't Help Singing (1944) also sing it that way,[1] so presumably that's an oldie. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:56, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Just of the top of my head I wonder if it is to assist the sound break between 'early' and 'in' which is harder to achieve if you sing 'earlee in...' as opposed to 'earligh in...'. Thr former needs a definite stop in voice but the latter can be sung as a contiuous sound. Richard Avery (talk) 15:26, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

You would pronounce a glottal stop between 'early' and 'in'? KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 17:47, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Somewhat similar is the pronunciation of Erie Canal in the song, at least as pronounced by The Weavers (Youtube link). Eer-eye-ee canal. --NorwegianBlue ^talk 00:28, 20 December 2011 (UTC)