> Anne Briggs > Songs > Maa Bonny Lad

Maa Bonny Lad

[ Roud 204 ; Ballad Index RcMBL ; Mudcat 165968 ; trad.]

Isla Cameron sang My Bonny Lad on Alan Lomax’s 1955 anthology The Columbia World Library of Folk and Primitive Music - Volume III: England. Isla Cameron and Bob Davenport sang My Bonny Lad in 1964 on their album Northumbrian Minstrelsy, and Bob Davenport sang it in 1997 on the Fellside CD The Red Haired Lad.

In 1971, Anne Briggs sang Maa Bonny Lad unaccompanied on her first solo album Anne Briggs. This recording was reissued on her Fellside and Topic compilation CDs, Classic Anne Briggs and A Collection. A.L. Lloyd commented in the original album’s sleeve notes:

Sir Richard Runciman Terry, member of a Northumbrian shipping family and a good collector of sailing-ship shanties dredged up this song from childhood memory and gave it to W.G. Whittaker who published it in North Countrie Ballads, Songs and Pipe-Tunes in 1922. In the song, “keel” means a sea-going boat, not the flat-bottomed coal-barges usually associated with the Tyne.

Carolyn Robson sang Ma Bonny Lad in 1981 on her Dingle’s album Banks of Tyne. She noted:

Ma Bonny Lad first appeared in print in W.G. Whittaker’s North Country Ballads of 1921. Keel boats were used to ferry coal and men to and from coal boats which were too big to wharf. This keelman obviously never made it home. This was the first Northumbrian folk song I can remember learning in school.

Folly Bridge sang My Bonny Lad in 1991 on their WildGoose cassette All in the Same Tune. Claire Lloyd learned it from Anne Briggs’ album.

Marie Robson sang My Bonny Lad on the 2002 Free Reed 25th anniversary anthology This Label Is Not Removable.

Rachel Unthank & The Winterset sang Ma Bonny Lad in 2007 on their second CD, The Bairns.

Matt Lazenby sang Ma Bonny Lad on his 2020 EP Sweet Dreams of Life.

Lyrics

Anne Briggs sings Maa Bonny Lad

Have you seen ought of my bonny lad?
Are you sure he’s well-o?
He’s gone o’er lang wi’ a stick in his hand,
He’s gone to row the keel-o.

Yes I hae seen your bonny lad,
’Twas on the sea I spied him.
His grave is green but not wi’ grass
And you’ll never lie beside him.

Hae you seen ought of my bonny lad?
And are you sure he’s well-o?
He’s gone o’er lang wi’ a stick in his hand,
He’s gone to row the keel-o.