If All The World Were Paper
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English country dance
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Transcription: by Darryl D. Bush
"If All The World Were Paper" is an English country dance tune in 6/8 or 6/4 time and<br> D Major or C Major (Playford). It was first<br> published by John Playford as a round dance for eight persons in his English Dancing Master (1651)<br> and in subsequent editions of the long-running Dancing Master series through the tenth edition of<br> 1698. The last volume was published by John's son, Henry. "If all the World were Paper" is a<br> one-strain tune in the Playford cannon.<br> The original tune goes to an old and well-known nursery rhyme that goes: <br> <br> If all the world were paper,<br> And all the sea were ink?<br> And all the trees were bread and cheese,<br> What should we do for drink?<br> <br> If all the world were sand O,<br> Oh then what should we lack O,<br> if as they say there were no clay<br> How should we take Tobacco? <br> etc. <br> <br> “If All the World were Paper” first came to prominence during the reign of Charles I and was<br> published in a collection called Witt's Recreation that contained a pot-pourri of poems, puzzles,<br> witty sayings and other such material.<br> It was printed by Christian's A Playford Assembly (2015), Karpeles & Schofield's A Selection of<br> 100 English Folk Dance Airs (1951), Kidson's Old English Country Dances (1890), Raven's English<br> Country Dance Tunes (1984), Sharp's Country Dance Tunes (1909) and Barlow's Complete Country Dance<br> Tunes from Playford's Dancing Master (1985).<br>
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