Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day

Subject: Origins: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 12:59 PM

I remember a parody from the late 50s or early 60s of the song Fourpence a Day, and it was titled Four pounds a day. I think that now it should be re-titled £40 a day, and that's not a lot in this day and age, so it will also be overtaken by inflation.
^^^
The rain's a pouring on the site, the tea's upon the brew
We're sitting on our arseholes with nothing else to do
Some want the rain to go to Spain, we want the rain to stay
Cos we're rained off and contented on four pounds a day

Four pounds a day me lads, and bugger all to do
No trouble from the foreman, he's in the union too
Outside our picks and shovels, they slowly rust away
We're rained off and contented on four pounds a day

So Paddy get the cards out, the racing page as well
As for the contractors, we hope they go to hell
The tea boy is on bonus, each brew means better pay
We're rained off and contented on four pounds a day.

Can't remember any more for the moment, but I have an old vinyl of The Iain Campbell Folk Group singing it, so if anybody wants more words, just shout.
Failte......Giok

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 01:11 PM

In the DT, with tune and writer credits: FOUR POUNDS A DAY

Subject: Origins: Four Pence a Day
From: Joe Offer
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 01:18 PM

Here's the Traditional Ballad Index entry for "Four Pence a Day." did MacColl write it?

Four Pence a Day

DESCRIPTION: "The ore is waiting in the tubs, the snow's upon the fell." The washer lads must be at work early in the day. The singer's poor parents could not send him to school, so he must work for four pence a day. He hopes his boss will develop a conscience
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1951 (recording, Ewan MacColl)
KEYWORDS: work worker poverty boss hardtimes
FOUND IN: Britain
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Silber-FSWB, p. 130, "Four Pence a Day" (1 text)
DT, FOURPENC*
RECORDINGS:
Ewan MacColl, "Four Pence a Day" (on Lomax41, LomaxCD1741)
Pete Seeger, "The Washer Lad" (on PeteSeeger23, AmHist1)
File: FSWB130A

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 02:57 PM

Source given by McColl in his book The Singing Island. "From the singing of John Gowland, retired lead miner of Middleton-in-Teasdale Yorkshire in 1947.
Giok

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: nutty
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 03:01 PM

I have 'Four Pence a Day' in a book somewhere (can't put my hand on it this very moment) but I know the song is listed as traditional, having been collected in the Middleton -in -Teesdale area and referring to the lead mining industry.

A visit to the Killhope Wheel Mining Museum will show you the work of the young 'Washer Laddies'. It was a very hard life undertaken by women and those children not old enough to go down the mine.

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 03:17 PM

Roud 2586. MacColl (Singing Island, 1960) comments: "Still current in Northeast Yorkshire, this song is attributed to Thomas Paine, lead-miner and bard of Teasdale. The washing-rake, where the lead-bearing rocks were separated from the clay and gravel, were usually operated by young boys or old disabled miners. Local legend has it that the mine-owners reacted to the song by temporarily closing the pits and importing leadminers from Germany."

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: nutty
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 03:27 PM

Miners were indeed imported from abroad. With no work local miners had to emigrate to places such as Canada, Australia and South Africa.

Their trials are well documented in the poems of Richard Watson ... The Teesdale Poet.

Things improved when in 1880 Middleton became the headquarters of the benevolent Quaker owned, London Lead Company which built houses, schools and libraries for its workers and became the first British company to introduce the five day week.

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 04:50 AM

Malcolm, it is strange indeed that I have a 1960 hard back copy [battered] of The Singing Island in front of me as I type, and it gives the attribution I posted originally. No mention of Thomas Paine is made, although as quoted Teesdale was mis-spelt in my copy.
Giok

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 05:42 AM

Giok, how about "forty pounds an hour"?

