Category: Listen

Introduced by Denise and Stuart Savage

This song was collected in November 1899 by W. Percy Merrick, and can be found in the Journal of the Folk Song Society Vol.1 – No.3, 1901. Widely collected in Southern England, see the version in the Penguin Book of English Folk Songs, attributed to Henry Hills, a farmer from West Sussex who lived in Lodsworth, a village just 3 miles from Petworth, where Stuart was born. We have been singing this simple but lovely song for over 40 years, and still love it.

Listen to Denise and Stuart singing the song:

Lyrics:

A sailor’s life is a merry life,
They rob young girls of their heart’s delight
Leaving them behind to sigh and mourn
They never know when they will return.

Here’s four-and-twenty all in a row,
My sweetheart cuts the brightest show.
He’s proper tall, genteel withal
If I don’t have him, I’ll have none at all.

O, father, fetch me a little boat
That I might on the ocean float,
And every Queen’s ship that we pass by
We’ll make enquire for my sailor boy.

We had not sailed long upon the deep,
Before a queen’s ship we chanced to meet.
You sailors all come tell me true,
Does my sweet William sail among your crew?

“O no, fair lady, he is not here,
For he is drowned, we greatly fear.
On yon green island as we passed by,
There we lost sight of your sailor boy.”

She wrung her hands, and she tore her hair,
Much like a woman in great despair.
Her little boat ‘gainst a rock did run.
“How can I live, now my William’s gone?”

She wrung her hands, and she tore her hair,
Much like a woman in great despair.
She threw her body into the deep.
In William’s arms to lay fast asleep.

November 1899 – W.P.M.

Denise and Stuart Savage became involved in the folk music revival in the 60s while living in West Sussex, England, and have performed in various group combinations, now as a duo. They visited the USA in 2002 and again in 2004 when we were lucky enough to perform in a number of house concerts from Washington, DC, to Vermont.

Introduced by Pete Coe

I went to Ireland in 66, new to all this traditional folk stuff. I ended up in Tralee Co Cork, met up with some chaps who persuaded me to join their folk group for the Tralee Folk Group Competition where they’d planned to sing The Mingulay Boat Song. But they didn’t know the words. I did, hence the invite. We came in 3rd, it would have helped us if the winners weren’t called Finbar, Eddie, Paul & Ted Furey! One of the lads had some interesting songs including Banks of Red Roses which he said he’d learned from his next door neighbour in Belfast. So I learned it from him & it turned out that his neighbour was Sarah Makem. Chris Coe and I recorded the song on our first LP Open The Door and Let Us In in 1971. However, I’ve added a couple more verses recently, from Scottish Travellers, which fill out the grim story.

Listen to Pete playing & singing Banks of Red Roses.

Lyrics:

Now when I was a young man, I heard me mother say
That Mary was a foolish girl and easily led astray;
That rather than work, she would sooner sport and play
With her Johnny on the banks of red roses

By the banks of red roses, me love and I sat down
And I took out me fiddle, for to play me love a tune
In the middle of the tune, o the bonnie lassie cried,
“O my Johnnie, lovely Johnnie, don’t you leave me!”

He took her to his lodge and he treated her to tea
Saying, “Drink, me dearest Mary, and come along with me.
Won’t you drink me dearest Mary, and come along with me
To the lovely, lovely banks of red roses.”

Well they walked and they talked, ‘til they came to a cave
Where young Johnny all the day had been digging of a grave
Where young Johnny all the day had been digging of a grave
For to lie his lassie low among red roses.

“O Johnny, dearest Johnny, that grave is not for me?”
“O yes, me dearest Mary, it’s a bridal bed for thee.
O yes, me dearest Mary, it’s a bridal bed for thee.
For I’ll leave you lying low among red roses.

And he took out his pen knife, it was both long and sharp,
And he plunged it right in to his own dear Mary’s heart.
He plunged it right in to his own dear Mary’s heart,
And he left her lying low among red roses.

