AH! VOUS DIRAI-JE, MAMAN
Created on 05/11/2002Latest update on 15/04/2023
Artist: André Campra & Jean-Philippe Rameau
Author: André Campra/Jean-Philippe Rameau
Year: 1740
Pastoral Rococo tune published in 1740. Mozart used it, Beethoven as well. Sung in every French school since 1877. Children song known in Dutch as Altijd Is Kortjakje Ziek (since the 1750s) and in German as Morgen kommt der Weihnachtsmann. Sometimes Kortjakje is considered to be the older version (Pieter de Vos collection in Amsterdam around 1700). In English the melody was used in A B C D E F G (The Schoolmaster) (1834), Bah, Bah, A Black Sheep (1879) and Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star (1806) with lyrics by Jane Taylor.
Covers:
- 1785:
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart [as Variations in C (K 265)]
- 1886:
Camille Saint-Saëns [melody used in Fossiles from Carnaval des animaux]
- 1889:
Emile Berliner [as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star; spoken version on 5 inch Berliner Grammophon]
- 1911:
Simon Abramsz [as Sinterklaas Vertrekt; his own lyrics]
- 1933:
Albert de Booy [as Altijd Is Kortjakje Ziek, a title first collected in 1700 by Pieter de Vos, when it followed a different tune (Op Een Tijd Niet Lang Geleen/Je suis Madelon friquet)]
- 1953:
Mel Blanc [as Yah, Das Ist Ein Christmas Tree]
- 1958:
Elegants [n°1 US as Little Star]
- 1961:
Dion [idem]
- 1964:
Flatt & Scruggs [as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star]
- 1966:
Aafje Heynis [as Altijd Is Kortjakje Ziek]
- 1967:
Teddy & Henk Scholten [as Sinterklaas Vertrekt]
- 1970:
Vashti Bunyan [as Lily Pond]
- 1974:
10 cc [at the end of Old Wild Men]
- 1974:
Steeleye Span [as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star]
- 1989:
Olivia Newton-John [idem]
- 2018:
Johnny Dowd [idem on lp Twinkle Twinkle]
- 2018:
Emile Berliner, inventor of gramophone and phonographic disc, sang it on his own prototypes. His variation was saved and released on the cd Emile Berliner's Gramophone - The Earliest Discs 1888-1901 (Symposium; 1988). See also: Au clair de la lune and Schnitzelbank.
