My Hat, It Has Three Corners

"My Hat, It Has Three Corners" is a folk song that goes back to a Neapolitan melody. Today it is popular in Britain, Germany, Sweden and Portugal as a children's action song.

Origin

The song is sung to the melody of "O mamma, mamma cara", which goes back to a Neapolitan canzonetta[1] and was also used in cantastoria. It is a "remarkable example of a 'wandering melody' that makes its way through the most varied of musical works."[2] Reinhard Keiser is said to have quoted the melody in his singspiel, Der Carneval von Venedig (1707), which was so successful that street lads kept inventing new texts for it.[3] However the score of this singspiel has been lost,[4] so that this information cannot be verified. Rodolphe Kreutzer used the melody in 1816 in the music for the ballet Le Carnaval de Venise choreographed by Louis Milon.[5] Niccolò Paganini played variations of this melody in his concerts under the title of "Carnival of Venice", Op. 10 (1829).[6][7][8] It was thanks to Paganini that the subject enjoyed greater popularity.[9] Under the title "Souvenirs de Paganini" Frédéric Chopin composed his Rondo No. 1 also as a variation on this melody. Other variations on the theme were created inter alia by Johann Strauss the Elder in versions for piano and orchestra respectively,[10][11] Francisco Tárrega for guitar, Jean-Baptiste Arban for cornet and trumpet and Wilhelm Posse for harp.[12] Variations for flute and piano were composed by Giulio Briccialdi (Carnevale di Venezia, Op. 78, c. 1855)[13] and Paul Génin (Carnaval de Venise, Op. 14, 1872).[14] The song was also popularised under the title "La bruna gondoletta" as a barcarole.[15] Using this text Julius Benedict and others published concert variations for voice and accompaniments.[16]

The text My hat, it has three corners describes the formerly commonly worn tricorne. Oral records in the German Folk song Archive go back to the years before 1870.[17] The text is first documented in print in the Saarland in 1886,[18] there, however, still based on the melody of the folk song "Wer lieben will, muss leiden".[19][20] The text has also come down to us from West Prussia.[21] The opening words of the text also appear in a parody rhyme from the Palatinate region, which was recorded around 1920, but must go back to the time of Napoleon:

Mein Hut, der hat drei Ecke,
Drei Ecke hat mein Hut,
Napoleon soll verrecke,
Mit seiner blech'ne Schnut.[22]

Text

In German, a language in which the text was popularised, the words are:

Mein Hut, der hat drei Ecken,
drei Ecken hat mein Hut.
Und hätt er nicht drei Ecken,
so wär’s auch nicht mein Hut.

A Bavarian drinking song parodies the theme:

Mein Hut, der hält drei Liter,
Und drei Liter hält mein Hut,
Un hält er nicht drei Liter,
so wär's auch nicht mein Hut.

The English version is as follows:

My hat, it has three corners,
Three corners has my hat.
And had it not three corners,
It would not be my hat.

The Swedish version is as follows:

Min hatt, den har tre kanter,
tre kanter har min hatt.
och har den ej tre kanter,
så är det ej min hatt!

The Portuguese version is as follows:

O meu chapéu tem três bicos,
Tem três bicos o meu chapéu.
Se não tivesse três bicos,
O chapéu não era meu.

Action song

The song can be performed as an action song, in which, as in a missing word song, another word is not sung with each stanza and only mimed using actions. If someone accidentally sings the missing word, he or she usually has to drop out or pay a penalty or a forfeit.