Now as he was going homewards, his heart was full of fear,
For every face along the road, he thought it was his dear
Every face along the road, he thought it was his dear
But he’d left her lying low among red roses.

So all you young maidens, a warning take by me
Beware, o beware of this young man’s company
Beware, o beware of this young man’s company
For he’ll leave you lying low among red roses.

By the banks of red roses, me love and I sat down
And I took out me fiddle, for to play me love a tune
In the middle of the tune, o the bonnie lassie cried,
“O my Johnnie, lovely Johnnie, don’t you leave me!”

Pete Coe in many ways represents the backbone of the modern folk revival. A fine solo performer and an energetic activist for the scene as well, founding Ryburn 3 Step, running folk clubs, dances and workshops in Ripponden and beyond while also teaching music and dancing in schools. He’s still one of the most committed, most versatile, most important folk artists in Britain. —Colin Irwin, MOJO

Introduced by Shelley Posen

The Boy That Wore The Blue, also known as The Soldier’s Letter, is an American Civil War song of unknown origin, Roud #4389. For some reason, it found favour in the logging camps of Eastern Canada and the Northeast U.S. over the next century.

I learned it in 1977 from Loy Gavan in Chapeau, Quebec, a village on Allumette Island in the Upper Ottawa Valley. It’s one of the most poignant and eloquent songs I’ve ever heard. The song’s vague and seemingly random provenance gives some insight into how traditional singing worked in a community, how offhand and precarious it could be, and how lucky we are to have what traditional songs we have.

The Boy That Wore The Blue came to Chapeau in the 1930s via an itinerant man-of-all work named Carl Brian—an “Englishman” (from England? an Anglophone?) who came from Quebec, no one knew exactly where. He cleaned the stables at the village hotel and did farm chores. Always short of money, Brian sang in the hotel bar after work for drinks: “He’d sit and sing that song I betcha four times in the night,” said Loy. “He sang lots of songs, but that was the best—the best song, the best story.” Loy’s older brother Cliff learned it from Brian, and Loy learned it from Cliff.

The Boy That Wore The Blue captivated me the first time I heard Loy sing it, and was the first of many songs I learned from him. It was “Loy’s song” in Chapeau: if I asked someone else to sing it, they’d demure: “That’s Loy’s song”—meaning not his property, but that he sang it best.

My Chapeau recordings and field notes, including everything I had of Loy, are in the Archives of the Canadian Museum of History.

The only time I myself was recorded singing The Boy that Wore the Blue was for Global TV, who came to the Canadian Museum of History to interview me about traditional singing in the Ottawa Valley. I was ill that day, but the show had to go on. The song shines through, I think.

Lyrics:

1. Dear Madam, I’m a soldier boy, my speech is rough and plain,
I am not used to writing and I hate to to cause you pain;
I promised him I would do this, he thought it might be so,
But it comes from one who loved him and perhaps might ease the blow.

2. Now in reading this you will plainly see the woes I cannot hide.
If you listen to a soldier boy, I will tell you how he died.
The night before the battle, we were in a crowded tent.
There was many a brave boy to mourn and many a knee was bent.

3. We left the tent at ten to nine, the soldier boy and I.
As we sat freely talking beneath the clear bright sky,
he seemed to want to talk of home and friends he loved so dear.
While I had none to talk about, but always liked to hear.

4. He told me of the morning that he first went away.
How sadly they did mourn for him they never bid him stay.
He named his sisters one by one until a dark blush came.
He told me of another one but never spoke her name.

5. “Oh Johnny, dearest Johnny, if it’s now that I should fall.
Would you write home and tell them that I loved and spoke of all.
Last night I wanted so to live I seemed so young to go.
And last week past my birthday I was eighteen years you know.

6. The morning of the battle, fast came the shot and shell.
I was standing close beside him and I saw him when he fell.
I raised him in my arms and I laid him on the grass.
It was going against the orders but I guessed they’d let it pass.

