Dance Up The Sun
(John Thompson)
Dance up the sun on a fine May morning,
Dance up the sun to call in the Spring,
Dance away the dark while the new day's dawning,
All is new when we dance and we sing.
Chorus:
And the bells will ring when the morris men come,
As we call in the Spring and we dance up the sun.
The bells will ring when the morris men come,
As we call in the Spring and we dance up the sun.
Gather in the dark, recall the Winter
Celebrate the tales that the old ones bring
The music rises with the first light's gleaming,
The dawn will break and the bells will ring.
Form the lines and turn together
Hear the clash of the staff as we shout and we sing,
The tunes all sound to the tattercoat's flying,
We call up the light as the day comes in.
Ancient ways with the season's turning,
The passing years see the dance go on
We sing the past as we dance to the future
We celebrate the year with the dawn of the sun.
The First Time Ever I Saw
Your Face
(Ewan MacColl - arr. Murray/Thompson)
The first time ever I saw your face
I thought the sun rose in your eyes
And the moon and stars were the gift you gave
To the dark and empty skies, my love
To the dark and empty skies
The first time ever I kissed your mouth
I thought the earth moved in my hand
Like the trembling heart of a captive bird
That was there at your command, my love
That was there at your command
The first time ever I held you close
And felt your heart beat next to mine
I thought our joy would fill the earth
And last 'til the end of time, my love
And last 'til the end of time.
Lament for Brendan Behan/The Auld
Triangle
(Fred Geis/Brendan Behan)
Word has come from Dublin city
She's lost her sweet, angry voice
Born of the spirit his flesh could not contain
Brendan Behan is dead
No stranger to life,
He lived right enough
No stranger to the glass in his hand
No stranger to the cause he fought for all his life
Brendan Behan is dead
Ireland has lost her sweet, angry singer
No more will his words of fine design
Ring out in Gaelic or sound down the lanes
Brendan Behan is dead
A hungry feeling came o'er me stealing
As the mice were squealing in my prison cell
Chorus:
And the auld triangle went jingle-jangle
All along the banks of the Royal Canal
To begin the morning, the warder bawling
Get out of bed now, and clean up your cell
The screw was peeping, the lag lay sleeping
He was weeping for his girl, Sal
In the female prison, there are 75 thousand women
And it's oft times with them, that I wished I did dwell
The wind was sighing, the day was dying
I lay crying in my prison cell
Wooden Spoon
(Nicole Murray)
Chorus:
The wooden spoon is in my fingers
It is dancing in the dough
Creaming butter in with sugar
Beating egg-whites into snow
Folding milk and flour in turn
With fragrant table-spoon of liquor
Lightly rising with my thoughts
As little candles burn and flicker
I'm the cook of all the ages
In my arms the mixing bowl
Baking tray or double saucepan
Rising up a banquet for your soul
I make rituals to mark your rites of passage
Spoon and knife
Marking as I dance along the table
All the courses of your life
Sweetest mother's milk I gave you
At the triumph of your birth
Filled with magical protection
Honouring your first day on this earth
Every year a fine confection
Of a cake to mark that day
Candles, sparklers, cats and spacemen
Princesses in sugar-spun array.
Clashing bells and petals floating
Wedding breakfast in the park
Platters of sublime invention
Sailing 'round your incandescent spark
When you slid the blessed knife
Through royal icing's counterpane
Moistened depths of fruit lay open
All the ringing crystal bubbles sang
When your final course was served
The table's merry disarray
Told of splendour and reknown
A wondrous life resumed into the clay
I was there to play my part
For smooth as marble sat the cake
Clinking glasses glowing stories
All the love that gathered at your wake
Fruitcake, fruitcake, Christmas cake is fruitcake
Wedding cake is fruitcake
Nuts and cherries, rum or brandy
Fruitcake, fruitcake wrapped in paper new-baked
Festive journeys we make
To mark a grand occasion with a ...
The Wine Song
(Grant Baynham)
There are those who like their wine
Because it adds sophistication
To that hearty meal they're serving to their friends.