In this version, the words of the song may accompanied by the following gestures:

  • my – point at yourself with your index finger
  • hat – touch your head or the imaginary brim of your hat
  • three – stretch out three fingers
  • corners – touch your elbow with your hand
  • not – shake your head

References
  1. ISBN 9783795908508, pp. 564–565}}
  2. Johann Lewalter: Deutsches Kinderlied und Kinderspiel. In Kassel aus Kindermund in Wort und Weise gesammelt. Abhandlung und Anmerkungen von Georg Schläger. Vietor, Kassel 1911, pp. 308–309.
  3. Bruno Aulich: Mondscheinsonate, Katzenfuge und andere merkwürdige Titel und Geschichten über berühmte Musikwerke aus drei Jahrhunderten. Heimeran, Munich, 1966, ISBN 3-7765-0002-6, p. 175.
  4. Birgit Kiupel, Cornelia Geissler: Hamburger Dienstmädchen – Trintje, Gesche und die 'verkehrte Welt. Musik und Gender im Internet, Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg, retrieved 14 February 2015
  5. Pasquale Scialò, Francesca Seller: Passatempi musicali: Guillaume Cottrau e la canzone napoletana di primo '800. Guida Editori, 2013, ISBN 978-88-6666-201-3, p. 135 (, p. 135, at Google Books).
  6. Il carnevale di Venezia, Op. 10 (Paganini: Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
  7. Vittore Castiglioni: Paganini. Biografia. La Pilotta, 1982, OCLC 654713870, S. 210 (, p. 210, at Google Books).
  8. International Musicological Society. Congress, Band 3. Bärenreiter, Kassel 1990, S. 1842 (, p. 1842, at Google Books).
  9. Matanya Ophee: "Seltenes & Curioses für Guitarre. Variationen über 'Carnaval de Venice' von Nikolai Petrovich Makaroff." In: Gitarre & Laute 4, 1982, Heft 5, pp. 285–293; here: p. 286.
  10. Johann Strauss Sr.: "Erinnerung an Ernst", Op. 126: Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
  11. Erinnerung an Ernst oder Der Carneval in Venedig, op. 126, naxos.com, accessed 24 Februar 2020
  12. see "Carnival of Venice (song)"
  13. Carnevale di Venezia, Op. 78 (Briccialdi): Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
  14. Carnaval de Venise, Op. 14 (Génin): Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
  15. G. B. Apparuti, A. Batacchi: The Singer's Assistant. Vol. 10. William Rushton, Kalkutta 1845, p. 156 (digitalised, p. 156, at Google Books).
  16. Concert variations on Carnival of Venice (Benedict): Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
  17. c.f. Otto Holzapfel: Liedverzeichnis: Die ältere deutschsprachige populäre Liedüberlieferung (Online-Fassung on the home page of the Folk Music Archive of the Province of Upper Bavaria; in pdf format; current updates) with further information.
  18. Carl Köhler, John Meier: Volkslieder von Mosel und Saar. volume 1. Niemeyer, Halle 1896, pp. 359 f., note p. 457 (My Hat, It Has Three Corners is available for free download at the Internet Archive)
  19. Johann Lewalter: Deutsche Volkslieder: in Niederhessen aus dem Munde des Volkes gesammelt. Issue 5. G. Fritzsche, Hamburg 1890–1894, p. 21 (, p. 21, at Google Books)
  20. Ludwig Erk, Franz Magnus Böhme (ed.): Deutscher Liederhort. Vol. 2. Breitkopf und Härtel, Leipzig 1893, pp. 432–434 (Digitalisat).
  21. Alexander Treichel: Volkslieder und Volksreime aus Westpreussen. Theodor Bertling, Danzig 1895, p. 124 (, p. 124, at Google Books).
  22. Walther Klein: Der Napoleonkult in der Pfalz (= Münchener Historische Abhandlungen. Number 5). C. H. Beck, München 1934, also Diss. University Munich 1932, p. 89 (, p. 89, at Google Books). The text comes from a questionnaire on the theme "How does the memory of Napoleon Bonaparte survive in your municipality?", which the Pfälzer Wörterbuchkanzlei of Kaiserslautern had produced. The questionnaire was issued around 1920, c.f. Roger Dufraisse: Die Deutschen und Napoleon im 20. Jahrhundert (= Schriften des Historischen Kollegs: Vorträge 21). Stiftung Historisches Kolleg, Munich, 1991, p. 8 (digitalised; pdf; 1.5 MB).
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