7. “Oh, underneath my pillow is a lock of golden hair.
There is a name upon it, send it in my mother’s care.
I promise her I did not think my time would come so soon.”
The fight it was three days ago, he died today at noon.

8. We wrapped him up in a soldier’s cloak. We bore him out at night.
We buried him under a bunch of trees while the moon was shining bright.
We carved him out a headboard as skillful as we could.
And if you want to see the spot, I’ll show you where it stood.

9. I am sending you his hymn book and the cap he used to wear.
And a lock we cut the night before from his dark, curly hair.
I’m sending you his Bible the night before he died.
We turned the leaves together and I read them by his side.

10. I kept the belt he used to wear, he bid me so to do.
There is a hole in the left side, just where the ball went through.
And now I’ve done his bidding and I’m sending all to you.
And sure we will all mourn for him, the boy that wore the blue.

Shelley Posen is a retired folklorist and songwriter living in Ottawa, Canada. Formerly Curator of Canadian Folklife at the Canadian Museum of History, his Ph.D. dissertation was based on research he conducted into singing in the Irish-French Ottawa Valley community of Chapeau, Quebec. Shelley has sung at folk festivals, in clubs and kitchens, and on concert stages in the U.S. and Canada. He was a member of the close harmony folk trio, Finest Kind, who toured North America and the U.K. for two and a half decades and recorded some 7 CDs. Shelley has recorded 4 CDs of his own.

Introduced by Harry Tuft

The origin of this song, “The Bay Of Biscay,” eludes me, even after a search of the internet. It appears that versions have been done by Shirley and Dolly Collins and Tim Hart and Maddy Prior, before the version I heard and have used in my own singing, by Norma Waterson on the album Waterson/Carthy. I imagine it would fall into the category of the ghost return of a dead lover. The melody is appropriately haunting, and Ms. Waterson’s version is impressive. I included it on an album I released in 2011, Treasures Untold, on my own label, Manasses Records.

Listen to Norma Waterson singing “The Bay of Biscay:”

https://youtube.com/watch?v=j_BK-e9mlvI

Lyrics:

My true love sailed on board a tender,
And where he is I do not know
For seven long years I have been waiting
Since he has crossed the Bay of Biscay-oh

One night as Mary lay a-sleeping
A knock came to her bedroom door
Saying arise, arise, my only Mary
It is your true love, I, William-oh.

So, Mary rose, put on her clothing
And swift she opened the bedroom door
And there she spied her true lover standing
His cherry cheeks they were as white as snow

Oh, William dear where are your blushes
Your blushes you got so long ago?
Oh Mary dear the clay has changed them
And I am the ghost of your William-oh.

And Mary dear, the dawn is breaking
The time has come for me to go
And, I must leave you broken hearted
Since I have crossed the Bay of Biscay-oh

Oh, If I had all gold and silver
And all the money in Mexico
I would give it all to the queen of England
For just one kiss from my William-oh.

For, my true love sailed on board a tender,
And where he is I do not know
For seven long years I have been waiting
Since he has crossed the Bay of Biscay-oh

In addition to his own label, Manassas, Harry Tuft has been a recording artist for Folk Legacy Records. His album Across The Blue Mountains, recorded in 1977, is currently back in print. Harry says, “I regard myself as a ballad singer, as it is the ballad story and melody that excite me so often. And I’ve been accumulating songs for over sixty years, even during the years as owner of the Denver Folklore Center.”

(Now Westlin Winds)

by Robert Burns
Introduced by Andrew Calhoun

This was first published in the Kilmarnock edition of Robert Burns’ Poems: Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, in 1786. Burns’ first draft was written ten years before in 1776. Robert was then 17 and its addressee, Peggy Thomson, of Kirkoswald, was 13. Burns indicated that it was to be sung to the tune of a humorous Ayrshire ballad, “I Had A Horse, I Had Nae Mair.”

