- Al Lloyd
-
English Drinking Songs
- The Derby Ram Time: 2:42
- The Foggy Dew Time: 2:40
- Maggie May Time: 1:39
- When Johnson's Ale Was New Time: 1:51
- The Butcher & The Chambermaid Time: 1:40
- A Jug of Punch Time: 2:26
- The Parson & The Maid Time: 1:20
- Three Drunken Huntsmen Time: 1:39
- All for Me Grog Time: 1:44
- The Drunken Maidens Time: 1:24
- Rosin the Beau Time: 3:42
- The Farmer's Servant Time: 1:53
- John Barleycorn Time: 2:12
- A Jug of This Time: 1:40
-
There are songs that are sung by the kitchen fireside and songs sung at the tail of a plough. There are also songs bawled around the barroom table of a little country alehouse on a Saturday night when the place is too crowded for darts.
The songs on this album come from such an alehouse on the gusty East coast of England. It's name is The Eel's Foot, but its address is a secret; the regular customers don't want a lot of tourists coming to spoil the singing and drink all the beer.
To The Eel's Foot, on a Saturday night, the farm-workers bring their songs and match them against the songs of sailors and cattle-dealers and travelling tinsmiths. Everything is formal. A chairman keeps good order, with a cribbage marker for a gavel. No one sings unless called upon, but each gets his turn. Mostly the songs are of the "Saturday night" kind that the genteel would call "bacchanalian". These are not drinking songs in the strict sense - not songs merely in praise of liquor - for in England such songs are usually made by men of booklearning who fancy themselves as rakes, and the folk will have none of them.
The beer drinkers in The Eel's Foot like their songs to tell a bit of a story. And they like their singing to go on till closing time... and a little later. Here are some of the songs they sing... songs as sly as a tinker's wink, as rough as a ploughman's hand, songs as snug and social as The Eel's Foot itself, with the wind and the rain outside and the firelight and the music within.
THIS NOTE ACCOMPANIED THE ORIGINAL RELEASE OF THIS ALBUM IN 1961 AND WAS WRITTEN BY THE FEATURED SINGER, A L LLOYD.
A L Lloyd was born in London in 1908 of musically endowed parents and learned many songs as a boy, especially from his folksinging fisherman father. At the age of 15, after the death of his parents, he emigrated to Australia, working there as a stockman, horsebreaker and shearing roustabout, and taking his first conscious interest in the folksongs he heard sung by his fellow workers. He extended his first- hand acquaintance with the songs and their singers while working at sea during the 1930s, particularly on Antarctic whaling ships. Later he became a freelance journalist and one of England's leading songlorists and musicologists.
English Drinking Songs
A.L.Lloyd with
Alf Edwards concertina, Al Jeffery banjo & harmonica
1 The Derby Ram
3.22
2 The Foggy Dew
3.24
3 Maggie May
2.06
4 When Johnson's Ale was New
2.21
5 The Butcher & the Chambermaid
2.07
6 A Jug of Punch
3.05
7 The Parson & the Maid
1.42
8 Three Drunken Huntsmen
2.06
9 All for Me Grog
2.12
10 The Drunken Maidens
1.47
11 Rosin the Beau
4.43
12 The Farmer's Servant
2.23
13 John Barleycorn
2.48
14 A Jug of This
2.11
Alf Edwards plays English concertina
on tracks 2,6,9, 11 & 13; Al Jeffery
plays banjo
on tracks 1,3,5,7,8,10,12 & 14 and harmonica on
track 4.
This CD is released courtesy of Fantasy, Inc.
Recording by Richard Swettenham & Bill
Leader.
Production for CD by Tony Engle.
This collection : © & © Topic Records
Ltd/Fantasy, Inc 1998
Topic Records Ltd, 50 Stroud Green Road, London N4 3EF
Manufactured in EC