"The Cuckoo's Nest" is an English reel and morris dance tune in 4/4 time and G Major (Longborough, Ilmington versions), G Minor/Dorian (Bacon & Raven-Bledington version) or E Minor (Mallinson-Bledington). The parts are played AABA (Bacon-Longborough), AAB, x4, AA (Ilmington, Longborough), AABBCC (Raven-Bledington), AABB,AABB,AACC,AACC,AA (Bacon & Mallinson-Bledington). The version given here is the Bledington version. It is sometimes known as "The Old Cuckoo's Nest" to differentiate it from what is perceived as newer airs with that title. This is not the same tune as the Irish song or the American tune. "The Cuckoo's Nest" has had great currency as a morris dance tune from many villages of England's Cotswold region; it is melodically similar in the areas of Ilmington, Longborough and Bledington although it has a wide variation in other locales. John Kirkpatrick (1976) notes that the Longborough dancers were particularly proud of their jumps which occur after every bar of stepping and that the music should reflect and allow for this practice. In folksong, the 'cuckoo's nest' is sometimes a euphemism for female genetilia (Simpson & Roud, Oxford Dictionary of English Folklore, 2000). It was printed in Bacon's A Handbook of Morris Dances (1974), Mallinson's Mally's Cotswold Morris Book, vol. 1 (1988), Mallinson's Mally's Cotswold Morris Book, vol. 2 (1988 and Raven's English Country Dance Tunes (1984)(two versions). It was recorded by Hutchings et al on Morris On (1983/1972) and John Kirkpatrick on Plain Capers (1976/1992).