Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Ernest
Date: 23 Oct 12 - 12:13 PM

a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTqNooUj0DU&feature=related">Another version (with chords)

and another

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Mr Happy
Date: 23 Oct 12 - 06:59 AM

I'm most surprised there's no better version on YT than this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSGna_VVK3c

This choir do it well, but the sound quality's unfortunately very distracting

Subject: Lyr Add: TINNER BOYS (Robert Stephen Hawker)
From: Hawker
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 07:46 AM

As I have the author's name as my Mudcat ID, I shall add my half pence......
Written by Parson Robert Stephen Hawker, vicar of Morwenstow, Cornwall 1825, set to music by Miss Louisa T Clare 1861. Accorning to Mike O'Connor, in his book St Petroc's Land, it was written by Hawker when living at Whitstone House, Bude Haven. It is believed that he based the final lines on an earlier song, written about 1807 called Tinner Boys......

Come all you Jolly Tinner Boys
And listen unto me
Ill tell ee of a story as
Shall make ee for to see
Concerning Boney Pearty
The schemes which he had made
To stop out tin and Copper mines
And all our Pilchard trade

Hurra for tin & Copper boys and fisheries likewise!
Hura for Cornish maidens - Oh bless their pretty eyes
Hurra for our old gentry and may they never fail
Hurra hurra for Cornwall Hurra boys one and ale!

He summoned forty thousand men
To Poland they did go
All for to rob and plunder there
You very well do know
But ten thousand were killed dead and laid
All dead in blood and gore
And thirty thousand rinned away
And I can't tell where, I'm sure

And should that Bony Pearty
Have forty thousand still
To make into an army for to
Work his wicked will
And try for to invade us
I he doesn't quickly fly
Why forty thousand Cornish boys
Shall know the reason why.


The tune for those who don't know it, is similar to The Grand old Duke of York.
Hope this adds to the interest of the song for you....and remember, Folk music is a living tradition, as it gets aurally passed on it changes, there is no rightor wrong version - only a different one!

Cheers, Lucy

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 18 Mar 02 - 07:20 AM

G'day Nigel,

Ah ... you'll have to stir up the DT (lots of things don't seem to have been posted since 1999!).

If it was only a matter of stirring the people on the thread (which I have only just looked at for the first time) ... I know I have an extensive photographic coverage of that Rebels All workshop Stewie mentions doing at the 14th Australian National Folk Festival - must be worth some blackmail/leverage!

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Mar 02 - 11:13 AM

Refresh:
I was looking for this one, but despite the Lyr Add heading, it doesn't seem to be in the DT, hence the refresh

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Wotcha
Date: 22 Nov 99 - 11:20 AM

Wildlone:

I go to Dorset every once in awhile; where in Dorset do the Yetties or other folk singers congregate? Anything near Blandford?

Cheers, Brian

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 21 Nov 99 - 07:09 PM

Wildlone, I didn't mean to suggest you were wrong, just that - as usual - there is no unanimity about the info available. Thought I could indulge in a little gentle teasing - I'll have to be more careful in the future. Sorry! - Susanne

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: wildlone
Date: 21 Nov 99 - 06:43 AM

The Yetties,A fine Dorset based folk trio all live in the same town as me.They have a music night the first weds of the month at the west end hall, ALL WELCOME.
Bonny Sartin has written some fine songs that deserve to go into the tradition.
I checked out the Yetties lyrics against the ones I posted there is only a couple of words changed.
I took the chorus from the Yetties singing as the original did not have one .cheers wl.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Stewie
Date: 21 Nov 99 - 12:28 AM

I found my source for the song. It was a Derbyshire group, The Ripley Wayfarers, who released some great albums in the 1970s. It was on their album 'Five Bells' on the Traditional Sound Recordings label Tradition TSR013. It wasn't the source of my information, though, all the sleeve notes had was: 'Old Cornish ballad. Another rousing chorus song that we enjoy singing'.

