1. There's a star in the East on Christmas morn,
Rise up, shepherd, an' foller,
It'll lead to the place where the Savior's born,
Rise up, shepherd, an' foller.

REFRAIN
Leave your sheep and leave your lambs,
Rise upl shepherd, an' foller;
Leave your ewes an' leave your rams,
Rise up, shepherd, an' foller.
Foller, foller,
Rise up, shepherd, an' foller;
Foller the star of Bethlehem,
Rise up, shepherd, an' foller.

2. if you take good heed to the angel's words,
Rise up, shepherd, an' foller,
You'll forget your flocks, you'll forget your herds,
Rise up, shepherd, an' foller.

REFRAIN

abc | midi | pdf

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Source: The Second Penguin Book of Christmas Carols, ed. Elizabeth Poston

Notes:
From The Second Penguin Book of Christmas Carols, p. 23.

Rise up, Shepherd, an' Foller. Christmas Plantation Song, printed in Religious Folk Songs of the Negro as sung on the Plantations, edited by Thomas P. Fenner, Virginia, 1909. One of the many Negro spirituals collected during the Civil War, mainly from Negroes of the islands off the coasts of Georgia and South Carolina and published in 1867 as Slave Songs of the United States, compiled by William Francis Allen, Charles Pickard Ware, and Lucy McKim Garrison in 1867 (reprint: Oak Publications, New York, 1965). Related tunes are found in English and Welsh folk song; a similar tune was sung in the Isle of Man and in Wales as a carol (Journal of Welsh Folksong ii, 182 ff.); and a form of the melody appears in an early American hymn 'He was found worthy' (Songs of Grace, Lorenz and Baltzell).

Roud: 15289 (Search Roud index at VWML)
Laws:
Child:

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Related Songs:  Rise up Shepherd (thematic)