The songs on this record belong to the centuries when few
people in country places could read or write: they were
taught to each generation by their forebears and, as they
were handed down by oral tradition, they were changed and
modified by different singers until many versions of each
tune existed. The words were sometimes changed or different
words were sung to a tune that was widely known. Such
songs were the common riches of the peasant before the
Industrial Revolution and the Education Acts changed the
face of England and the life of the people.
When the earliest collectors started work nearly all the
singers from whom they took down songs were elderly, for
the younger people had started to despise these tunes and
to turn to printed music and popular songs. Lucy Broad-
wood, E. D. Hammond, Cecil Sharp and Ralph Vaughan
Williams as well as many others noted down tunes and
words and they published the best examples from their
collections and so gave back to the people of England the
songs that belong to them.
SIDE 1
Just as the tide was flowing was collected at Rollesby
Norfolk, where Mr. Locke sang it to R.V.W. in 1908.
Several other versions are known and the tune is also used
for a Morris dance. (Unaccompanied chorus.)
The Captain's Apprentice, This tragic ballad was sung to
R.V.W. by Mr. Carter, a fisherman, at King’s Lynn in 1905,
It must have been a common story when young children
were apprenticed on the high seas. The word “gasket”
means the small cords used to fasten the sails to the rigging.
(Tenor and piano.)
The Lark in the Morning, a happy, lyrical song, was
collected from Mrs. Kemp of Herongate, Essex in 1904.
(Soprano and piano.)
An Acre of Land is a riddle song with a cheerful chorus.
It was sung to R.V.W. by Mr. Frank Bailey, an ex-soldier,
at Coombe Bissett near Salisbury, in 1904.
(Unaccompanied chorus.)
The Unquiet Grave is the final fragment of a ballad which
appears in many forms. The dead lover returns to his
mourning sweetheart whose tears, falling on his shroud,
break the sleep of death. This arrangement of the tune was
made by R.V.W. in 1949 for the National Federation of
Women’s Institutes, and it is one of the three songs that
make the autumn group in his Cantata Folk Songs of Four
Seasons. (Soloists from the Purcell Singers: Barbara Elsy,
Noreen Willett, Pauline Stevens.)
The Carter is a farm worker’s song from the days before
mechanised agriculture. A carter and his horses, like a
shepherd and his sheepdog, were friends who relied on
each other. (Tenor and piano.)
As I walked out is one of the many sad songs in which a
girl accuses her lover of deserting her for a rival. It was
sung to R.V.W. by Mr. Broomfield of East Horndon,
Essex, in 1904. (Soprano and piano.)
On Christmas Night is one of the best-known English
carols. R.V.W. collected it from Mrs. Verrall of Monks
Gate, Horsham, in 1904 and used it in his Fantasia on
Christmas Carols. (Unaccompanied chorus.)
SIDE 2
Six Studies in English Folk Song (1927) originally written
for cello and piano and dedicated to the cellist May Mukle,
with alternative versions for violin, viola or clarinet.
The song tunes are:
1. Lovely on the water.
2. Spurn Point.
3. Van Dieman’s Land.
4. She borrowed some of her mother’s gold.
5. The Lady and the Dragoon,
6. As I walked over London Bridge.
(Viola and piano.)
Dives and Lazarus was one of R.V.W.’s favourite tunes.
It exists in many versions and he used some of them in his
work for strings and harp: Five Variants of Dives and
Lazarus (1939). (Unaccompanied male voice chorus.)
The Cuckoo and the Nightingale, a country idyll with a
happy ending, sung accompanied. R.V.W. collected this
tune in 1907 at Cottenham, Cambridge, from someone
whose name may have been Mrs. Darn, but the writing
in the notebook is not very clear. (Soprano.)
Bushes and Briars, a love song where the young man over-
hears his girl singing, is sung unaccompanied with the free
rhythm of the traditional singer. It was the first song
R.V.W. collected and it was given to him by Mr. Pottipher
of Ingrave in Essex in 1903. When R.V.W. asked him where
he got the song from Mr. Pottipher replied: “If you can
get the words the Almighty will send you the tune.” (Tenor.)
Wassail Song was collected near Hooton Roberts, a small
Yorkshire village where R.V.W. often stayed with friends.
The “mouldy cheese” referred to in verse five was probably
Stilton. (Unaccompanied chorus.)
URSULA VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
IMOGEN HOIST
Rosamond Strode is the leading soprano of the Purcell
Singers, she used to join other musicians in the informal
madrigal group conducted by R.V.W. in his own house. She
is now cataloguing the several hundred tunes in the manu-
script books he used for collecting folk music.
Patrick Shuldham Shaw’s mother was a founder member of
the English Folk Song Society so he was born into the
world of folk music. He is himself a collector of folk songs
and has broadcast. traditional music in several languages.
He also sang madrigals at R.V.W.’s house.
Jean Stewart played for R.V.W. in the orchestra at Leith
Hill Festivals while she was still a student at the Royal
College of Music. She was the viola player of the Menges
Quartet and R.V.W. wrote his second quartet, in A minor,
for her, each movement beginning with a viola solo.
Daphne Ibbott enjoys*accompanying all kinds of music. She
accompanies Campoli, is a member of the Beaufort Trio
and of The New Music Chamber Ensemble.
The Purcell Singers are a small professional choir formed
by Imogen Holst in 1953. They sing early music, going back
as far as the 12th century, and they have recorded some of
Britten’s music under the composer. Their first professional
engagement was a concert of folk music at Cecil Sharp
House at which R.V.W. was present.
Imogen Holst knew R.V.W. since her early childhood as her
father’s closest friend and later was his pupil at the Royal
College of Music. At one time she worked on the staff
of the English Folk Dance and Song Society and for the
last 10 years she has been an Artistic Director of the
Aldeburgh Festival with Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears.
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