Here is the first verse of the model:

‘I had a horse, and I had nae mair,
I gat him frae my daddy;
My purse was light, and my heart was fair,
But my wit it was fu’ ready.
And sae I thought me on a time,
Outwittens of my daddy,
To see mysell to a lawland laird,
Wha had a bonny lady.’

Mr. Burns later sent his lyric to The Scots Musical Museum, indicating that it could be set to the tune, “Port Gordon.” Scholars for well over a century have taken this gesture as evidence that Burns was disaffected with his original choice, which has never been published with the lyric; but they are missing something. “I Had a Horse, I Had Nae Mair” (I Had No More) had already been published, with its tune, in the second volume of the Musical Museum, where it is song #185; James Johnson (and Burns) preferred not to repeat melodies, hence his flexibility. The tune to which this is now commonly sung is neither of those to which he assigned it. Robert Burns is unique among major poets of his time in composing to melodies; he played fiddle, and needed to become deeply engaged with a tune before he could write lyrics for it; he was also a major collector of traditional lyrics and tunes. I explain in the linked video why this particular tune is of inseparable artistic importance to this particular lyric.

Burns borrows phrases freely from Alexander Pope’s poem, “Windsor Forest,” from these lines written in 1704:

See! from the brake the whirring pheasant springs,
And mounts exulting on triumphant wings…

With slaught’ring guns th’ unwearied fowler roves…
Where doves in flocks the leafless trees o’er-shade,
And lonely woodcocks haunt the wat’ry glade.

Burns’ punctuation is as distinctively expressive as Emily Dickinson’s. An example is “all fading-green and yellow.” With the hyphen, only the green is fading, and the yellow stands out. This can be suggested by the singer, with a pause.

Here’s a version by Sheena Wellington, which showcases some of the birds mentioned.

Lyrics:

Note: Some of the words Burns uses may be unfamiliar – they translate as:
Westlin – western
Moorcock – grouse
Cushat – wood pigeon
Fell – level area on mountain
Hern – heron

Now westlin winds, and slaught’ring guns
Bring Autumn’s pleasant weather;
The moorcock springs, on whirring wings,
Amang the blooming heather:
Now waving grain, wide o’er the plain,
Delights the weary Farmer;
The moon shines bright, as I rove at night,
To muse upon my Charmer.

The Partridge loves the fruitful fells;
The Plover loves the mountains;
The Woodcock haunts the lonely dells;
The soaring Hern the fountains:
Through lofty groves, the Cushat roves,
The path o’ man to shun it;
The hazel bush o’erhangs the Thrush,
The spreading thorn the Linnet.

Thus every kind their pleasure find,
The savage and the tender;
Some social join, and leagues combine;
Some solitary wander:
Avaunt, away! the cruel sway,
Tyrannic man’s dominion;
The Sportsman’s joy, the murd’ring cry,
The flutt’ring, gory pinion!

But Peggy dear, the evening ‘s clear,
Thick flies the skimming Swallow;
The sky is blue, the fields in view,
All fading-green and yellow:
Come let us stray our gladsome way,
And view the charms o’ Nature;
The rustling corn, the fruited thorn,
And every happy creature.

We’ll gently walk, and sweetly talk,
While the silent moon shines clearly;
I’ll clasp thy waist, and fondly prest,
Swear how I love thee dearly:
Not vernal show’rs to budding flow’rs,
Not Autumn to the Farmer,
So dear can be, as thou to me,
My fair, my lovely Charmer!

And there, upon a mark of blood,
his brother he has slain.
See the widow tear her hair.
Hear her mournful wail;
Beware the lonely hunter’s fate
that makes her weep and rail.
Feel the lonesome summer’s wind.
Hear its mournful cry.
There’s many a youth whose life was spent,
all on the mountains high.

Andrew Calhoun is a gigging singer-songwriter/folk artist since 1975. He’s founder and president of Waterbug Records, Inc. since 1992. In 2012 he received the Lantern Bearer Award from Folk Alliance Region Midwest; in 2014, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Woodstock Folk Festival. He’s currently (2017) at work on a Robert Burns songbook called Glorious Work, which will have 173 songs with background, translations and musical arrangements.

