Listen
Arrangement: Ian J. Watts / Mike Wilbury · Singalongasong Band / ClassicRocks
Lyrics
Oh, where have you been Billy Boy, Billy Boy?
Oh, where have you been charming Billy?
I have been to seek a wife, She's the joy of my life,
She's a young thing and cannot leave her mother.
Did she ask you to come in Billy Boy, Billy Boy?
Did she ask you to come in charming Billy?
Yes, she asked me to come in, there's a dimple on her chin,
She's a young thing and cannot leave her mother.
Can she make a cherry pie Billy Boy, Billy Boy?
Can she make a cherry pie charming Billy?
She can make a cherry pie quick as a cat can wink an eye,
She's a young thing and cannot leave her mother.
How old is she Billy Boy, Billy Boy?
How old is she charming Billy?
Three times six and four times seven, twenty-eight and eleven,
She's a young thing and cannot leave her mother.
Traditional lyrics — public domain. Arrangement © Singalongasong Band / ClassicRocks.
History & Background
History & Origin
Billy Boy is a traditional English folk song built on one of the oldest structural devices in popular music: the call-and-response pattern. A persistent questioner asks about the qualities and particulars of a young woman, and the infatuated Billy supplies enthusiastic answers, each ending with the telling refrain that she is "a young thing and cannot leave her mother."
The song appears to have its roots in eighteenth-century English folk tradition, though precise dating is difficult. Its structure — rapid-fire questions and increasingly comic answers — made it well suited to social singing, where a leader could improvise additional verses. The arithmetic of the penultimate verse, in which the woman's age is given in a deliberately confusing sum, is a typical piece of folk humour designed to delay and amuse.
The final punchline — "Is she alright then? Aye, she'll do!" — is characteristic of the drier wit found in Northern English and Scottish folk song, deflating Billy's enthusiasm with a shrug of pragmatic approval.
Versions of the song have been collected across England, Scotland, and America, where it was popular in minstrel and parlour song traditions throughout the nineteenth century. The American version sometimes begins "Oh where have you been, Billy Boy, Billy Boy?" with a slightly different tune, demonstrating how folk songs evolve across the Atlantic.
Our recording gives the song an energetic, playful treatment that captures the original spirit of community singing.
