Three Blind Mice

Lyrics

The modern words are:

"Complete version"

Published by Frederick Warne & Co., an illustrated children's book by John W. Ivimey entitled The Complete Version of Ye Three Blind Mice, fleshes the mice out into mischievous characters who seek adventure, eventually being taken in by a farmer whose wife chases them from the house and into a bramble bush, which blinds them.

Soon after, their tails are removed by "the butcher's wife" when the complete version incorporates the original verse — although the earliest version from 1609 does not mention tails being cut off. The story ends with them using a tonic to grow new tails and recover their eyesight, learning a trade (making wood chips, according to the accompanying illustration), buying a house and living happily ever after. Published perhaps in 1900, the book is now in the public domain.

Origins and meaning

A version of this rhyme, together with music, was published in Deuteromelia or The Seconde part of Musicks melodie (1609). The editor of the book, and possible author of the rhyme, was Thomas Ravenscroft, who in 1609 was still a teenager. The original lyrics are:

Attempts to read historical significance into the words have led to the speculation that this musical round was written earlier and refers to Queen Mary I of England blinding and executing three Protestant bishops, but problematically the Oxford Martyrs, Ridley, Latimer and Cranmer, were burned at the stake, not blinded; although if the rhyme was made by crypto-Catholics, the mice's "blindness" could refer to their Protestantism. However, as can be seen above, the earliest lyrics don't talk about harming the three blind mice, and the first known date of publication is 1609, well after Queen Mary died.

The rhyme only entered children's literature in 1842 when it was published in a collection by James Orchard Halliwell.

Variations

Amateur music composer Thomas Oliphant (1799–1873) noted in 1843 that:

This absurd old round is frequently brought to mind in the present day, from the circumstance of there being an instrumental Quartet by Weiss, through which runs a musical phrase accidentally the same as the notes applied to the word Three Blind Mice. They form a third descending, C, B, A.

Robert Schumann's Kreisleriana #7, which is arguably about a cat (Murr), appears to be based upon "Three Blind Mice", but in a predominantly minor key. "Three Blind Mice" is to be found in the fugue which is the centerpiece of #7.

Joseph Holbrooke (1878–1958) composed his Symphonic Variations, opus 37, based on Three Blind Mice. Also, Joseph Haydn used its theme in the Finale (4th Mvt) of his Symphony 83 (La Poule) (1785–86); one of the 6 Paris Symphonies, and the music also appears in the final movement of English composer Eric Coates' suite The Three Men. "Three Blind Mice" was also used as a theme song for The Three Stooges and a Curtis Fuller arrangement of the rhyme is featured on the Art Blakey live album of the same name. The song is also the basis for Leroy Anderson's orchestral "Fiddle Faddle".

The British composer Havergal Brian (1876-1972) used the tune as the basis of his orchestral work "Fantastic Variations on an Old Rhyme" (1907-08). The work was originally intended as the first movement of a satirical "Fantastic Symphony" (Symphony No.1), a programmatic work, based on the nursery rhyme. The second movement was intended as a scherzo for pizzicato strings, depicting the souls of the departed mice going to heaven and the third movement was a Lament for the dead mice. Both these movements are lost. "Festal Dance" (1908) formed the finale, depicting the wild dance of triumph of the farmer's wife in which passing references to the tune can be heard. Having been performed separately, the first and last movements became independent works around 1914.

The theme of the second movement of Sergei Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 4 (1926, revised 1928 and 1941) was criticized as resembling Three Blind Mice.

Colorado rock band Sawatch recorded a version of Three Blind Mice on their new cd "Another Gin.'

In popular culture

The soundtrack for the 1962 James Bond film Dr. No features "Kingston Calypso", a calypso version of "Three Blind Mice" with new lyrics, in reference to three villainous characters in the film.

In several sports (basketball and hockey, for example, which have three referees), "Three Blind Mice" is used as a derogatory phrase for poor referees. Bands also play the song to mock referees in similar cases. Such references, however, are frowned upon officially by both sports as unsportsmanlike. Before Major League Baseball required four umpires at every game, there were regularly three. The Brooklyn Dodgers had a fan band called the "Sym-Phoney Band", led by Shorty Laurice, which started playing "Three Blind Mice" when the umpires came out onto the field until the league office ordered the team to stop, around the same time a fourth umpire was added. In 1985, Wilbur Snapp, the organist for the Clearwater Phillies, was thrown out of the game for playing "Three Blind Mice" after what he considered a bad call. In 1992, Jason Patrick, keyboardist for the Amarillo Texans independent baseball team, was also ejected for playing the song after a disputed call. On August 1, 2012, during a Daytona Cubs – Fort Myers Miracle minor-league baseball game, umpire Mario Seneca tossed the public address announcer Derek Dye for playing the song "Three Blind Mice" after a disputed call at first base.

Canadian rock trio Rush often played "Three Blind Mice" as an intro to their own songs in concert, notably during their "Hold Your Fire" tour of 1987–1988. An elaborate parody of the rhyme, arranged as if it were a piece of jazz-music, occurs in an act by Ronnie Corbett and Ronnie Barker, poking fun at Johnny Dankworth and Cleo Laine.

The Three Stooges used a jazz interpretation of Three Blind Mice as the theme song for most of their comedic short films after 1938.