Another of my favourite songs.

The Hurdy-gurdy Man  from Schubert's bleak song-cycle Winterreise.

Der Leiermann

1. with hurdy-gurdy accompaniment.

2. the original piano version with Thomas Quasthoff accompanied by Daniel Barenboim.

There are also beautiful interpretations by Fischer-Dieskau, and with Hans Hotter and Gerald Moore,
together with the German text by Wilhelm Müller.

Here is my singable translation:

In the wretched village 

a hurdy-gurdy-man,

who with frozen fingers 

plays the best he can.

Barefoot on the ice he stumbles here and there; and his little coin-cup stays forlornly bare.

or

Nothing on his feet, he staggers through the cold. No one puts a farthing in his battered bowl.

No-one cares to listen

or give him a glance.

Now the dogs are growling;

he has not a chance,

but he keeps on grinding,

doesn't seem to care,

churning out his music

in the chilly air.

Otherworldly relic,

will I go with you ?

Will your hurdy-gurdy

accompany me, too ?

It took me most of a morning to translate these simple lines!

Contrast and compare:
                                         Those, like me,  who were around and interested in the British and Irish Folksong revival of the 1950s and 1960s (thank you Lonnie Donegan!) may remember Cyril Tawney's The Oggie-Man, about the demise of a man who sold a kind of savoury pasty...