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HOME, LADS, HOME (3) (Cecily Fox Smith) Overseas in Flanders the sun was dropping low, With tramp and creak and jingle, I heard the gun teams go, When something seemed to set me a-dreaming as I lay Of my own Hampshire village at the quiet end of day Cho: Home, lads, home, all among the corn and clover Home, lads, home, when the working day is over, For there’s rest for horse and man when the longest day is done And they’ll all go home together at the setting of the sun. Brown thatch with garden blooming with lily and with rose And the river running past them so quiet where it flows Wide fields of oats and barley, and the elder flowers like foam And the sky all gold with sunset, and the horses going home. Oh Captain, Boxer, Traveller, I see them all so plain With tasselled ear-caps nodding all along the leafy lane And somewhere a bird is calling, and there’s swallows flying low And the lads are sitting sideways and singing as they go. Well gone is many a lad now, and many a horse gone too, Of all the lads and horses from those old fields I knew, For Dick fell at Givenchy and Prince beside the guns On that red road of glory, a mile or two from Mons. Dead lads and shadowy horses, I see them all the same, I see them and I know them and I call them each by name, Riding down from harvest, when all the west’s aglow And the lads all sitting sideways and singing as they go Chorus 2 Home lads, home, with the sunset on their faces Home, lads home, to those quiet, happy places, For there’s rest for horse and man when the longest day is done And they’ll all go home together at the setting of the sun. Chorus 1. ______________________________ “Home Lads, Home” – Cicely Fox Smith and the folk process. Many people are now familiar with the poet, Cicely Fox Smith (dates), whose work has been set to music by a number of folk performers including Alan Fitzsimmons, Pint and Dale, and Dave Webber. Her poems (like many of Kipling’s) seem to have a natural affinity with the folk tradition, and it is interesting to see how the “folk process” has had an impact on one of her poems, “Homeward”, published in 1916. A number of people have asked me about the different sets of words that seem to be around for this song, so I hope the following notes will provide an explanation. The “folk process” is a term often used to describe the subtle way in which songs change when they are transmitted via the oral tradition. Singers “remember” slightly different versions of the tune and words, occasionally changing a word or place name to fit their local context more comfortably, and so on. As a result, we end up with often quite widely different versions of the same song cropping up in different areas. The existence of an original printed source does not seem to be a barrier – if the people want to make a work their own, they will go ahead and do it! I first came across the words of “Homeward” in 1983, in a magazine called “This England”, where they were credited to “an unknown Hampshire soldier” and given the title “Going home together” . The poem simply cried out for a musical setting, so after some time at the piano, the song “Home, Lads, home” came into being. I made one or two alterations to the words while I was in the course of writing the music; some of these were simply to do with scansion. However I must confess to changing the word “river” to “Meon”, and the line “riding down from harvest” to “riding down from Swanmore”. I also used one verse as a chorus. The reason for the changes was that the descriptions fitted the Meon Valley (where I was working at the time) very well, and I wanted to give the song an even stronger sense of place. The first line in the magazine version, incidentally, began “Overseas in India”. This version of the song soon found a home among folk performers and was recorded by Bermuda Quadrangle, Roger Watson, Cockersdale and others. Some time later, I was told that the words were in fact by Cicely Fox Smith, but it was a number of years before I saw a copy of her original words. In the meantime, Mick Ryan asked to use the song in his World War I folk opera “A Day’s Work”, and we changed the first line to “Overseas in Flanders” for obvious reasons. I was very surprised when I eventually gained access to the original words, which started – “Behind a trench in Flanders”! Clearly, the folk process had been at work, as the version published in “This England” had a number of differences from CFS’s original. Presumably, someone liked it enough to learn it off by heart, and time and memory (or memories) did the rest of the editing! The next factor in the song’s evolution, was when my husband Steve and I decided to do some research into the life of Cicely Fox Smith. We discovered that she had in fact lived very near the Meon Valley in the 1930’s, but prior to that she was living in the North of Hampshire. From what we have gleaned from the Records Office, we are now virtually certain that at the time of writing the poem in question, she was living in Chilbolton, at St. Michael’s Cottage, a few minutes walk from the River Test. So…in performance I now no longer mention the Meon, or Swanmore, although most other people who sing the song still do! In my own performance of the song I am gradually working back towards the original words, but it isn’t easy to change it much now that so many people know it (and lots of them think it is traditional)! I think it is a tribute to Cicely Fox Smith’s ability to touch the heart in simple language, that despite numerous minor alterations, the integrity and essence of her poem has stayed the same. From what I have come to know of her, I think she would not be averse to the idea of her poems becoming part of a living English tradition. Sarah Morgan 30/8/02 @war @farming @animal filename[ RESTHOR3 TUNE FILE: RESTHORS CLICK TO PLAY SM Feb07 |
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