Episode 17: The Cuckoo: A chart topper since the 1200’s

Down the Road on the Blue Ridge Music Trails of North Carolina

The English folksong “The Cuckoo,” often sung as a round or canon, celebrated the arrival of summer recalling the sights and sounds of English barnyards and meadows. Some scholars consider the song a parody and possibly too coarse for polite society. The manuscript in which it is preserved was copied between 1261 and 1264. The song evolved into a more poetic form and became part of the English folksong lexicon. Give a listen to this transitional version where “she never sings cuckoo ’til summer is near.” Now that’s old-time music!