Category: Songs

Copyright David Harley, 1981

Another example of the sort of song I never write. I’m not really sure where this one came from. When I was singing with Anna (Lyn) Thompson in the 80s we were going to work this one up as a duet, but never really got to it. So I pretty much forgot about it until recently, so for a while there was just a very rough-and-ready demo here. The present demo, however, was recorded back in the 80s, and the voice was in better shape.

2020 version:

Down to the River: copyright David Harley, 1981

Another example of the sort of song I never write. I’m not really sure where this one came from.

I won’t go down to the river / anyway not yet
There’s too much to do and the water’s cold / and I don’t want my feet wet
I don’t want my feet wet

I won’t go down to the river / I guess I really should
But the sand’s so warm between my toes / and you know it feels so good
I know it does me good

Come on down to the river / it can’t do you harm
You’ve got to learn sometime to sink or swim / and the sun will keep you warm
The sun will keep you warm

I won’t go down to the river / you know I can’t go down
The water’s so still, the sides so steep / I’m scared that I might drown
So scared that I might drown

Come on down to the river / the road’s so hard and rough
If you keep your head and your hands are clean / surely you can’t drown in love?
You can’t drown in love

I can’t go down to the river / I surely can’t go down
My soul is parched but my body aches / and I just know I’ll drown
I know I’ll surely drown

Come on down to the river / it tastes so sweet and cold
Come on down before it gets too late / and wash the mud out of your soul
The mud out of your soul

We’ve got to get on down to the river / we have to learn to trust
Got to wash away all the doubt and fear / before the whole damn’ world dries up
Before the world dries up

David Harley
Wheal Alice Music

Copyright David Harley, 1987

Backup:

 

Let’s get down to cases before someone packs their bags
And there’s nothing else to do but walk away.
Please don’t say there’s nothing to talk over: that’s not true
Unless you’d rather just call it a day…

There’s a cuckoo in our love nest
I can see him in your eyes
When you’re looking straight at me
It’s not always me you see
Who is that ghost you recognized?

Sometimes when we’re making love
You seem confused about my name
It seems I’m sharing you
With someone else you knew
Who’s gone, but not forgotten just the same

If you need time to think it over
You’re right, there’s nothing to explain
But please don’t go burning your fingers
On any old flames

I’m not afraid of losing you
I never had you anyway
There always seemed to be
A part of you that you kept from me
Words you never cared to say

If you need time to think it over
You’re right, there’s nothing to explain
But please don’t go burning your fingers
On any old flames

I’m not afraid of losing you
I never had you anyway
There always seemed to be
A part of you that you kept from me
Words you never cared to say

David Harley

I’ve heard too many gorgeously sung versions of this to add my own indifferent vocals to the pot, but I do want to include it in a recording project, so this is a sketch for an instrumental version. It needs work, of course – it’s much too busy at the moment – but I think there are possibilities here. It fits because I’m planning to include a couple of my own Yeats settings. However, the well-known melody used here doesn’t need replacing by any tune of mine. :)

Backup:

After I wrote a review of the CD ‘A Shropshire Lad’ (by Michael Raven and Joan Mills), in which I specifically mentioned that Michael had set When I Was One and Twenty to the tune better known as Brigg Fair, I had a thought. I mentioned in passing in that article that the theme of the poem is not dissimilar to that of the Yeats poem (based on an imperfectly remembered folk song) Down By The Salley Gardens. The Yeats poem was published in 1889, and A Shropshire Lad was published in 1896, so it’s very likely that Housman knew the Yeats poem, though for all I know, he may have written his own poem before he came upon Salley Gardens. I’m not sure it matters all that much: I’m not doing a PhD thesis. :)

Down by the salley gardens
my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens
with little snow-white feet.
She bid me take love easy,
as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish,
with her would not agree.

In a field by the river
my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder
she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy,
as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish,
and now am full of tears.

Anyway, a quick turn around the fretboard demonstrates that the melody Maids of Mourne Shore, the one most commonly associated with Down By The Salley Gardens since Hughes used it for his setting in 1909, would also work with When I was One and Twenty. As would any of the other tunes associated with or set to the Yeats poem, I guess. Oddly enough, the melody to The Rambling Boys of Pleasure, usually assumed to be the song that Yeats was trying to recreate, probably wouldn’t work so well, at any rate without some modification to accommodate the length of the lines. According to the music historian A.V. Butcher, Butterworth‘s setting to One and Twenty was related to a folk melody, but which one is unknown. Certainly the setting doesn’t ring any bells with me.

David Harley