We love heading Down on the Farm - there are so many animals to meet!

We love to sing Old Macdonald Had a Farm, but did you know that this song has origins going back a long way....

In "Tommy's Tunes" published in 1917 appears the song "Ohio" with these lyrics... Do they look familiar?!

Old Macdougal has a farm in Ohio-I-o

And on that farm he had some dogs in Ohio-I-o

With a bow-wow here, and a bow-wow there,

Here a bow, there a wow, everywhere a bow-wow.

(It then lists hens (cluck cluck), ducks (quack quack), cows (moo moo), pigs (oink oink), cats (meow meow) and a donkey (hee haw).

 

However, it seems the lyrics can be traced back even further, in an Opera called "The Kingdom of the Birds" published in 1719:

In the Fields in Frost and Snows,

Watching late and early;

There I keep my Father's Cows,

There I Milk 'em Yearly:

Booing here, Booing there,

Here a Boo, there a Boo, every where a Boo,

We defy all Care and Strife,

In a Charming Country-Life.

Amazing! Who knew that when we're singing Old Macdonald we are actually singing opera!