Lyr Req: The Smacksman (Sea shanty)

Subject: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: GUEST,Bothy Bill
Date: 03 Aug 01 - 06:18 AM

Can anyone help me finding the lyrics for the old sea shanty "The Smackman".

Thanks in advance

Bothy

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: IanC
Date: 03 Aug 01 - 06:38 AM

Damn ... surely must be in DT but my SuperSearch isn't working. Sam Larner, anyway!

Cheers!
Ian

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Aug 01 - 08:08 AM

Oh, this is a great one! I'll post some verses when I get back from this week-end if no one else has.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: GUEST,Bothy Bill
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 10:16 AM

Charley, or others, any luck with the verses for the Smacksman?

Cheers

Bothy

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Charley Noble
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 10:20 AM

Oh, yah...looking for Bob Roberts.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 10:37 AM

It's not THE COD BANGING SONG?

THIS looks promising for later-- under re-construction but song databse promised. Maybe e-mail them?

No lyric, but THIS was interesting!

And er, it seems to have another meaning too.... eeeew!

~Susan

--- Last link fixed. ---
---Jeff (PA)---

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 10:39 AM

That last should have been THIS.

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 10:40 AM

I give up. It's http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~matthew/occupations/000_lst.htm.

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Skipjack K8
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 11:01 AM

It is forbidden, Susan

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 11:28 AM

It works when I go there from the Google search page link though, so I don't get it. It's a dictionary of occupations, giving a bunch related to fishermen, including Smacksman.

~S~

Subject: Lyr Add: THE SMACKSMAN
From: masato sakurai
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 12:08 PM

Is this the song you are talking about? "The Smacksman," sung by Tom Brown, is in Sea Songs & Shanties (Saydisc CD-SDL 405).

Once I was a schoolboy
And I stopped at home with ease.
Now I am a smacksman
And I sail the rolling sea.
I thought I'd like seafaring life,
But very soon I found
It was not all plain sailing boys
When out on the fishing ground.

So coil away the trawl-warp boys,
Let's heave up the trawl,
When we get our fish on board
We'll have another haul.
Straightway to the capstan
And merrily spin around/spin away/heave away,
That's the cryin the middle of the night,
Haul the trawl--boys--haul.

Every night in winter
As regular as the clock,
We put on our old sou-westers,
Likewise our oilskin frock,
And straightway to the capstan
And merrily spin away,
That's the cry in the middle of the night
As well as in the day.

When we get our fish on board
We have them all to gut,
We have all to clean
And in the ice-locker put.
We gut them and we clean them,
And we stow them safe as well,
We stow them just as nice
As an oyster in his shell.

(Notes by Peter Kennedy):
I take this to be a parody on the amusing sea song On Board of the Kangaroo which starts "Once I was a waterman and lived at home at ease, but now I am a mariner and plough the angry seas". I have also recorded a version from a fisherman at Hastings in Sussex.

Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 12:47 PM

Masato, it's just so wonderful to have you here at Mudcat.

~Susan

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: GUEST,Bothy Bill
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 01:21 PM

Great stuff, Masato. It is indeed the song I was looking for. Thank you very much.

Bothy

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Charley Noble
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 03:52 PM

Yes, Masato, you've nailed it on the head, notes and all. Beautiful! And now I don't have to type it up from my old cassette, if I could find it, that is to say. Thank you!:-)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: masato sakurai
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 04:26 PM

I'm glad everyone liked my posting, though I made a typing mistake in the middle (b instead of br).

Regards from the other side of the planet.
Masato

---

Fixed now. --JoeClone

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 04:34 PM

Masato, what sources are you using???

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: masato sakurai
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 04:52 PM

I didn't find a song with the title in some shanty books or folk song index in front of me. So, I used a search engine connected to Google. It told me that the song is in the Saydisc CD. Then, I took it from my collection, copied the words, and posted it. That's all I did.

Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 04:55 PM

So... do I understand right-- first you looked at your own printed materials, then a search told you what CD it was on, you realized you had the CD, and you typed in the words from the CD notes?

I just wondered because you have been able to find some very interesting things others did not find-- I wondered if it was your personal collection or some search tricks you were using.

