Can anyone answer this ‘cause I don’t have a clue… I was taking my son to preschool and they were singin’ “Old Mc Donalds farm”… When they get to the E-I,E-I-O part…WTF is E-I,E-I O ???
I think it’s just silly sounding but easy to remember filler.
See also: yo-de-lay-hee-hoo, hey nonny nonny, oh-dee-oten-doten-day oh-dee-oten-day-o.
It’s the only way I can remember the three vowels in the alphabet.
Wiki has:
Perhaps the earliest recorded member of this family of songs is a number from an opera called The Kingdom of the Birds, published in 1719-1720 in Thomas D’Urfey’s Wit and Mirth, or Pills to Purge Melancholy:
In the Fields in Frost and Snows,
Watching late and early;
There I keep my Father’s Cows,
There I Milk 'em Yearly:
Booing here, Booing there,
Here a Boo, there a Boo, every where a Boo,
We defy all Care and Strife,
In a Charming Country-Life.
but, yeah: fa-la-la-la-la
I believe it was all that was left seeing as the “bop-doo-wop-doo-wop”, “dip-dee-dip di-dip” and “ram-a-lam-a-ding-dong” had all previously been taken.
Moving thread to Cafe Society from MPSIMS.
Who was that man? I’d like to shake his hand.
It’s just nonsense filler, but I think it’s meant to echo barnyard sounds, particularly the braying of mules…
Never really thought about it before, actually.
It sure comes in handy when a crossword puzzle needs a bunch of vowels.
My hypothesis is that it’s an onomatopoeia for the notes being played on a fiddle.
More old variations from the Mudcat Cafe:
It stands for “Everything Is Excellent In Oregon.”
Back in 1959 when the Oregon Territory was making its case for entry into the union, the locals cast about for a way to convince the US congress into accepting them.
At this time, advertising by use of subliminal persuasion was in its infancy and legislators from Oregon decided to plant the letters E-I-E-I-O in various unsuspecting places.
Once Oregon was accepted into the US, the campaign was halted with the only remnant being the refrain from Old McDonald which was specifically written for this purpose.
This is a 100% true story by the way.
True fact. But I tried to use it in Scrabble once - I was holding a handful of vowels and nothing else. My opponent cried foul. 
I, uhm, think you may have transposed some numbers up above… :rolleyes:
Yes, it’s 1859 and 0.01%.
Well, the wikipedia piece mentioned above avoids saying whether it was originally British, although that seems likely, however these filler words, although common from mediaeval times on, in this case ‘E I, E I, O’ seem particularly from the northern regions of Enfland, specifically Lancashire’s flattish voices…
In this once famous 1960s song about the once famous painter, L. S. Lowry, Matchstick Men and Matchstick Dogs, the children’s chorus — now probably grandparents — sing in the background, in Lancastrian accents: 'Eee, Aye, Addy, Addy-O.
Youtube
Actually… apart from mingling England with Elfland… apparently further investigation, in the quick form of an interview in 2006 with the singers, reveals it to be 'Eee, Aye, Alley, Alley-O
I never knew that.
Youtube 2
It’s related to ooh, eee, ooh-ah-ah; ting, tang, walla-walla bing-bang.
As confirmed by Snopes, no doubt.