And there are those who like their wine
Because it helps in the creation
Of that party feel on which so much depends.
And there are those who'd like their wine
To come from eastward-facing chateaux
On the plateaux of Lorraine and all that bunk
But their motives are not mine
And I like lots and lots of wine
And I like it 'cos it makes me drunk.
There are those who take a glass
Because it helps them to relax
They find it helps their social manner to improve
Well, that's a jolly useful scheme
Which I have taken to its logical extreme:
I sometimes get so well-relaxed I can't move
And there's another kind of fellow
Drinks champagne to make him mellow
And he swears by Cliquot, Bollinger and Brut
Well, I tried some Brut myself
I found it on the bathroom shelf
And he was right: it got me mellow as a newt.
Chorus:
You can judge your wine by the quality of the vine,
Its colour and bouquet and all that junk.
But it all comes back to the falling over factor
And the fact that it gets you drunk
There are those who like to think
That it's important what you drink
They haven't got an inkling what it's all about
They spend their evenings wasting
Decent drinking time by tasting
Drops of this and that, then spitting it all out.
They pass along the tables
Strewth, they even read the labels
Muttering things like, "What a shame
The cork has shrunk"
Or "fruity nose" or "too much tannin"
When they ought to get a man in
Who appreciates the chance to get drunk.
They spend their time describing
What they ought to be imbibing
Which is wine of course, although you'd never think it.
For they use words like "young but promising, "
"Precocious," "full of fun" -
You'd think they want to adopt the stuff, not drink it.
And at a meal these silly asses
Have a row of empty glasses
A different wine with every dish they eat.
Me, I mix whatever's handy
In a stiff, all-purpose shandy
Which goes very nice with fish or shredded wheat
There are those who take delight
Pronouncing all the labels right
They roll their r's and do the German glottals.
Me, I couldn't give a monkey's
'Cos the stuff that gets you drunk is
On the inside, not the outside of the bottles
So have a cheese and wine,
Invite your friendly Philistine
Call me drunkard, call me sot
Or call me wino. What do I know?
You'll find me in the kitchen
I'll be gigglin' and twitchin'
Having a sup and throwing up across your lino
You can judge your wine by the quality of the vine
Its colour and bouquet, if you insist.
But it all comes back to the falling over factor
And the fact that it gets you
Misty-eyed and mellow,
Makes you maudlin, mawkish, miserable and pissed
Scots of the Riverina
(Henry Lawson)
The boy cleared out to the city from his home at harvest time --
They were Scots of the Riverina, and to run from home was a crime.
The old man burned his letters, the first and last he burned,
And he scratched his name from the Bible when the old wife's back
was turned.
A year went by and another. There were calls from the firing-line;
They heard the boy had enlisted, but the old man made no sign.
His name must never be mentioned on the farm by Gundagai --
They were Scots of the Riverina with ever the kirk hard by.
The boy came home on his "final", and the township's bonfire
burned.
His mother's arms were about him; but the old man's back was turned.
The daughters begged for pardon till the old man raised his hand
--
A Scot of the Riverina who was hard to understand.
The boy was killed in Flanders, where the best and bravest die.
There were tears at the Grahame homestead and grief in Gundagai;
But the old man ploughed at daybreak and the old man ploughed till
the mirk
There were furrows of pain in the orchard while his housefolk went
to the kirk.
The hurricane lamp in the rafters dimly, dimly burned;
And the old man died at the table when the old wife's back was turned.
Face down on his bare arms folded he sank with his wild grey hair
Outspread on the open Bible and a name re-written there.
Sweetest Complexity
(John Thompson)
Chorus:
I will drink of thee, sweetest complexity
For a time we may embrace,
'Though the morning finds you gone
The hours growing late,
We few are left to talk and solve the problems of the world
Before the night takes us in sleep
The time we have is short
But in these hours we'll come to know
A little more of each other's woes
Our hopes and dreams and times
The glasses now passed 'round
Sweet liquid filled that we may taste
The magic of a distant place
Where dark pools lie unseen
Water's sweet release will fill the air with flavours bright
To guide we pilgrims through the night
To places we've not been
Our troubled thoughts may pass away
Upon your gentle touch
Though we may remember little
You will have shown us much
You come to us from distant places:
Smoky fire or clearest stream
To share with us your secrets
Alchemy's sweetest dream.
