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Doleful Dance of Death
Shaking of the Sheets / Doleful Dance of Death
[ Roud V11404 , V54664 ; Bodleian Roud V11404 ; DT SHAKSHET , SHAKSHT2 ; Mudcat 82833 ; trad.]
William Chappell: Popular Music of the Olden Time
William Chappell printed The Doleful Dance and Song of Death, “from a black-letter copy, in the Ashmolean Museum”, in his 1855–56 book Popular Music of the Olden Time.
Steeleye Span recorded Shaking of the Sheets, coupled with the Adderbury Morris tune The Black Joke, in 1989 for their Dover album Tempted and Tried. The album’s sleeve notes commented laconically:
Six feet of earth makes us all of one size.
A live recording from the Beck Theatre on 16 September 1989 was released on their Dover video A 20th Anniversary Celebration. A 1994 live recording was released on their Park album Steeleye Span in Concert.
Carnival of Souls sang Shaking of the Sheets on their 2000 album Carnival Oddities.
John Spiers and Jon Boden recorded the similar themed Doleful Dance of Death in 2005 for their CD Songs and Jon Boden sang it as the 26 August 2010 entry of his project A Folk Song a Day. They noted on their CD:
Jon heard this song from the inimitable Tim Healey of the excellent Oxford Waits, who came across it in the Oxford University Broadside Collection. Jon has doctored the lyrics fairly drastically but it can be heard in all its 17th century glory on Switter Swatter (Beautiful Jo BEJOCD-44).
This video shows Jon Boden & The Remnant Kings at Cecil Sharp House, London, on 23 June 2011 as part of Jon Boden’s A Folk Song a Day Midsummer Concert presented by the EFDSS:
Frankie Archer sang The Dance of Death, probably adapted from William Chappell’s Popular Music of the Olden Time, on an April 2026 download single and on her 2026 album The Dance of Death. She noted:
The Dance of Death is a romp. End of the world YOLO boogie like if death is coming for us anyway then let’s go out with a bang. The idea of Death coming to claim people with a dance was popular in medieval times when the plague made people face their own mortality. Nobody is immune from death, so let’s live life while we can.
Lyrics
The Doleful Dance and Song of Death in Popular Music of the Olden Time
Can you dance The Shaking of the Sheets,
A dance that ev’ry one must do;
Can you trim it up with dainty sweets,
And ev’ry thing that ’longs there-to?
Make ready, then, your winding sheet,
And see how ye can bestir your feet,
For Death is the man that all must meet. (×2)
Bring away the beggar and the king,
And every man in his degree;
Bring away the old and youngest thing,
Come all to death, and follow me;
The courtier with his lofty looks,
Tho lawyer with his learned books,
The banker with his baiting hooks. (×2)
Merchants, have you made your mart in France,
In Italy, and all about,
Know you not that you and I must dance,
Both our heels wrapt in a clout;
What paean you to make your houses gay,
And I must take the tenant away,
And dig for your sake the clods of clay? (×2)
Think you on the solemn ’sizes past,
How suddenly in Oxfordshire
I came, and made the judges all aghast,
And justices that did appear,
And took both Bell and Barham away,
And many a worthy man that day,
And all their bodies brought to clay. (×2)
Think you that I dare not come to schools,
Where all the cunning clerks be most;
Take I not away both wise and fools,
And am I not in every coast?
Assure yourselves no creature can
Make Death afraid of any man,
Or know my coming where or whan. (×2)
Where be they that make their leases strong,
And join about them land to land,
Do you make account to live so long,
To have the world come to your hand?
No, foolish nowle, for all thy pence,
Full soon thy soul must needs go hence;
Then who shall toyl for thy defence? (×2)
And you that lean on your ladies’ laps,
And lay your heads upon their knee,
“May think that you’ll escape, perhaps,
And need not come to dance with me.”
But no! fair lords and ladies all,
I will make you come when I do call,
And find you a pipe to dance withall. (×2)
And you that are busy-headed fools,
To brabble for a pelting straw,
Know you not that I have ready tools
To cut you from your crafty law?
And you that falsely buy and sell,
And think you make your markets well,
Must dance with Death wheresoe’er you dwell. (×2)
Pride must have a pretty sheet, I see,
For properly she loves to dance;
Come away my wanton wench to me,
As gallantly as your eye doth glance;
And all good fellows that flash and swash
In reds and yellows of revell dash,
I warrant you need not be so rash. (×2)
For I can quickly cool you all,
How hot or stout soever you be,
Both high and low, both great and small,
I nought do fear your high degree;
The ladies fair, the beldames old,
The champion stout, the souldier bold,
Must all with me to earthly mould. (×2)
Therefore take time while it is lent,
Prepare with me yourselves to dance
Forget me not, your lives lament,
I come oft-times by sudden chance.
Be ready, therefore,—watch and pray,
That when my minstrel pipe doth play,
You may to heaven dance the way. (×2)
Steeleye Span sing Shaking of the Sheets
Chorus:
Dance, dance The Shaking of the Sheets,
Dance, dance when you hear the piper playing,
Everyone must dance
The Shaking of the Sheets with me.
Bring away the beggar, bring away the king,
And every man in his degree.
Bring away the oldest and the youngest thing,
Come to death and follow me.
Bring away the merchant who made his money in France,
And the crafty banker too,
When you hear the piper, you and I must dance
The dance that everyone must do.
Chorus
I’ll find you in the courtrooms, I’ll find you in the schools,
When you hear the piper play.
I’ll take away the wise men, I’ll take away the fools
And bring their bodies all to clay.
All the politicians of high and low degree,
Lords and ladies, great and small.
Don’t think that you’ll escape and need not dance with me,
I’ll make you come when I do call.
2× Chorus
It may be in the day, it may be in the night,
Prepare yourselves to dance and pray.
That when the piper plays The Shaking of the Sheets
You may to Heaven dance the way.
2× Chorus
Spiers & Boden sing Doleful Dance of Death
Can you dance The Shaking of the Sheets,
The dance that everyone must do?
Hear the drummer strike a noble beat,
The harp ring sweet and true.
Gather rosebuds while you may,
For when you hear the piper play,
You may to heaven dance away,
You may to heaven dance away.
You may fill your pockets up with gold
And dress all in rich array.
Wise or foolish, meek or bold,
There’s only a penny left to pay.
The poorest man is crowned complete
The day he finds his winding sheet,
For death is the man that all must meet,
Yes, death is the man that all must meet.
You may build your mansions high
With roaring fires to keep you warm.
Shut the shutters, bolt the gates,
Draw curtains tightly against the storm.
The strongest tower its hearth betrays
When my tune the minstrel plays,
A doleful dance to end your days,
A doleful dance to end your days.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Patrick Montague for lyrics corrections.