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The Shoals of Herring

[ Roud 13642 ; Ballad Index PaSe154 ; DT SHOALHER ; Mudcat 54563 , 77133 ; Ewan MacColl]

The Shoals of Herring was written for the third of the eight BBC radio ballads by Ewan MacColl, Charles Parker and Peggy Seeger, Singing the Fishing (first broadcast on 16 August 1960, released on an Argo LP in 1966 and now available on a Topic CD). It was about the herring fishery and fishermen, and the song was designed specifically to highlight the life-story of Sam Larner, who had spent a long life as a herring fisherman, but was retired at the time of the recording. He first went to sea, he said, in 1892, when he was just a boy. In this moving documentary, the song is sung partly by Ewan MacColl and partly by Bert Lloyd, all skilfully interpolated among the spoken words of Mr Larner. An extract of this with A.L. Lloyd and Sam Larner is on the last track of the first side of Karl Dallas’ brilliant 4 LP anthology, The Electric Muse: The Story of Folk Into Rock.

(A 12" LP of Sam Larner was later produced: Now Is the Time for Fishing: Songs and Speech by Sam Larner of Winterton, England, collected and edited by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger; Folkways 1961; Topic 2000.)

Ewan MacColl sang The Shoals of Herring in 1963 on his Folkways album New Briton Gazette Volume Two and again in 1983 on his album Black and White; the latter recording was also included in 1996 on the 3 CD anthology The New Electric Muse: The Story of Folk Into Rock. A recording from Ewan MacColl’s 70^th Birthday Symposium on 1 March 1986 at GLC County Hall, South Bank, London was first broadcast by the BBC on 15 March 1986 and was included in 1995 on MacColl’s Cooking Vinyl album Folk on 2.

Bob Davenport sang The Shoals of Herring on the 1963 Hullabaloo ABC Television programme broadcast on 7 December 1963.

The Ian Campbell Folk Group sang The Shoals of Herring on the 1964 LP Edinburgh Folk Festival Vol. 2, and Nigel Denver recorded it in the same year for his eponymous LP Nigel Denver.

The Three City Four (Martin Carthy, Leon Rosselson, Ralph Trainer and Marian McKenzie) sang The Shoals of Herring on their 1965 LP The Three City Four.

The Exiles sang Shoals of Herring in 1967 on their Topic album The Hale and the Hanged. A.L. Lloyd and Gordon McCulloch noted:

Ewan MacCoIl wrote the words and melody of The Shoals of Herring for his ‘radio-baIlad’ called Singing the Fishing, a documentary feature-programme with music, concerning the life and work of herring fishermen of the Solway and the East Anglian drifting ports, first broadcast by the BBC in 1960.

Louis Killen recorded Shoals of Herring in 1968 for his 1973 LP Sea Chanteys, sang it in 1973 with the Clancy Brothers on their album Greatest Hits, and sang it solo in 1979 on the Folkways album Sea Songs Seattle and in 1995 on his CD Sailors, Ships & Chanteys.

Derek Sarjeant sang The Shoals of Herring in 1970 on his album Derek Sarjeant Sings English Folk. The album’s sleeve noted:

This is Derek’s arrangement of Ewan MacColl’s justly famous song, which he wrote in 1961 for one of the BBC radio-ballads, about Britain’s herring fishing industry, called Singing the Fishing.

The Corries sang The Shoals of Herring on their 1975 album Live From Scotland Volume 3. This track was included in 2009 on the Greentrax anthology People and Songs of the Sea.

Dave Burland, Tony Capstick and Dick Gaughan sang Shoals of Herring in 1978 on their album Songs of Ewan MacColl, and Dave Burland returned to it in 1996 on his CD Benchmark. Dick Gaughan sang Shoals of Herring in the music recorded for the 1983 ballet Shoals of Herring. This recording was included in 2025 on his box set R/evolution 1969/83.

Isla St Clair sang The Shoals of Herring in 1995 in her BBC Radio 2 series and on the accompanying album Tatties & Herrin’: The Sea.

Ceolbeg sang The Shoals of Herring in 2000 on their Greentrax album Cairn Water. They noted:

The power of Ewan McColl’s writing comes through as clearly now as it did in the sixties. But, as the herring itself now vanishes from our seas, there is an added poignancy which, Rod [Paterson] feels, revives this song forty years later.

Bob Fox sang Shoals of Herring in 2003 on his Topic album Borrowed Moments. He noted:

The songs of Ewan MacColl are amongst the most powerful and emotive songs ever written and have always had a great influence on me. It would seem that he also had the knack of writing songs about industries destined to disappear, coal mines, steam trains, and if the new EU fishing regulations are anything to go by surely Shoals of Herring is an epitaph for the fishing industry.

