A Book of Old Ballads — Complete

About

This collection of English and Scottish traditional ballads — including 'Barbara Allen,' 'Lord Randal,' 'The Twa Corbies,' 'Thomas the Rhymer,' and 'Sir Patrick Spens' — represents the oral poetry tradition at its most concentrated: spare narrative, incremental repetition, sudden death, supernatural visitation, love betrayed. The ballad form is among the most performable in the tradition — the four-line stanza, the refrain, the dramatic dialogue — and collections like this one are ideal for group performance with multiple voices.