Introduced by Mark Gilston

This song was “gifted” to me by Ben Mendel from New York City in the late 1970’s. He told me he learned it from Bob Beers and that it was originally from Montana. I have been unable to find any other recorded sources or versions, though my understanding is that the huge evil cervine premonition of death is a legend in the northwestern states and in southwestern Canada. It certainly is a wonderfully eerie song, and I always included it in concerts around Halloween.

Listen to Mark sing the tune:

Lyrics:

It was a lonely summer’s day. Two brothers, they did go
To labor in the stony field, some harvest for to mow.

All in a row the three did reap: the lonely farmer’s wife,
And last of all the eldest son did wield the mighty knife

They scarce had followed once around, when in the clearing stood
The specter of a devil buck come bounding through the wood.

His eye did burn with evil, and his horn was dark with moss;
And on his mighty whistle side, they saw the bloody cross.

Now the brothers, they did shun the field, and threw away the blade;
And there, betwixt the two of them, a bitter oath was made.

“Oh, I will take the mountains high, and you, the river west;
And ere the sun does set again, we’ll snare him in his nest.”

And, oh, the widow tore her hair all on the farmer’s grave,
For it was this dreadful wicked beast did make her weep and rave.

Now the youngest one he did go west, but took the rise instead.
And there he spied the devil buck a-standing in his bed.

Oh he did waver in his spell, and trembled to the ground;
But with a sick and fevered eye, his bloody mark, he found.

The air was torn with thunder, as he took his dreadful aim.
And there, upon a mark of blood, his brother he has slain.

See the widow tear her hair. Hear her mournful wail;
Beware the lonely hunter’s fate that makes her weep and rail.

Feel the lonesome summer’s wind. Hear its mournful cry.
There’s many a youth whose life was spent, all on the mountains high.

Mark Gilston was born and raised in New York City. Both of his parents were steeped in the folk music revival scene of the 1950’s. He grew up listening to 78’s and LP’s of American, Russian, Spanish, Caribbean and Israeli folk music. Learning guitar and taking piano lessons starting at age 5, he was constantly immersed in music. In his youth, Mark gained a love of traditional American ballads and Old-Time songs and instrumentals from recordings and from his father, who often sang the old ballads which he had learned in his youth in Appalachia.

After earning a Bachelor’s degree in Folklore, Mark went to graduate school at SUNY Binghamton studying ethnomusicology and ended up settling there until 1994.

Mark has been giving concerts and leading workshops since 1971. He interned at the Library of Congress Archive of Folk Song, and has worked as a researcher for Alan Lomax. He has published numerous articles and books on music and folklore. Mark is also a multi-instrumentalist with an international reputation in English concertina and mountain dulcimer. He won the prestigious National Mountain Dulcimer Championship in 2016. Mark has 14 CDs on the Ramble Creek and Creative Engineering labels. “Devil Buck” is on Mark’s debut CD, “It Would Sure Be a Miracle.”

Introduced by Matthew Byrne

Variant of a traditional ballad called “The Lumber Camp Song” found all over northeastern North America. Evidence collected on its background suggests a New Brunswick or Maine origin. This variant was arranged and recorded by Jim Payne & Fergus O’Byrne on their 1995 album Wave Over Wave: Old And New Songs Of Atlantic Canada (SingSong Inc). A very similar variant was collected in 1959 from Martin Deveau of Upper Ferry, NL, by Kenneth Peacock and published as Hurling Down The Pine in Songs Of The Newfoundland Outports, Volume 3, pp.750-751, by the National Museum of Canada (1965) Crown Copyrights Reserved.

Listen to Jim Payne & Fergus O’Byrne sing the tune:

Lyrics:

Come all you jolly fellows, come listen to me song,
It’s all about the lumber boys and how they get along;
A crowd of jolly good fellows as ever you may find,
It’s how they spend their winter months in hurling down the pine.