Mick Groves sang The Shoals of Herring on his 2004 album of songs of Ewan MacColl, Fellow Journeyman. He noted:

Another big chunk of [MacColl’s] life was taken up with the Radio Balads he made with Peggy Seeger and BBC producer Charles Parker. From these I have plucked: Shoals of Herring (Singing the Fishing, winner of the Prix d’ltalia), Blantyre Explosion (The Big Hewer), and Champion at Keepin’ ’em Rolling (Shuttle and Cage).

Meet on the Ledge sang The Shoals of Herring on the 2008 Cromer Lifeboats charity compilation Never Chance Your Luck Against the Sea.

Robert Lawrence sang The Shoals of Herring in 2010 on his CD The Journey Home.

Jon Boden sang Shoals of Herring as the 20 February 2011 entry of his project A Folk Song a Day. He noted in the blog that it’s a “powerful song from the Radio Ballads. Sung on FSC, despite being a tad wordy for communal singing—the strength of the melody drives it on.”

Seth Lakeman sang The Shoals of Herring in 2015 on Cooking Vinyl’s Ewan MacColl centenary tribute album Joy of Living.

Fraser and Ian Bruce sang Shoals of Herrin’ on their 2017 album Auld Hat New Heids.

Lyrics

Ewan MacColl and A.L. Lloyd on Singing the Fishing

[EM, track 1] With our nets and gear we’re faring
On the wild and wasteful ocean.
It’s there on the deep that we harvest and reap our bread
As we hunt the bonny shoals of herring.

[ALL, track 4] Oh, it was a fine and a pleasant day,
Out of Yarmouth harbour I was faring
As a cabin boy on a sailing lugger,
For to go and hunt the shoals of herring.

[ALL, track 4] Oh, the work was hard and the hours were long
And the treatment surely took some bearing.
There was little kindness and the kicks were many
As we hunted for the shoals of herring.

[ALL, track 4] Oh, we fished the Swarte and the Broken Bank;
I was cook and I’d a quarter-sharing.
And I used to sleep standing on my feet
And I’d dream about the shoals of herring.

[ALL, track 4] Oh, we left the homegrounds in the month of June,
And to canny Shields we soon was bearing,
With a hundred cran of the silver darlings
That we’d taken from the shoals of herring.

[EM, track 4] Now you’re up on deck, you’re a fisherman.
You can swear and show a manly bearing.
Take your turn on watch with the other fellows
While you’re searching for the shoals of herring.

[ALL, track 5] Oh, I earned my keep and I paid my way,
And I earned the gear that I was wearing,
Sailed a million miles, caught ten million fishes,
We were sailing after shoals of herring.

[EM, track 15] Wi’ our nets and gear we’re faring
On the wild and wasteful ocean.
It’s there on the deep that we harvest and reap our bread
As we hunt the bonny shoals of herring.

[ALL, track 15] Night and day the sea we’re daring,
Come wind or come winter gale, sweating or cold,
Growing up or growing old or dying,
While we’re hunting for the shoals of herring.

(EM = verse sung by Ewan MacColl, ALL = sung by A.L. Lloyd; the track numbers refer to the Topic CD reissue of Singing the Fishing)

Ewan MacColl on Black and White

With the nets and gear we’re faring
On the wild and wasteful ocean.
It’s there on the deep that we harvest and reap our bread
As we hunt the bonny shoals of herring.

Oh, it was a fine and a pleasant day,
Out of Yarmouth harbour I was faring
As a cabin boy on a sailing lugger,
For to go and hunt the shoals of herring.

Oh, the work was hard and the hours were long
And the treatment, sure it took some bearing.
There was little kindness and the kicks were many
As we hunted for the shoals of herring.

Oh, we fished the Swarte and the Broken Bank;
I was cook and I’d a quarter-sharing.
And I used to sleep standing on my feet
And I’d dream about the shoals of herring.

Well, we left the homegrounds in the month of June,
And to canny Shields we soon was bearing,
With a hundred cran of the silver darlings
That we’d taken from the shoals of herring.

Now you’re up on deck, you’re a fisherman.
You can swear and show a manly bearing.
Take your turn on watch with the other fellows
While you’re following the shoals of herring.

In the stormy seas and the living gales
Just to earn your daily bread you’re daring
From the Dover Straits to the Faeroe Islands
While you’re following the shoals of herring.

Well, I earned my keep and I paid my way,
And I earned the gear that I was wearing,
Sailed a million miles, caught ten million fishes,
We was following the shoals of herring.

Acknowledgements

Transcribed by Reinhard Zierke with a bit of help from Matt Rose. Thank you!