Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats

Subject: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: GUEST,Charlot
Date: 22 Apr 05 - 03:40 PM

Looking for words and translation of French-Canadian song, "Nous etions trois soldats", recorded on "Chants et complaintes maritimes des Terres francaises d'Amerique", volume 16 in the series "Anthologie des chansons de mer"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Apr 05 - 03:44 PM

we be soldiers three?
is the next line "Pardonnez moi, je vous en prie?"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: Emma B
Date: 22 Apr 05 - 03:55 PM

I'm only aware of "Nous étions trois marins" a "Chanson de marins"-

Nous étions trois marins    (bis)
tous trois natifs de Nantes lanla
tous trois natifs de Nantes

there are 14 other verses available - si vous desirez.......

Subject: Lyr Add: WE BE SOLDIERS THREE
From: Peace
Date: 22 Apr 05 - 03:59 PM

^^^
WE BE SOLDIERS THREE

We be soldiers three
Pardonnez moi, je vous en prie
Lately come forth from the Low Country
With never a penny of money

Here, good fellow, I drink to thee
Pardonnez moi, je vous en prie
To all good fellows wherever they be
With never a penny of money

And he that will not pledge me this
Pardonnez moi, je vous en prie
Pays for the shot, whatever it is,
With never a penny of money

Charge again, boy, charge it again
Pardonnez moi, je vous en prie
As long as there is any ink in thy pen
With never a penny of money

We be soldiers three
Pardonnez moi, je vous en prie
Lately come forth from the Low Country
With never a penny of money.

from a Google of

We Be Soldiers Three

[Also in the DT]

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: masato sakurai
Date: 22 Apr 05 - 08:13 PM

Listen to "Nous étions trois soldats" (Nord-Ouest canadien) here. It's not "We Be Soldiers Three."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 22 Apr 05 - 08:37 PM

Anthologie des chansons de mer vol. 16, which contains this song, is a co-production of Radio-Canada and Chasse-Marée.ArMen. TCDI 1000-2. It is not in the CBC Catalogue; only through Radio-Canada.ca (Musiques traditionnelles).

"We Be Soldiers Three" is in the DT, taken from Pills to Purge Melancholy vol. 1, and Ravenscroft (17th c.).   Also thread 23538: We be soldiers three

It has no direct connection to the French and French-Canadian marine song.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: Brían
Date: 22 Apr 05 - 08:49 PM

This song seems to be related to Nous étions trois capitaines

Brían

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 25 Apr 05 - 08:08 AM

Another related song, ultimately from the same source (Thomas D'Urfey's anthology of songs and poems called "Wit and Mirth: or, Pills to Purge Melancholy" from 1719), is TRAVELERS THREE in the DT. I believe those lyrics are the same ones Ed McCurdy sang on one of the albums in his bawdy series "When Dalliance Was in Flower and Maidens Lost Their Heads." He took songs from d'Urfey and modified them in various ways, for example, modernizing any obscure words. I believe the original refrain was "Without ever a stiver of money."

Subject: Lyr Add: NOUS ÉTIONS TROIS SOLDATS
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 04 Nov 09 - 04:02 PM

From Le Foyer Canadien, Volume 1 edited by Jean-Baptiste-Antoine Ferland, Louis Joseph Cyprien Fiset, Antoine Gérin-Lajoie, F. A. H. La Rue, Henri Raymond Casgrain (Quebec: Bureaux du "Foyer Canadien", 1863), page 367:


NOUS ÉTIONS TROIS SOLDATS

Nous étions trois soldats, — Du régiment passé,
Pour l'amour d'une fille, — Nous avons déserté,
Mon faluron dondaine, — Mon faluron dondé.

Dans mon chemin rencontre — La mariée chaussée.
Beau soldat, beau soldat, — Montre-moi ton congé.
Le congé que je porte — Il est dessous mes pieds.
L'ont pris, l'ont emmene, — Aux prisons enchaîné.
Il y fut six semaines, — Sans être interrogé.
Au bout de la septième — Son procès fut jugé.
Il fut jugé à pendre, — A pendre et étrangler.
Aux quatr' coins de la ville, — Au milieu du marché.
Quand fut sur la potence,— Il demande à parler.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Nov 09 - 03:12 PM

Always seems to be three. As in Mademoiselle from Armentieres - "Three German Officers crossed the Rhine."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Nous etions trois soldats
From: Bob the Postman
Date: 06 Nov 09 - 08:12 AM

Barbeau published a "Nous etions trois marins, tous les trois capitaines", otherwise "La fille de chambre", in which a chambermaid is courted by a young man on behalf of an older man and tells him "Ton maitre est assez vieux pour parler pour lui-meme".