Killing Floor
(Michael Atkinson)
Joe spoke no english but he had a dream
And he saved up most of his pay
To bring his wife and six kids from the Lebanon
And settle down here to stay
You could feel the prison of his loneliness
Cause he wouldn't see them for years
He kept brandy behind the compressed air tanks
And he gulped it when the coast was clear
Nick the Greek collected tropical fish
But he had to be a character too
So he smuggled in Pirhana just to break the law
And he fed them on kangaroo
Bob's pride was his handlebar moustache
And he said he still combed out sand
Pushed a tank through the Iraqi desert
So they made him the leading hand
And the summer night shifts were long and cool
And Charlie chain smoked cigars
David sweated in his speckle paint mask
As he gazed out at the stars
Fred had been a farmer and a heavyweight champ
He had hands like a stump jump plough
Move the earth with a thrust of his arm
He was loading on the paint line now
And the boys made a noise every Friday night
In the bar of the Hilton Hotel
Downing pints and chewing the fat
Till the ten o'clock closing bell
It was only rumour until the foreman came
And hiding his shame with a cough
He said they're cutting back down to one shift now
They're gonna have to lay you off
Joe held his gaze and gulped at brandy
And spat it out at his feet
Bob stood bolt still looking thunderstruck
Nick swore for an hour in Greek
But their anger was spent in a rush of fire
And then smouldered out of mind
When they shook hands on that last grey day
Each was in his way resigned
Then a few days later I saw old Joe
And he looked like he'd aged ten years
Drunk on the tiles at the Exchange Hotel
And he couldn't hold back the tears
Fred had talked of his grueling heavyweight bouts
I remembered what he'd said
There's no giving up on that killing floor
If you don't fight you're dead
If you work with your hands for your livelihood
Some day you might have to choose
When the class war rages on the factory floor
If you don't fight you lose
Rue
(Mary Humphreys/trad arr Tom Bliss)
As I walked out one morning
So early in the day
I spied a fair young maid a-walking
Gathering sweet may
I asked of her to bed with me,
To marry if we do
There's a herb in my father's garden
And some do call it rue
Chorus:
When fishes fly and swallows die
Young men will prove true
There's a herb in my father's garden
And some do call it rue
We walked and we talked together
'Til at length we did agree
To lay upon a bank of ivy
'Neath a shady tree
The song thrush and the blackbird
In and out the bush they flew
There's a herb in my father's garden
And some do call it rue
When twenty weeks are over
and her stays no longer tie
She writes to me a letter
But to my shame I reply
"My family would have none of me
If I should marry you"
There's a herb in my father's garden
And some do call it rue
Well maybe she goes walking
With a baby on her hip
Or maybe to the old wise woman
Medic for to sip
If I should have my time again
There's so much I'd not do
There's a herb in my father's garden
And some do call it rue
Miner's Washing
(John Warner)
I came from Durham in '99,
Married a laddie from the Coal Creek mine,
The finest lad that a girl could ever know,
Till he brought me his washin' from the pit below.
Chorus:
Scrubbing the miner's clothes,
Scrubbing the miner's clothes,
All piled up in a ghastly stack,
Heavy as lead, and smelly and black,
And oh the pain in my aching back,
Scrubbing the miner's clothes.
Now your Korumburra miner is a grimy sort of bloke,
So I drop in his duds for an all night soak.
I'll take me a soap and I'll grate it like a cheese,
And chuck it in a bucket with his grubby dungarees.
I get me up before the peep o' light
My copper for to fill and my fire for to light,
I'll serve Tom his crib while the copper's on the boil,
Then gird up my muscles for a day's hard toil.
It's drag 'em from the copper to the rinsing tub,
Pound 'em with the dolly and scrub, scrub, scrub,
Pour away the mucky water, do it all again,
Heave 'em through the wringer and pray it doesn't rain.
