6/23/11

Public

The best-known version is a 1952 BBC Archive recording by an Irish traveller, Mary Doran. Belfast singer Winnie Ryan also performed a version, and was recorded by folklorists Peter Kennedy and Sean O'Boyle in 1952. Doran's version was taught to the singer Anne Briggs by A.L. Lloyd.; Anne Briggs in turn taught it to singer/guitarist Bert Jansch. It appears on Jansch's 1966 album Jack Orion as "Black Water Side. Bert Jansch learnt the song from Anne Briggs and recorded it five years before her—in 1966—for his album Jack Orion; this version also appeared on The Electric Muse and served as the basis for Led Zeppelin's Black Mountainside. the song is considered "Traditional" and has no writer credited. more on origins and