Susanne, your mention of the Yetties reminded me of a fine song that they used to sing, 'Dancers of Stanton Drew'. It does not seem to be in the DT, so I will post it as a 'LYR ADD'.

Cheers, Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Stewie
Date: 20 Nov 99 - 08:13 PM

Hi Wildlone,

It's a fine song. Some 20-odd years ago, I used it in workshop (entertainment) called 'Rebels All' at the 14th National Folk Festival in Australia. I cannot remember my source for the song, but it wasn't the Yetties. The version I had used your first stanza as the main chorus. I had the following intro for it but, once again, I cannot recall where I obtained the information on which it is based. However, it concurs basically with what you have provided:

'Some rebels are born and others are the creation of the balladeers. Sir Jonathon Trelawny, Bishop of Winchester and third baronet of Berry Pomeroy Devonshire, was immortalised in song far beyond his deserts. Certainly, along with several other bishops, he did oppose the second Declaration of Indulgence of James II in 1688. When the king mentioned the word 'rebellion' Trelawny fell on his knees and repudiated the suggestion that he and his brethren should be guilty of such an offence. Nevertheless, the Cornishmen identified themselves with Trelawney in his struggle with the king and made him out to be something of a 'nationalist' hero. The refrain - 'And shall Trelawney die/Then 20 000 Cornish men will know the reason why' - was first raised some 60 years earlier when Cornishmen feared for the life of Trelawney's grandfather, the first baronet, at the hands of the House of Commons. The 'Song of the Western Men', suggested by the old refrain, was actually composed by Robert Stephen Hawker in 1825 but it long passed as an original song dating from 1688. Despite its isrepresentations, the song deserves to survive for its own intrinsic merit'.

Cheers, Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: wildlone
Date: 20 Nov 99 - 07:29 PM

My version was taken from an old book I have:
Ballads and Poems, Illustrating English history,
Edited by Frank Sidgwick, Pub in 1913 by Cambridge University Press.
If the information I posted was wrong I can only say that the book is wrong as well.
I also have the Yetties words and their recording of this it allways goes down a treat when sung at the folk night in Sherborne even if Bonny insists on banging that bloody drum.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Song of the Western Men
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 20 Nov 99 - 06:56 PM

Sure, wildlone? :-)

[1997:] Most people think that this song refers to Bishop Trelawney who was locked up in the Tower of London in 1688 by King James. However, Bishop Trelawney's grandfather also did time in the Tower courtesy of Charles I. Nothing but trouble them Trelawney's! Here's an example of a song still in use today. Should you go to a Cornish rugby match you might well hear a raucous rendering. (The Yetties, notes Folk Music of England)

BTW, did your version come from a Yetties recording? It is almost word for word the one I have by them. Thanks for posting it! - Susanne

Subject: Lyr Add: SONG OF THE WESTERN MEN (R S Hawker)
From: wildlone
Date: 20 Nov 99 - 12:24 PM

A good sword and a trusty hand,
A merry heart and true!
King James's men shall understand
What Cornishmen can do.

And have they fixed the where and when
And shall Trelawney die ?
Then twenty thousand Cornish men
Will know the reason why!

Out spake the captain,brave and bold,-
A merry wight was he;
Though London tower were Michael's hold,
We'll set Trelawney free.

We'll cross the Tamar, land to land,
The Severn is no stay;
And side by side, and hand in hand,
And who shall bid us nay?

And when we come to London wall,
A pleasent sight to view;-
Come forth, come forth, ye cowards,all;
Here are better men than you!

Trelawney he's in keep in hold,
Trelawney he may die,
But twenty thousand Cornish bold
Will know the reason why!

There is a chorus that go'es like this

And shall Trelawney live,
Or shall Trelawney die,
Heres twenty thousand Cornishmen
Shall know the reason why.
Robert Stephen Hawker{1803-1875}
wrote this poem in 1825 although lines 6 to 8 have been proverbial in Cornwall
since JamesII imprisoned the Severn Bishops,
one of whom was Sir Johnathan Trelawney