Yes, inflation is a big problem, especially in modern songs. I know someone who sings "Granny's old armchair": To my brother, it was found,/She had left a hundred pound, and the chair turns out to contain a thousand pounds or more. He tries to make it more contemporary by giving the siblings a thousand pounds and having ten thou in the chair, but it doesn't have the same impact: the original values work better again now. "The Sunday papers" was written by Barrie Roberts around 1970 and has a reference to a naval surplus gunsight/Plus postage, twelve and nine. (That's about 67 pence in Centigrade.) After decimalisation in 1972 he tried changing it to one-oh-nine, but it never really sounded right; and after a year or two (not to mention a decade or two) it was difficult to come up with a sum that would rhyme: better to go back to the original. (And it featured Brigitte Bardot, who has also suffered badly from inflation.)

Steve

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: DMcG
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 06:14 AM

The Molecatcher has a similar problem with inflation that I've not been able to come up with a satisfactory solution for. Any suggestions?

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P
From: greg stephens
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 06:27 AM

Well, the relevant lines in the Molecatcher are:

For cropping my fields and for ploughing my ground
This night will cost you no less than ten pounds
If ten pounds is all then I do not mind
for it only works out about tuppence a time

I would propose the following update:

For taking a ramble on my right of way
This night will cost you no less than 10K
If 10K is all then I do not mind
A pony a ride seems perfectly fine

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P
From: greg stephens
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 06:40 AM

I have just been doing some arithmetic. The original lines in the song suggest that the unfortunate man with his testicles in a bit of a predicament is boasting of 1200 illicit encounters. My rewrite, influenced by fitting in a pony/ride double entendre, implies a much more modest 400 bouts. To preserve the proportion of the original, we should be talking of £8.33333...per go, which is difficult to fit into a fluent line.

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 02:35 PM

Giok: MacColl, as you say, gives the attribution you quoted (page 110); he also gives the notes I quoted (page 42). Nothing strange there, I think. Teasdale is not the usual spelling, certainly, but is found elsewhere. Why MacColl used that form I wouldn't know.

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Willa
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 04:57 PM

Giok and Malcolm
From Songs of Struggle and Protest', Mercier Press
Fourpence a day. Collected by Joan Littlewood and Ewan McColl from the singing of John Gowland, a retired lead miner of Middleton-in-Teesdale, Yorshire. The song is attributed to Thomas Raine (sic)lead miner and bard of Teesdale.
Bibliography ref. 'The Shuttle and Cage' Industrial folk ballads. The Workers' Music Assoc. 1954
Discography ref.Steam Whistle Ballads. E.McColl Topic 12T104
British Industrial Folk Songs. E.McColl. Stinson SLP79

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: GUEST,Les the thread jumper
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 02:42 AM

Does anybody remember this:

Four thousand pounds a day me lads, and the Yatch Brittania too(Br)
A couple of planes and a fleet of cars, oh what am I to do,(Br)
It's such a job to make ends meet, I'm greying day by day. (Br)
Bringing up a family upon a Monarch's pay.(P)

We had a do for Charlie, when he was 21,(Br)
His party at Cannarvon, it cost me quite a bomb. (Br)
Itwasn't all the boozing that made the image crack,
But going to the pub next day to take the empties back! (P)

To the tune of Four pence a day.

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 03:51 AM

Sing a song of Phil the Greek,
Baldy head and brassy cheek,
Gets a thousand ounds a week
Just for pocket money.
(to "Moira's Wedding")


... and the rest!

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Lanfranc
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 05:03 AM

"Dancing at Whitsun" has similar problems. It was written in the 1960s to commemorate the deaths in WW1 of almost the entire male population of a Sussex village.

The central character is the widow of one of the fallen, and "fifty long springtimes since she was a bride" indicated that the lady in question was then in her 70s. In 2003, changing the lyric to "ninety long springtimes" would make her well over 100!

This song doesn't really lend itself to being updated, so I nowadays revert to the original "fifty" and preface it with a brief introduction. It would be a shame were it not to be sung because of the passage of time.

"They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them."
(For the Fallen - Lawrence Binyon)

Alan

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 05:08 AM

Alan: a popular misquotation!.
It should read:

"They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them."

Nigel

Subject: RE: Inflationary pressures on folk tradition-4 P a Day
From: Lanfranc
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 10:39 AM

Aye, and all that glitters really glisters! I stand corrected.

Thanks, Nigel!

Alan