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The Rain It Rains

[words William Shakespeare, music Jon Boden]

John Spiers and Jon Boden took William Shakespeare’s verses and sang them as The Rain It Rains in 2008 on their Navigator CD Vagabond. They noted:

Sung by Feste, the itinerant Jester in Twelfth Night, after the other characters have gone inside to enjoy their happy ending leaving Feste outside the gate to finish the play off by himself.

This video shows them at Biddulph Town Hall in summer 2007:

Jon Boden also sang The Rain It Rains as the 20 July 2010 entry of his project A Folk Song a Day.

Lyrics

Jon Boden sings The Rain it Rains

When that I was a little wee boy
    Sing hey ho the wind and rain
Life was a song and love a toy
    The rain it rains most every day
But when that I came to man’s estate
    Sing hey ho the wind and rain
Against thieves and knaves men shut their gates
    The rain it rains most every day

Chorus (repeated after each verse):
Hey ho the wind and rain
The rain it rains most every day

Ten pretty girls all in one row
Will toss their petticoats to and fro
Ten brave boys on the courtyard wall
The bigger they come the harder they fall

The wind blows high and the wind blows low
And turns a friend into a foe
A long time ago the world was begun
And since that day this song’s been sung