Songs

Part One: Love, Courtship and Desire

I Long to Have a Young Man

1. Whistle, Daughter, Whistle (Roud 1570; G/D 7:1334)
2. Don’t Let Me Die an Old Maid (Roud 802; G/D 7:1378; Henry H138)
3. Oo’er, What a Death to Die! (RoudBS B109828)
4. How Can I Keep My Maidenhead? (Roud 13128)
5. The Maid’s Conjuring Book (Roud V42733)
6. Dainty Davie (Roud 2387)
7. The Besom Maker (Roud 910)
8. Nightshift

#3 words Mabel Constanduros, music Gwen Lewis; tune and additional words Sandra Kerr;
#8 Peggy Seeger, based on Sheila Douglas’s Too Much of a Good Thing

The Unfortunate Lass

9. The Shearing’s Not for You (Roud 4845; G/D 7:1486)
10. The Unfortunate Lass (Roud 2; Laws Q26)
11. The Trees They Do Grow High (Roud 31; Laws O35; G/D 6:1222)
12. Must I Be Bound? (Roud 18829; Henry H218ab)
13. Fair Annie (Roud 42; Child 62; G/D 6:1161; Henry H126)
14. The Two Sisters (Roud 8; Child 10; G/D 2:213)

My Thing Is My Own

15. Who Will Shoe Your Pretty Little Foot? (Roud 49; Child 76; G/D 6:1226)
16. Prince Heathen (Roud 3336; Child 104; G/D 7:1497)
17. Blow Away the Morning Dew (Roud 11; Child 112; G/D 2:301)
18. Tansey’s Mill
19. Fair Maid of Islington (Roud 168)
20. Three Drunken Maidens (Roud 252)
21. William Taylor (Roud 158; Laws N11; G/D 1:169; Henry H213, H757)
22. Old Woman’s Song (Roud 1648)

#18 text based on The Magdalen’s Lament from J.R. Kinloch’s book The Ballad Book (1827), tune The Keech in the Creel

Part Two: Marriage

Take Your Partners …

23. Lady Diamond (Roud 112; Child 269; G/D 6:1224)
24. The Old Man From Over the Sea (Roud 362; G/D 4:815)
25. You Must Have a Man About the House (Roud V31695)
26. Darling Annie
27. The Sandgate Girl’s Lamentation (Roud 3170)
28. Sorry the Day (Roud 1561)
29. The Woman That Wish’d She’d Never Got Married (Roud V983)
30. Don’t Get Married Girls

#26 Peggy Seeger;
#30 Leon Rosselson

We’ve Been Together Now for Forty Years

31. My Old Dutch (Roud 25943)
32. Get Up and Bar the Door (Roud 115; Child 275; G/D 2:321)
33. Dolly Duggins (Roud V4887)
34. My Husband’s Got No Courage (Roud 870; G/D 7:1367)
35. Supper Is Not Ready (Roud 2577)
36. John Anderson, My Jo (Roud 16967)
37. Begone, Begone (Roud 966)
38. The Jealous Husband Well Fitted (Roud V19874)

Nothing Between Us Now

39. Lament of the Working-Class Hero’s Wife
40. The Gypsy Laddie (Roud 1; Child 200; G/D 2:278; Henry H124)
41. The Scolding Wife (Roud 2576; G/D 7:1284)
42. Marrowbones (Roud 183; Laws Q2; G/D 2:318; Henry H174; TYG 6)
43. Emily
44. Nothing Between Us Now

#39 new words to a trad. Scots tune by Linda Peachey and sisters from Edinburgh and Glasgow women’s liberation groups, 1977;
#43 Peggy Seeger;
#44 John Pole, 1977

Part Three: Motherhood and Childhood

We Must Choose

45. We Must Choose
46. The Death of Queen Jane (Roud 77; Child 170; G/D 3:693)
47. The Cruel Mother (Roud 9; Child 20; G/D 2:193; TYG 73)
48. Gathering Rushes (Roud 899; G/D 7:1493)
49. The Wee Totum (Roud 5551; G/D 5:1072)
50. Bridget and the Pill
51. Nine-Month Blues
52. What’ll the Neighbours Say?

#45 Frankie Armstrong, 1976;
#50 Words Brian Pearson, tune trad.;
#51 Peggy Seeger;
#52 Sandra Kerr

Wheni Suzy Was a Baby

53. Lullaby for a Very New Baby
54. Dance to Your Daddy (Roud 2439; G/D 8:1562)
55. Hush You My Babby (Roud 19909)
56. Bee-o
57. Rock-A-Bye Baby (Roud 2768; G/D 8:1552; Henry H591a)
58. My Ma’s a Millionaire
59. When Suzy Was a Baby
60. Eight O’Clock Bells
61. Curly Locks (Roud 19787)
62. Hecketty Pecketty (Roud 3459)
63. Robin A-Thrush (Roud 2792; TYG 1)
64. Old Mother Reilly (Roud 19075)
65. Boys Will Be Boys

#53 Peggy Seeger, 1973;
#54 words William Watson;
#58 Children’s street song, Glasgow version;
#59 Clapping game, collecte by Alison McMorland;
#60 Skipping game;
#65 Leon Rosselson