Chorus:

Snap crack goes me whip, I whistle and I sing,
I jumps up on me double sled so happy as a king;
Me horse is always ready, and I am never sad,
There’s no one here so happy as a double sledder lad.

At four o’clock in the morning the boss he will shout:
“Arise all ye teamsters, it’s time that ye are out!”
Those teamsters they all get up in a frightened way:
“O where are me shoes and pants? Me socks are gone astray!”

The next to get up are the choppers, their socks they cannot find,
They blame it on the teamsters and swear it with all their mind;
Some other man might have them on and him be very near,
We’ll pass it off all as a joke and have a hearty cheer.

Chorus

Six o’clock is breakfast and every man is out,
And every man if he’s not sick, he’s sure to be on the route;
Oh, you should hear those axes ring until the sun goes down,
“Hurry me boys! the day is o’er, a-shanty we are bound.”

We all arrive at the shanty, cold hands and wet feet,
We then pull off our logans, our supper for to eat;
We’ll sing and dance till nine o’clock and to our bunks we’ll climb,
I’m sure those months don’t seem so long in hurling down the pine.

Chorus

The sawyers and choppers they lay the timber low,
The teamsters and the swampers drag them to and fro;
The next to come in are the loaders, all at the break of day:
“Load up your sleds five hundred feet, to the riverside away!”

Springtime will roll around, our boss he will say:
“Heave up your saws and axes, boys, and help to clear the way;
The floating ice it is all gone and business has arrived,
Two hundred able-bodied men are wanted on the drive.”

Chorus

Springtime will roll around, and glad will be the day,
When fellows who left their girls at home will wander back that way;
And now me song is ended and don’t you think it’s true?
And if you doubt one word of it, just ask one of the crew.

Chorus (x2)

Matthew Byrne is a traditional singer from St. John’s, Newfoundland, with a lineage of singing and song-finding that runs deep into Placentia Bay. Since bursting on to the trad scene in 2010 with his debut recording, Ballads, Matthew has swiftly earned his place as one of Canada’s most authentic and vital traditional voices. In that time, Matthew’s music has traveled well beyond the rugged shores of his homeland. His role as singer and song-finder in The Dardanelles has brought him to many major international festival stages. Matthew is currently completing his third full-length solo recording, Horizon Lines, which was released in August 2017. His 2015 release, Hearts & Heroes, won “Traditional Album of the Year” at the 2015 Canadian Folk Music Awards.

Introduced by Lisa Null

The version I sing of “Sweet William’s Ghost” (Child #77) is based on the singing of Mike Kent of Cape Broyle Newfoundland. It was collected as “Lady Margaret” in 1951 by Kenneth Peacock in Songs of the Newfoundland Outports, vol 2. I love the way it deals with the continuance of love and commitment after death. William has to be relieved of the promise he made to marry Margaret who follows him over the hills walking and talking, even asking if she can be buried with him. It’s an old ballad, appearing in Allan Ramsay’s The Tea Table Miscellany (1740) and Thomas Percy’s Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765). Bill Shute accompanies this song on a guitar played like a hammered dulcimer.

Listen to Bill and Lisa sing the song on this YouTube clip:

Lyrics:

Lady Margaret was sitting in her own lone home
Made of lime and stone
Lady Margaret was sitting in her own lone home
When she heard a dead man moan.

“Oh is it my father, Lord Thomas,” she said
“Or is it my brother John?
“Or is it my true love, Sweet William,”
“From Scotland home has come?”

” ‘Tis not your father, Lord Thomas,” he said
“Nor is it you brother John?”
“But it is your true love, Sweet William,
“From Scotland home has come.”

“Did you bring to me any diamonds or pearls?
“Did you bring to me any ring?
“Did you bring to me any token at all
“That a true love ought to bring?”

