Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: GUEST,BlackAcornUK
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 06:54 AM

As an aside - and perhaps worthy of a separate thread - how many other songs (either 'genuinely traditional' or idiomatic modern compositions by revivalists), make reference to standing stones, hill forts, chalk figures or other elements of pre-history in the landscape?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: GUEST,BlackAcornUK
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 06:49 AM

The bits in brackets (hopefully obviously!) indicate my second guess/possible substitutions, but after 4-5 listens in a row I'm pretty certain of my 'primary transcript'.

Although the title of the song is Salisbury Plain, I'm certain that the word at the end of line 1 is 'Silbury' -

My interpretation is that Silbury Hill and Frome lie just beyond the edges of Salisbury plain (to the North and West, respectively) - they're part of the wider downland, but the wind blows coldest in the area claimed for military manoeuvres, in the shadow of Stonehenge ('the ragged stones').

For verse 5, I take 'the blues' to be deliberstely multi-layered - the bluestones of Stonehenge; some of the rarer breeds of blue butterfly, adonis blues and chalk hill blues, which have enclaves around Salisbury Plain; and also, a reference to the junctures when the military site was expanded, at times of grave external threat, and regiments like The Blues (the Royal Horse Guards, who were merged with the Royal Dragoons in 1969, and so might have been in Hutchings' mind at the time of writing) may have been welcomed to the plain by the local populace. From a bit of Wikipedia sleuthing I note that in the present day the successor regiment, the Household Cavalry, is garrisoned at the Powle Lines barracks of Bulford Camp, one of 4 major British Army camps on the Plain.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: GUEST,BlackAcornUK
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 06:22 AM

I've tried to listen with as close an ear as possible, and this is what I get from Carole Pegg on Mr Fox's LP recording:

Cold blows the wind on Silbury
Cold blows the wind on Frome
But colder still the wind does (does't?) blow
All around the ragged stones

I worked the land with all my kin
And many's the change I've known
That (but?) strangers now have come to blight
The seeds that we have sown

The harmless hare that runs the ridge
The gulls that chase the plough
The lofty pheasant all are seen
And each is wary now

And daily sounds the cannon-fire
Its echoes shake (echo shakes?) the plain
The fox and rabbit both are forced
To flee from their domain

The girls once flocked to see the blues
As they passed gaily by
But you're welcome as the cold, cold rain
That darks (dogs?) the summer sky

And friends ask me, when will there be
A bull without a horn
And I say when there grows a rose
Without a prickly thorn

Cold blows the wind on Silbury
Cold blows the wind on Frome
But colder still the wind does (does't?) blow
All around the ragged stones

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: GUEST,BlackAcornUK
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 06:54 AM

As an aside - and perhaps worthy of a separate thread - how many other songs (either 'genuinely traditional' or idiomatic modern compositions by revivalists), make reference to standing stones, hill forts, chalk figures or other elements of pre-history in the landscape?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: GUEST,BlackAcornUK
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 06:49 AM

The bits in brackets (hopefully obviously!) indicate my second guess/possible substitutions, but after 4-5 listens in a row I'm pretty certain of my 'primary transcript'.

Although the title of the song is Salisbury Plain, I'm certain that the word at the end of line 1 is 'Silbury' -

My interpretation is that Silbury Hill and Frome lie just beyond the edges of Salisbury plain (to the North and West, respectively) - they're part of the wider downland, but the wind blows coldest in the area claimed for military manoeuvres, in the shadow of Stonehenge ('the ragged stones').

For verse 5, I take 'the blues' to be deliberstely multi-layered - the bluestones of Stonehenge; some of the rarer breeds of blue butterfly, adonis blues and chalk hill blues, which have enclaves around Salisbury Plain; and also, a reference to the junctures when the military site was expanded, at times of grave external threat, and regiments like The Blues (the Royal Horse Guards, who were merged with the Royal Dragoons in 1969, and so might have been in Hutchings' mind at the time of writing) may have been welcomed to the plain by the local populace. From a bit of Wikipedia sleuthing I note that in the present day the successor regiment, the Household Cavalry, is garrisoned at the Powle Lines barracks of Bulford Camp, one of 4 major British Army camps on the Plain.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: GUEST,BlackAcornUK
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 06:22 AM

I've tried to listen with as close an ear as possible, and this is what I get from Carole Pegg on Mr Fox's LP recording:

Cold blows the wind on Silbury
Cold blows the wind on Frome
But colder still the wind does (does't?) blow
All around the ragged stones

I worked the land with all my kin
And many's the change I've known
That (but?) strangers now have come to blight
The seeds that we have sown

The harmless hare that runs the ridge
The gulls that chase the plough
The lofty pheasant all are seen
And each is wary now

And daily sounds the cannon-fire
Its echoes shake (echo shakes?) the plain
The fox and rabbit both are forced
To flee from their domain

The girls once flocked to see the blues
As they passed gaily by
But you're welcome as the cold, cold rain
That darks (dogs?) the summer sky

And friends ask me, when will there be
A bull without a horn
And I say when there grows a rose
Without a prickly thorn

Cold blows the wind on Silbury
Cold blows the wind on Frome
But colder still the wind does (does't?) blow
All around the ragged stones

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 28 Dec 17 - 11:36 AM

the fox and rabbit both are forced
to flee from the domain.

In fact the military owned part of the plain is a haven for wildlife.

Subject: Lyr Add: Salisbury Plain (Hutchings-Pegg)
From: Einsetumadur
Date: 28 Dec 17 - 11:14 AM

I've tried to write down the lyrics of the wonderful "Salisbury Plain", which Ashley Hutchings wrote with Bob Pegg around 1969/70.

Some places still sound clumsy, or it's old English, maybe someone's interested in correcting me?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7tdaJKrcgE


Cold blows the wind on Salisbury,
cold blows the wind on Frome,
whence colder still the wind does blow
all 'round the ragged stones.

I‘ve worked the land with all my kin,
and many's the change I've known,
but strangers now have come to blight
the seeds that we have sown.

The harmless hare that runs the ridge,
the grouse that chase in the clow(?),
the lofty pheasant all are seen
and each is where we now(?)

And daily sounds the cannon-fire,
its echo shaking the plain,
the fox and rabbit both are forced
to flee from the domain.

The girls once flocked to see the gluze(?)
as they pass gaily by
but you‘re welcome as the cold cold rain(?)
that darks the summer sky.

And friends ask me: „When will there be
a bull without a horn?“,
and I say „When there grows a rose
without a prickly thorn.“


clow = enclosure?
gluze = cairn/barrow?