{"id":1726,"date":"2015-06-16T11:49:36","date_gmt":"2015-06-16T10:49:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eyeplug.net\/magazine\/?p=1726"},"modified":"2011-04-12T17:14:35","modified_gmt":"2011-04-12T17:14:35","slug":"songcraft-willows-song-magnet-paul-giovanni","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/songcraft-willows-song-magnet-paul-giovanni\/","title":{"rendered":"SongCraft: Willow’s Song – Magnet (Paul Giovanni)"},"content":{"rendered":"
This entry is part 10 of 10 in the series Song Craft<\/a><\/div><\/div><\/div>

Being the best-known song of the film, it is sometimes referred to as “The Wicker Man Song”, although the film contains many other songs. The film tells the story of an upright Christian police officer investigating the disappearance of a young girl, the search for whom leads him to a remote Scottish isle inhabited by\u00a0pagans. While staying at the\u00a0Green Man pub, Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward) is roused from prayer by the landlord’s daughter Willow, played by (Britt Ekland), who sings this rather erotic ballad through the adjoining wall of their separate bedrooms. The song is an attempt to seduce Howie by alluding to Willow’s sensuality.<\/p>\n

The music is played by the band\u00a0Magnet. According to the film’s associate musical director Gary Carpenter, the screen version was sung by Rachel Verney <\/span><\/span>(although some have believed that it was sung by the Scottish jazz singer\u00a0Annie Ross). There are two different album versions of\u00a0The Wicker Man soundtrack. The 1998 version released by\u00a0Trunk Records features the film version of the song. The 2002 version released by Silva Screen features an alternate recording in which Lesley Mackie (who played Daisy in the film) sang to the same backing tracks.<\/p>\n

According to Paul Giovanni, “The idea for the song was completely original with me — there was no indication of what it was to be in the script except a couple of lines of absolute filth” (sourced by screenwriter\u00a0Anthony Shaffer from various anthologies of lyrics that would be appropriate to spring pagan festivals). <\/span><\/span>“The main thing is in the rhythm, and we used all of the old twangy instruments in there”.\u00a0One couplet in the song is adapted from a poem by\u00a0George Peele, part of his play\u00a0The Old Wives’ Tale<\/em> (printed 1595).\u00a0Another may be taken from a verse of the Elizabethan-period drinking song “Martin Said To His Man” (or may since have been added to it).<\/p>\n

“Willow’s Song” was also the title of a song\u00a0Shakespeare used in\u00a0Othello<\/em>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Willow’s Song<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Heigh ho! Who is there?
\nNo one but me, my dear.
\nPlease come say, how do?
\nThe things I’ll give to you.
\nBy stroke as gentle as a feather
\nI’ll catch a rainbow from the sky
\nand tie the ends together.<\/p>\n

Heigh ho! I am here.
\nAm I not young and fair?
\nPlease come say, how do?
\nThe things I’ll show to you.
\nWould you have a wond’rous sight?
\nThe midday sun at midnight.<\/p>\n

Fair maid, white and red,
\ncomb you smooth and stroke your head.
\nHow a maid can milk a bull!
\nAnd every stroke a bucketful.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This entry is part 10 of 10 in the series Song Craft<\/a><\/div><\/div><\/div>

“Heigh ho! Who is there?
\nNo one but me, my dear.
\nPlease come say, how do?
\nThe things I’ll give to you. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":1728,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[62,83,96],"tags":[161,121,234],"series":[224],"class_list":["post-1726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cinema","category-exotica","category-taboo","tag-boo-madly","tag-eyeplug","tag-paul-giovanni","series-songcraft"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1726"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eyeplug.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=1726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}