“I have brought to you no diamonds or pearls
“I’ve brought to you no ring
“But I’ve brought to you my white winding sheet
“That my body was buried in.”

“Oh love where are your red rosy cheeks
“That oft times once did bloom?”
“Oh they now are rotten and they will be forgotten
“By the love I lost so soon.”

He took her by the lily-white hand
And bid him company
He took her by the middle so small
Saying “Follow, follow me.”

She lifted her underskirts one by one
Just about the knee
She went over the hills on a cold winter’s night
In a dead man’s company.

They walked and they talked alone together
Till the cocks began to crow
“O it’s time for the dead and the living to part
“Lady Margaret I must go,”

“Is there any room at your head?” she said
“Is there any room at your feet?”
“Is there any room all about your sides
“Where I might lie down and sleep?”

“My father is at my head,” he said
“My mother is at my feet
“And there’s three hell hounds all about my sides
“Where I would lie down and sleep.”

“One is for my drunkenness
One is for my pride
And one is for promising a fair, pretty maid
That she might be my bride

She took a cross all from her bosom
And smoted him upon the breast
Saying “Here is a token for you, Sweet William,
“God grant you a happy night’s rest.”

“I am grateful to you, Lady Margaret,” he said
“I’m grateful unto you;
“If the dead they are bound to pray for the living
Then I’m bound to pray for you.”

“When will we meet?” Lady Margaret she said
“When will we meet?” said she
“Well I hope the very next time we do meet
“In heaven we both shall be.”

Lisa Null co-founded Green Linnet Records with Pat Sky about 1972. She toured widely in England, Canada, and the United States with guitarist Bill Shute, former lead rock guitarist of “Fifth Estate.” An associate lecturer at Georgetown University, she taught all aspects of music’s relationship to American history. She has three albums available through Folk-Legacy Records: “Sweet William’s Ghost” can be found on her ballad album, “Bill Shute & Lisa Null: The Feathered Maiden.”

Introduced by Ian Robb

I first heard this “unbroken token” ballad from a young St. John’s singer, Ellen Power, then in her teens, at the Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival. Asking around, I discovered that the song had come from singer and accordion player Dorman Ralph, of Little Harbour Deep, White Bay, Newfoundland, who lived in St John’s from 1956 until his death in 1999.

I was attracted to the song for two reasons: Firstly, I loved the denouement, when not only do the long parted lovers fall into each other’s arms, but “both sat down to sing…” Secondly, I was intrigued by the melody, which is a version of that collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams from Harriet Verrall, in Monk’s Gate, Sussex, and to which he set John Bunyan’s poem “To Be a Pilgrim,” creating one of the best known English hymns. On the English folk scene, the tune is mostly associated with Mrs Verrall’s song “Our Captain Cried All Hands” and with a version of “A Blacksmith Courted Me,” but despite the fact that the text of “Welcome Home My Sailor” is known in England, sung and recorded by no less than Lal Waterson and later, Eliza Carthy, the tune used is quite different.

The words here are as I sing it, mostly from Jim Payne and Fergus O’Byrne’s version on their CD, How Good is Me Life, with some inevitable minor tinkering.

Here are Jim Payne and Fergus O’Byrne singing the song:

Lyrics, from Jim Payne, who had it from Dorman Ralph, White Bay, NL:

One night as I walked out, it being dark all over
The moon gave out no light, I could scarce discover
Down by a briny beach where ships were sailing,
A comely maid I spied, weeping and wailing.

I boldly stepped to her and I asked what grieved her,
The answer that she gave was none could relieve her,
“My own true love’s last prayer was to cross the ocean
My heart is like the wave, always in motion.”

I said, “My fair young maid, mark well my story
For your true love and I fought for England’s glory
By one unlucky shot he from me was parted,
And by our foe’s last shot, died broken hearted.

He said before he died that his heart was broken
‘I’ll give you my gold ring, take it as a token
Give it to my true love — there is none who’s fairer —
And tell her to prove true, and wed the bearer’.”