Beyond Kardella, the sky's looking fine,
Basket up the washing to the old clothes line,
I'll bet when it's hung out and I've heaved up the prop,
The rain'll come a pourin' and the wind will drop.
Now all you maidens who to marriage do incline,
Never wed a laddie from the Coal Creek mine,
A squatter might be surly, a merchant might be mean,
A banker might be boring, but they're easier to clean.
John Barleycorn
(Trad/arr John Thompson)
John Barleycorn is a hero bold
As any in the land
His fame has stood for ages long
And forever it may stand
The whole wide world respecteth him
No matter friend or foe
And those that make with him too free
He's sure to lay them low
Chorus:
Hey John Barleycorn, Ho John Barleycorn
Old and young your praises sung
John Barleycorn
He lies in the earth for a long, long time
'Til the rain from heaven does fall
John Barleycorn does rise again
And so surprises them all
He grows into the Summer sun
His robes so rich and green
His head it is speared with a goodly beard
On his face the gold is seen
The hired men with the scythes so sharp
Cut him off at the knee
They beat and they pierce him o'er and o'er
Treating him most barborously
They then fill up some darksome pit
With water to the brim
They then heave in little barleycorn
To make him sink or swim
His noble blood they let grow old
Then they drink it by the bowl
John Barleycorn rises up again
And so befuddles them all
He can make a boy into a man
A man into an ass
He can make the huntsmen hunt the fox
And change silver into brass
John Barleycorn is a hero bold
As any in the land
His fame has stood for ages long
And forever it may stand
He can bid the mournful heart rejoice
Bring joy to noble's hall
Make weak men strong and old men young
And all men brave and bold.
Time is a Tempest
(John Broomhall/John Thompson)
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
We are all travellers, we are all travellers
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
Travelling through the storm
Our cities are crowded, our forests are falling
Warclouds above, angry voices are calling
Five minutes to midnight is no time for stalling
It's time to share our load
So lift up your voices and sing of the wind and rain
Sing of the wind and rain, sing of the wind and rain
So lift up your voices and sing of the wind and rain
Travelling through the storm
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
We are all travellers, we are all travellers
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
Travelling through the storm
They've poisoned the oceans, they've dammed the great rivers
They've killed all the jungles, they're takers, not givers
They call it progress, well it gives me the shivers
We're in for a Winter that's cold.
So lift up your voices and sing of the wind and rain
Sing of the wind and rain, sing of the wind and rain
So lift up your voices and sing of the wind and rain
Travelling through the storm
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
We are all travellers, we are all travellers
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
Travelling through the storm
So brothers and sisters, we'll join hands together
With love in our struggle, we'll face the foul weather
And when the sun shines through, under blue skies we'll gather
Our journey will take us home
So lift up your voices and sing of the wind and rain
Sing of the wind and rain, sing of the wind and rain
So lift up your voices and sing of the wind and rain
Travelling through the storm
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
We are all travellers, we are all travellers
Time is a tempest and we are all travellers
Travelling through the storm
Rosslyn Murray's Extra-Special Boiled Fruitcake Recipe
2 eggs
2 tablespoons chopped peel
1/2 cup plain flour
1 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 cups self-raising flour
1 cup water
1 teaspoon bicarb of soda
1 teaspoon mixed spice
125 g (4 oz) butter
2 cups mixed fruit (sultanas, currants, raisins, dates, cherries,
walnuts - not technically a fruit, but very nice)
A smidgin of rum
Grease and line a 20 cm (8 in) round tin with paper. Beat the eggs
and sift the flour. Mix the fruit, peel, sugar, water and butter
together in a large saucepan, bring slowly to the boil and simmer
for only one minute. Remove from the heat and allow to cool. Beat
the eggs into the mixture and then fold in the flour and soda. Blend
all ingredients well. Place in a moderate oven, 180 deg. C (350
F) and cook for 1 1/4 - 1 1/2 hours. Test with knife or skewer.
Yum!
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