Lyr Req: Brenda Wootton and Trevithick

Subject: Lyr Req: Brenda Wootton and Trevithick
From: GUEST,John Foxen
Date: 05 Apr 14 - 08:29 AM

I'm trying to track down a song that Brenda Wootton used to sing about railway pioneer Richard Trevithick. It's not the Opie, Davy, Foote, Trevithick and Bone song that she recorded but one with a Latin American beat (because Trevithick went to South America).
The words I can remember are:
"Turn on the steam, whoo hoo (audience encouraged here to make train whistle noises)
"Trevithick was an engineer, an engineer."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Brenda Wootton and Trevithick
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Apr 14 - 08:18 AM

Camborne Hill?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Brenda Wootton and Trevithick
From: GUEST,John Foxen
Date: 07 Apr 14 - 10:34 AM

No - not Camborne Hill.

Subject: Lyr Add: BALLAD OF TREVITHICK (from Roger Bennett)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 08 Apr 14 - 03:54 PM

I went to see what Spotify had, and found this. It's probably not the song you had in mind, and I don't know whether Brenda Wootton had anything to do with it. This is my transcription:


BALLAD OF TREVITHICK
As sung by Roger Bennett on "Folk, Roots, and Traditional Music from Cornwall: Songs from the Hill, Vol. 3" (2006)

1. Richard Trevithick was born near Camborne town.
His puffer was a steam engine going up the hill and down.
The locals were all 'mazed, and even the Aussies bowed.
Tevithick the inventor old(?) Cornwall should be proud.

CHORUS: Onward, ever onward, always on the move,
Richard Trevithick had something else to prove,
Always on the move.

2. As well as a steam engine, this railway pioneer
Invented screw propulsion, and steamships did appear;
And the paddle wheel we must not forget,
But he went on to something else he hadn't invented yet.

3. He went to South America; a fortune there he found,
Bought a pearl fishery and lost two thousand pounds,
Very nearly found himself in an alligator stew,
"Hurrah!" he told the destitute. "The deal's fallen through."

4. Trevithick had no business sense, no money left to dream.
After all he had done, he'd just run out of steam.
For all his wild exuberance Trevithick finally paid.
He died up in Dartford, in a pauper's grave was laid.

LAST CHORUS: Onward, ever onward, always on the move,
Richard Trevithick now had nothing left to prove,
Nothing left to prove. REPEAT.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Brenda Wootton and Trevithick
From: GUEST,John Foxen
Date: 11 Apr 14 - 09:11 AM

Thanks very much for your efforts Jim. It's a very good song but not the one I remember.
I shall keep on searching.