Maggie May (traditional song)
| "Maggie Mae" | |
|---|---|
| Song by the Beatles | |
| from the album Let It Be | |
| Released | 8 May 1970 |
| Recorded | 24 January 1969 Apple Studios |
| Genre | Skiffle |
| Length | 0:40 |
| Label | Apple, EMI |
| Songwriter(s) | trad. arr. Lennon–McCartney–Harrison–Starkey |
| Producer(s) | Phil Spector |
"Maggie May" (or "Maggie Mae") (Roud 1757) is a traditional Liverpool folk song about a prostitute who robbed a "homeward bounder": a sailor coming home from a round trip.
John Manifold, in his Penguin Australian Song Book, described it as "A foc'sle song of Liverpool origin apparently, but immensely popular among seamen all over the world". It became widely circulated in a skiffle version from the late 1950s.
In 1964, the composer and lyricist Lionel Bart (the creator of the musical Oliver!), used the song and its backstory as the basis of a musical set around the Liverpool Docks. The show, also called Maggie May, ran for two years in London. In 1970 a truncated version of the song performed by the Beatles was included on their album Let It Be.
As with most folk songs, the lyrics exist in many variant forms. The song specifies several real streets in Liverpool, notably Lime Street in the centre of the city.
In the most established version, it is sung in the first person by a sailor who has come home to Liverpool from Sierra Leone. He is paid off for the trip. With his wages in his pocket, he sees Maggie "cruising up and down old Canning Place". She had "a figure so divine" (either "like a frigate of the line" or with "a voice so refined"). He picks her up and she takes him home to her lodgings. When he awakes the following morning, she has taken all his money and even his clothes, insisting that they are in "Kelly's locker", a pawn shop. When he fails to find his clothes in the pawn shop, he contacts the police. She is found guilty of theft and sentenced to transportation to Botany Bay.
While the most famous version of the chorus contains the line, "she'll never walk down Lime Street any more", Stan Hugill in his Shanties from the Seven Seas writes that in different versions several streets are named, referring to different historical red light areas of Liverpool, including Paradise Street, Peter Street and Park Lane.
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