The "A Biscuit" Refrain In "Down Down Baby" & Certain Other Playground Rhymes

Edited by Azizi Powell

Here's an excerpt of a cocojams2 blog post http://cocojams2.blogspot.com/2014/11/a-biscuit-phrase-in-playground-rhymes.html on the use of the words "a biscuit" as a refrain in some playground rhymes:

"A number of playground rhymes include the refrain "a biscuit" or a folk processed form of those words. As a result of my curiousity about the source of that "a biscuit" phrase in those playground rhymes, I've come up with the theory that the "a biscuit" refrain is a folk processed form of the words "a trisket". The words "a trisket" words were popularized by the Jazz song "A Trisket A Tasket". That said, from the rhyme examples that I've found, it appears that the "a biscuit" refrain wasn't included in "Down Down Baby" and other rhymes until the 1970s. And rhyme examples that mention "Ronald McDonald" couldn't have been created before 1963 when that McDonald's mascot was first created. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_McDonald.

I'd love to know if anyone remembers chanting a rhyme with "a biscuit" used as a refrain prior to the 1970s.

My guess is that when they are used as a refrain, the words "a biscuit" may not have originally had anything to do with the food named "biscuit". That said, in some "a biscuit" refrain rhymes those words appear to refer an actual "biscuit"- for instance in some examples of those rhymes the lines go: "I have a boyfriend/a biscuit/He is as sweet as/a biscuit".
-end of quote-
Notice that the example given below omits the word "as":

"I've got a boyfriend, a biscuit/ He's so-oo sweet, a biscuit".
-snip-
That cocojams2 post contains fifteeen examples of "a biscuit" refrain rhymes. Here are two examples that I didn't include in that post:

"I can only remember the down down baby one, our version went like this

Ronald McDonald, ooh ahh a biscuit
Ronald McDonlad, ooh ahh a biscuit
A-shishi-wa-wa, a biscuit
I've got a boyfriend, a biscuit
He's so-oo sweet, a biscuit

Sweeter than an ice-cream, cherry on top
Sweeter than an ice-cream, cherry on top

Down down baby, down down the rollercoaster
Sweet sweet baby, I'll never let you go

Shimmy shimmy cocopop, shimmy shimmy wow!
Shimmy shimmy cocopop, shimmy shimmy pow!

I can't believe that I remember all that!!"
-mal'occhio http://www.essentialkids.com.au/forums/index.php?/topic/845958-hand-clapping-games/ "Hand clapping games", Posted 18 November 2010

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Domino, Domino, Domino biscuit
Ooh chi chi wa wa a biscuit
Kisha’s gotta lover a biscuit
He’s so sweet a biscuit
Like a cherry tree a biscut
Ice cream soda ginger ale pop
Hop on the initial of your sweetheart

Or…

Kisha’s got a lover a biscuit
He’s so sour a biscuit
Needs to take a shower a biscuit
- Kisha, http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/showthread.php?t=31403&page=6 "Old School Chants, 04-02-2003
-snip-
Posters to this blog thread were members of historically Black Greek letter sororities. I think that this example was performed as a hand clap rhyme.

Although no dates are given for most of their comments, from some other things that were mentioned, such as just completing university, my guess is that these "old school chants" are from the early 1980s to the mid 1980s. For instance, although one blogger gave a sub-heading for her post of "the 70s", three bloggers shared examples of a Coca Cola ad jingle ("Have A Coke And A Smile" that aired in 1981. Also, one blogger mentioned her age in 2003 as 23 years old, another blogger indicated that she remembered the rhyme she shared "from the 1985-ish Houston [Texas], and another rhyme included the slang word "fly" which gained popularity because of the 1995 Boogie Boy's record "Fly Girl".

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I've not been able to find any videos of any "a biscuit" (refrain) rhymes. However, for your enjoyment, here's a now classic Sesame Street clip of a group of African American girls performing a version of "Down Down Baby" (Shimmy Shimmy Co Co Pa" (ko ko bop, coco puffs?)

Sesame Street: Handclapping Chants



Sesame Street, Uploaded on Mar 27, 2009
-snip-
A commenter on this video's discussion thread wrote that this clip was filmed in 1986.

By the way, what's the earliest documented date for any "Down Down Baby" ("Shimmy Shimmy Co Co Pa") playground rhyme? "Shimmy Shimmy Ko-Ko-Bop" by Little Anthony and the Imperials was recorded in 1960. But that rhyme doesn't have anything to do with being "down by the roller coaster" or having a boyfriend (or a girlfriend) who was sweet "like a cherry treat" or "as a biscuit"). Were there "Shimmy Shimmy Coco Pa" (or similarly spelled) rhymes before 1960?

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Also, for your viewing pleasure, here's a 1942 video of Ella Fitzgerald singing "A Tisket A Tasket" in Abbott & Costello's movie Ride 'Em Cowboy (1942):

Ella Fitzgerald - A Tisket A Tasket (video)



Andrew Bloggs, Published on Oct 23, 2014

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RELATED LINK
Click http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2013/09/a-tisket-tasket-information-lyrics-and.html. "A Tisket A Tasket" (information, lyrics, and video). That post includes quotes from online sources that indicate that the words "tisket" and "tasket" were made up to rhyme with the word "basket" and those words weren't given any meaning.

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EDITOR'S COMMENT
Some of the exanples in that cocojams2 blog post were featured on my cocojams.com cultural website that was online since December 2001. That website vanished late October 2014 [!?!) and I am partially recreating its playground rhymes pages from back-up files and from recent internet "rhyme harvesting". That's the story behind this blog name cocojams2.

Thanks for visiting pancocojams.

Visitor comments are welcome.