Part Four: Work—the Waged and the Unwaged

A Woman’s Work …

66. I Remember Christmas
67. The Old Man and His Wife (Roud 281; Laws Q1; Henry H702)
68. The Housewife’s Lament (Roud 5472)
69. Nine Hours a Day (Roud V5840)
70. Come Geordie Hold the Bairn
71. Washing Day (Roud 3747)
72. Lady Bus Driver
73. Get Back to Your Home!
74. The Maintenance Engineer
75. The Poor Whore’s Complaint (Roud V32296)
76. ’Ilda
77. A Woman’s Work (RoudBS B118165)

#66 Sam Richards, 1973;
#70 Joe Wilson (1841-75);
#72 words David Bradford, music Helen Glavin, 1977;
#73 Steve Skinner, 1977;
#74 Sandra Kerr, 1974;
#76 words Marie Makino, music Ernest Barry, 1932;
#77 words Sue Pay, 1934, tune Sandra Kerr, 1977

The Boss’s Darling?

78. Factory Girl (Roud 1659; Henry H127)
79. Cushie Butterfield (Roud 3504)
80. Fish Gutters’ Song (Roud 12504)
81. The Boss’s Darling
82. The Testimony of Patience Kershaw
83. The Spinner’s Wedding (Roud 12503)
84. The Jute Mill Song (Roud 2585)
85. I’m a Poor Old Weaver (Roud V32780)
86. Part-Time Job
87. Typist’s Song
88. I’m Gonna Be an Engineer

#80 Ewan MacColl;
#81 Jean Hart of the Women’s Theatre Group for Work to Role, 1974;
#82 Frank Higgins, 1969;
#83 Mary Brooksbank;
#86 words Chris Rodgers, tune Rocky Road to Dublin, from Womankind, 1975;
#87 Sam Richards, 1975;
#88 Peggy Seeger, 1972

Keep That Trouble Stirring

89. The Coal Owner and the Poor Pitman’s Wife (Roud 44465)
90. Strike! Strike! Strike!
91. Idris Strike Song
92. Equal Pay Blues
93. Song for the Trico Women Workers
94. Picket Line Song
95. Woman This and Woman That
96. Benledi Street Ballad
97. Nothing for Free
98. I Don’t Take the Welfare to Bed
99. The Lid of My Granny’s Bin (Roud 36047)
100. Women of This Glen

#89 William Hornsby, 1844;
#95 Laurence Hausman, 1816;
#97 words Sandra Kerr, tune Shrims and Winkles;
#98 Clair Chapman of the Women’s Theatre Group for Work to Role, 1974;
#100 Gaelic song of the MacDonald women from the bloody Campbell-MacDonald massacre, 1690s

Recorded by Bill Leader at Leader Sound, Halifax;
[10] recorded at Livingstone Studios, Barnet;
Sleeve design by Claudine Meissner

Musicians

Frankie Armstrong: vocals [2-3, 5, 7b, 10, 13];
Kathy Henderson: fiddle [6];
Sandra Kerr: vocals [2, 4-5, 7a, 8, 11], autoharp [4], concertina [8, 11], Appalachian dulcimer [6, 7c], guitar [4, 9-11], piano [13];
Alison McMorland: vocals [1, 5-6, 7c, 9, 12], banjo [2, 9]

Tracks

LP Side 1

1. [AM] Whistle, Daughter, Whistle (Roud 1570; G/D 7:1334)
2. [FA, SK] Hares on the Mountain (Roud 329)
3. [FA] Fair Annie (Roud 42; Child 62; G/D 6:1161; Henry H126)
4. The Maintenance Engineer
5. [FA, SK, AM] The Lament of the Working-Class Hero’s Wife
6. [AM] The Jute Mill Song (Roud 2585)
7. Lullabies: [SK] Bye Bye My Baby (Roud 19912) / [FA] Hush Thee My Babby (Roud 19909) / [AM] Bee-o

LP Side 2

8. [SK] Oo’er, What a Death to Die (RoudBS B109828)
9. [AM] The Wee Totum (Roud 5551; G/D 5:1072)
10. [FA] Family Secret
11. [SK] Nothing Between Us Now
12. [AM] John Anderson, My Jo (Roud 16967)
13. [FA] Lady Bus Driver

All tracks trad. except
Track 4 Sandra Kerr;
Track 5 words Linda Peachey, music trad.;
Track 6 Mary Brooksbank;
Track 8 words Mabel Constanduros, music Gwen Lewis; tune and additional words Sandra Kerr;
Track 11 John Pole;
Track 13 words David Bradford, music Helen Glavin

Side A produced by Dave Ward;
Side B produced by Brian Pearson and Frankie Armstrong

Frankie Armstrong sang both of these songs on her 1990 Harbourtown Records album Ways of Seeing too.

Musicians

Frankie Armstrong: vocals
with women from “Babies Against the Bomb”

Tracks

Side 1

1. Message from Mother Earth

Side 2

2. Shall There Be Womanly Times or Shall We Die?

Track 1 Frankie Armstrong;
Track 2 words Frankie Armstrong, Brian Pearson; tune Frankie Armstrong

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Alistair Banfield for the record details and photos