And when she heard these words, she fell distracted
She knew not how she felt, nor how she acted
She wrang and tore her hair, like one in anger,
“Young man you’ve come too late, I’ll wed no stranger.”

And when I heard these words, my love grew stronger
I fell into her arms, I could stay no longer
We both sat down to sing, and she sang clearest
Like a nightingale she sang, “Welcome home my dearest.”

She sang, “God bless the wind that blew you over,”
She sang, “God bless the ship that brought you over,”
She sang, “God bless the waves that tossed you over,”
Like a nightingale she sang, “Welcome home my sailor.”

Recorded versions:
Dorman Ralph, from his eponymous CD, released in 1999.
Jim Payne and Fergus O’Byrne, from their 2005 CD, How Good is Me Life.
Both are available from Singsong Inc.

Ian Robb is a singer, concertina player and occasional “writer of old songs,” who lives in Ottawa, Canada.

Introduced by Dick Swain

This wonderful song was introduced to most people by Joe Hickerson on his recording, Drive Dull Care Away, Vol. 1, Folk Legacy Records, FSI-58. It was collected on Prince Edward Island from Charles Gorman by folklorist Edward (Sandy) Ives, and published in his book,Drive Dull Care Away: Folksongs from Prince Edward Island, Charlottetown, PEI, Institute for Island Studies 1999, pp. 81-82. The book includes a CD with a field recording of Charles Gorman singing the song. In the late 18th and early 19th century it appeared in broadsides and a number of songsters under the titles “Contentment” or “The Friendly Society.” In the notes to his recording, Joe Hickerson says that an untitled version of the song was published in the September 30, 1775 issue of The Pennsylvania Ledger; or the Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania & New Jersey Weekly Advertiser, and included the refrain, “Let us then constant be / For while we’re here / My friends so dear / We’ll fight for liberty.”

Listen to John Roberts and Debra Cowan sing the song in this YouTube video:

Lyrics:

Oh, why should we our lot complain
Or grieve at our distress?
Some think if they could riches gain
T’would be true happiness
But alas how vain is all their strife
So while we’re here with our friends so dear
We’ll drive dull care away:

Chorus:
Away, away, away, away
We will drive dull care away
So while we’re here with our friends so dear
We’ll drive dull care away.

Why should the rich despise the poor?
Why should the poor repine?
When we will all in a few short years
In equal friendship join
They’re both to blame, they’re all the same
We are all made of one clay,
So while we’re here with our friends so dear
We’ll drive dull care away:

[Chorus]

We’ll drive dull care away:

[Chorus]

So let us make the best of life
Not rendering it a curse
But take it as you would a wife
For better or for worse
Life at its best is but a jest
Like a dreary winter’s day
So while we’re here with our friends so dear
We’ll drive dull care away:

[Chorus]

The following verse appears under the title “The Friendly Society” with a different tune and no chorus in Spicer’s Pocket Companion, Ishmael Spicer, Connecticut Historical Society, MS, [1797?]. See Jim Douglas, Contentment or The Nutmeg Songster, Sturbridge, MA, Pedlar Press, 1986.

When age, old age, comes creeping on
And we are young no more
Let’s not repine at what we’ve done
Or grieve that youth is o’re
But cheerful be as formerly
And innocently gay
And since we’re here with our friends so dear
We’ll drive dull care away

Combining his skills as a librarian with a life-long interest in folk music, Dick Swain researches and performs songs from the places he has lived and worked, including the Great Lakes Region, Pennsylvania, and Maine. He accompanied Sandy Ives on several trips to Prince Edward Island and has performed at folk festivals, museums, and libraries in the U.S. and Canada. He was Program Director of the CDSS Pinewoods Folk Music Week four times and was a staff member of the Traditional Music and Dance (TradMaD) Camp in 2017. He is especially proud that Sandy Ives signed his copy of Drive Dull Care Away with the words: “For Dick Swain, who sings the old come-all-ye’s the way they should be sung!”