If it is mostly your collection, I wish I was on your side of the world!

~Susan

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: toadfrog
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 04:59 PM

Looks like a good song. Isn't a chantey, though.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: masato sakurai
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 05:07 PM

Yes, you're right. Most of the info I've got is through printed materials and records (and CDs), and of course through this great site these days. I've been collectiong folk song books for years. There are virtually no reliable libraries around here. Even college libraies don't have many folk books in English. I'll stop here. This is not the place for my personal story.

Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Charley Noble
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 05:10 PM

That's where all the C. Fox Smith sea poem books and stories have been going!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 05:13 PM

Masato, thank you very much. People often introduce themselves here just like that-- wherever they have "run into" each other, in a thread. And I don't mean to pry-- it's just that you are a VERY welcome addition here.

Some of us keep copies of just the tables of contents of our songbooks-- so we can look up what we have more easily. How do you organize yours?

And have you seen the "Basic Folk Library" thread?

~Susan

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: masato sakurai
Date: 30 Aug 01 - 05:33 PM

Susan, I consult every guide, esp. bibliography, available to me. "Basic Folk Libray" is one of them.

Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Barry Finn
Date: 31 Aug 01 - 12:13 AM

It's recorded on a collection called "Sea Songs & Shanties"(on Saydisc) with Tom Brown singing. The notes don't say where he got it from but it did say that he was local to Harry Cox. Others who are on this CD are Bob Roberts (the singing bargeman), the Coppers, Harry Cox, Sarah Makem & more, it's a great CD. Barry

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: radriano
Date: 31 Aug 01 - 10:47 AM

Hi Barry, how's tricks?

Is there a local source for that Saydisc? Local being this side of the pond.

Richard

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Anglo
Date: 01 Sep 01 - 01:31 AM

Andy's Front Hall stocks a bunch of the Saydisc folky stuff. I don't know if they have it in stock, but I've seen it there. Email [e-mail] or 518-765-4193.

And no doubt Dick G. will tell you you can get it through Mudcat :-)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Anglo
Date: 01 Sep 01 - 01:33 AM

PS. -Radriano, "Local being this side of the pond" is not really very specific. :-)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: Martina Ryan
Date: 03 Sep 01 - 04:59 AM

Stormalong John (a Liverpool Shanty group) do a great version of this on their "Through Stormy Seas" CD. Available from the Chantey Cabin (http://chanteycabin.co.uk/). I'm not even going to try to make that a blue clicky thing. The CD is well worth getting anyway. I'd say that most British shanty fans would regard Stromalong John as being amongst the best. Martina.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Sea shanty 'The Smacksman'
From: RoyH (Burl)
Date: 03 Sep 01 - 05:15 PM

Tom Brown of Worksop, Notts, was a dear friend of mine, well loved and missed on the folk scene where he sang often with his wife Bertha, his "little Irish Rose". He grew up in East Anglia, was a neighbour of the Cox family. As a young man he went to sea where he learned many songs to add to those from home. Later in life he moved to Worksop and became a railway man. One night, when he was in his early sixties, he went to a local folk club and there heard some of the songs of his youth. He loved it, and went again the next week and asked if he could sing. The guest artist that night, one Roy Harris, heard him and immediately arranged to meet him for a chat about his songs. Next time around he took a tape recorder. Later Tom sang and talked about his life on BBC Radio Nottingham, and started going around to folk festivals. At the time of his first look inside a folk club Tom was suffering from clinical depression, but his involvement in the music cured him. He always said that being in the folk scene 'brought him back to life'. Among the time-passing skills he learned at sea was macrame. I have a large red macrame owl on my wall, a gift from Tom. In 'The Smacksman' Tom always pronounced 'coil' in 'coil away the trawl warp, boy's', as 'Kyle'. So did Sam Larner, who sings the song on Topic 12T244 "A Garland For Sam", published by Topic in 1974. Tom Brown has cassettes on Peter Kennedy's 'Folktrax'. Check 'em out. You will hear some grand songs and an honest unpretensious singer who loved giving voice. I miss him but I have his recordings, his macrame, and a smiling photograph as reminders of a warm-hearted friend, and further proof that the time I've spent in folk music has been distinguished by meeting some memorable people.