| Author | Topic: Add: Tom Bowling | |
| John Cox | Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 12:52 am | |
Here, a sheer hulk, lies poor Tom Bowling The darling of the crew; No more he'll hear the tempest howling For death has broach'd him to. His form was of the manliest beauty, His heart was kind and soft, Faithful, below he did his duty, But now he's gone aloft. Tom never from his word departed, His virtues were so rare, His friends were many, and true-hearted, His Poll was kind and fair; And then he'd sing so blithe and jolly, Ah, many's the time and oft! But mirth has turn'd to melancholy, For Tom is gone aloft. Yet shall poor Tom find pleasant weather, When He, who all commands, Shall give, to call life's crew together, The word to pipe all hands. Thus Death, who kinds and tars despatches, In vain Tom's life has doff'd, For, though his body's under hatches His soul has gone aloft. Composed by Charles Dibdin, 1789, in memory of his elder brother Captain Dibdin. It appeared in his highly successful show The Oddities. It is still played regularly at the Last Night of the Proms, but rarely heard in a vocal rendition. Recorded by John Potter and the Broadside band in 1993. | ||
| Jon Freeman | Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 01:57 am | |
Thanks John. When we add we try to get the whole song complete with a tune into the song database. The format we use is abc. Any chance of an abc submission or other attempt at the tune? Loads of other possibilities too - If you could scan it for example and email me the tune (jon@folkinfo.org), I can do what's needed. Thanks, Jon | ||
| Jon Freeman | Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 02:03 am | |
Also, and I know this seems fussy, Please let us know where you got your version. | ||
| Malcolm Douglas |
Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 03:25 am | |
A few brief notes. 1.2. The darling of our crew 1.7. Faithful below, Tom did his duty 1.8. And now he's gone aloft, 1.9. And now he's gone aloft. 1.6. Ah! many's the time and oft; 1.7. But mirth is turn'd... (final line repeated) 3.5. kings and tars (final line repeated) Presumably the text above is from the record mentioned. The small emendations indicated are from vol.IV of British Minstrelsie (Greig, Parry, Bussell, Fleetwood Sheppard, Hopkinson, eds., London n.d.), but the song was extremely widely published as sheetmusic, in popular anthologies and songsters, and on broadsides. Dibdin's songs were something of a bugbear for Cecil Sharp; partly because of their often contrived sentiment (Dibdin had actually been commissioned by the government to write stirring, patriotic songs, and turned out a great many), but mainly because they were the kind of songs that educationalists were at the time introducing into schools as "National Songs". Sharp argued very strongly that they were vastly inferior to folk songs, and not nearly so suitable for educational purposes; and fell out with a number of people over it. "You are inculcating the children of England with the sickly virus of Tom Bowling", he told Arthur Somervell. As we now know, the boundaries between folk music and popular music were nothing like so distinct as many of the early collectors believed, and it seems likely that quite a lot of the singers they encountered will have known songs by the Dibdins and similar writers. These were rarely noted; as much as anything because there seemed no point. They were not rarities, and the purpose of the exercise was to rescue endangered species, not -in most cases- to reflect the full repertoire of country singers. The prolific singer Henry Burstow (who listed the 420 songs that he kept in his head) knew Tom Bowling, of course, but folk song collectors didn't want it from him; they knew it themselves already. Inevitably, it fell out of favour in the end. The sentiment is rather over-heavy for modern tastes, but the tune is quite a fine example of its type. I occasionally sing it myself, with, I must admit, considerable relish. The song is number 1984 in the Roud Index, where most of the examples listed are from printed sources. | ||
| masato sakurai | Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 06:20 am | |
I have often been listening to Sarah Walker's singing of "Tom Bowling," which is on The Sea (Hyperion). | ||
| Jon Freeman | Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 12:08 pm | |
Interesting to learn the collectors made such a strong distinction between popular and folk songs. Oddly enough Pip and I had a short discussion on this yesterday when trying to describe what could be included in the database. Ours is a bit of a blur and I can't say we would know with any degree of accuracy but we agreed on "anything likely to be in the repertoire of traditional singers". | ||
| Pip Freeman | Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 12:13 pm | |
Continuing the nautical theme--Welcome on board John, it's always good to see a newcomer. | ||
| Jon Freeman | Posted - 13 Sep 03 - 10:07 pm | |
I hadn't realised when this thread was posted that it is the Last Night of the Proms tonight. Those who can get BBC1 may well get the change to hear this song later... Some Romanian soprano on now, sounding good too (a rare thing for me to say about sopranos). | ||
| Jon Freeman | Posted - 16 Sep 03 - 08:38 pm | |
We have taken a version from "News-Chronicle Song Book" and added it to the database here The words are essentially the same as given by John Cox but contain a couple of the changes noted by Malcom Douglas. I don't think there is a need to note where these lyrics vary. | ||