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Bushes and Briars

[ Roud 1027 ; Master title: Bushes and Briars ; Ballad Index FSOE026 ; VWML HAM/2/9/9 , RVW2/4/3 ; Bodleian Roud 1027 ; DT BUSHBRIR ; Mudcat 40546 ; trad.]

Roy Palmer: Folk Songs Collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams Frank Purslow: The Foggy Dew James Reeves: The Everlasting Circle Stephen Sedley: The Seeds of Love

A phonograph recording of probably Mrs Humphreys of Ingrave, Essex, made in 1904 by Lucy Broadwood and Ralph Vaughan Williams, was included in 1998 on the EFDSS anthology A Century of Song.

Isla Cameron sang Bushes and Briars in 1966 on her self-titled album Isla Cameron. She also sang it in the soundtrack of the 1967 film Far From the Madding Crowd. The latter recording was included in 1987 on the BBC album Through Bushes and Briar.

Toni Arthur sang Bushes and Briars in 1970 on the B-side of Dave Arthur’s and her Trailer single Lazlo Feher.

June Tabor sang Bushes and Briars on of her first recordings, the 1974 charity anthology The First Folk Review Record. Folk Review editor Fred Woods noted:

The words are those printed in [Stephen Sedley’s] The Seeds of Love, and the tune—used in the film Far From the Madding Crowd—was collected by Cecil Sharp.

And Stephen Sedley noted in his book:

Vaughan Williams collected a famous set of this song in Essex. The present comparably fine version was collected by Hammond from George Dowden of Lackington, Dorset [VWML HAM/2/9/9] . The text has been collated with two broadsides in the British Museum. The last stanza is a ‘floater’, found in other songs also.

Barry Dransfield played Bushes and Briars together with a Swedish tune on his 1978 Topic album, Bowin’ and Scrapin’. He noted:

The remarkable similarity of the Swedish Air included here and Bushes and Briars prompted me to relate them. Similarities like this often occur in folk tunes throughout Europe.

Barry Skinner recorded Bushes and Briars in 1978 as the title track of his Fellside album Bushes & Briars.

The Aire Valley Singers sang Bushes and Briars in 1979 on their Hill & Dale album Out of the Aire.

Eliza Carthy and Nancy Kerr sang Bushes and Briars in 1993 on their eponymous album Eliza Carthy & Nancy Kerr, and this track was also included on their compilation CD On Reflection. Eliza commented in the first album’s sleeve notes:

Bushes and Briars is a traditional song. I got it in two versions from my mother and father. This is my dad’s version, not as long as some more popular versions. On the wax cylinder it is sung by a woman who sounds like a trained singer but is was collected from a Mr Pottipher in Essex by Vaughan Williams [VWML RVW2/4/3] .

Their recordings from an Andy Kershaw radio session on 12 March 1994 and live from a 1994 concert were both included in 2020 on Eliza Carthy’s CD Live to Air.

Magpie Lane sang Bushes and Briars in 1994 on their Beautiful Jo album Speed the Plough, which was also included in the same year on their compilation English Country Songs and Dances. They noted:

When Vaughan Williams heard this in 1903, he “felt it was something he had known all his life”. It was sung to him by a 70 year-old Essex labourer, and was to be the first of many folk songs which the composer collected.

Jane and Amanda Threlfall sang Bushes and Briars on their 2000 CD Morning Tempest and on their 2007 CD Revisited. They noted:

This was the first traditional song heard by Vaughan Williams from a traditional source. Having been invited to a vicarage tea-party at Ingrave, Essex, in 1903, he heard it sung by 70 year old labourer Charles Pottipher [VWML RVW2/4/3] , the composer declaring that it was as if he’d known the song all his life. When talking to Pottipher about his songs, the singer said, “If you can get the words, the Almighty will send you the tune.” Vaughan Williams collected several variants of the tune but, sadly, few of the actual verses. To complete the words he relied on published broadsides.

George Deacon sang Bushes and Briars in 2002 on his CD of songs collected and written by John Clare, Dream Not of Love.

Alva sang Bushes and Briars in 2003 on their Beautiful Jo album The Bells of Paradise. They noted:

This exquisite song, sung by a 72-year-old labourer, Charles Potiphar, was the first Vaughan Williams noted in Ingrave, and he experienced a deep sense of recognition’s though “it was something he had known all his life”. Being new to folk song collecting, he only transcribed the first verse, and got the rest of the words from a late 19^th-century broadside published by W.S. Fortey of Seven Dials (London). John Clare also noted the song in his manuscripts, compiled in the 1820’s.
trepan - to betray.

Coope Boyes & Simpson recorded Bushes and Briars in 2005 for their CD Triple Echo of songs collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams, George Butterworth and Percy Grainger.

Maggie Sand and Sandragon sang Bushes and Briars in 2009 on her WildGoose CD Susie Fair. She noted:

This ballad of unrequited love is believed to be the first song collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams, in Essex, England.

Nick Dow sang Through Bushes and Briars on his 2013 CD Old England’s Ground. He noted:

Old George Dowden sang this and a bunch of other equally good songs to Henry Hammond in 1907 [VWML HAM/2/9/9] . His repertoire included The Sheepstealer and The Streams of Lovely Nancy. I met his great grandson who remembered The Sheepstealer. Not much is known about George Dowden, however I have discovered that he was a merchant seaman, and away from home fairly regularly, hence there is no record on the census forms. Hammond does not give any biographical details. I reckon he was a good singer though looking at his repertoire.

Paul James sang Bushes and Briars in 2018 on Blowzabella’s album Two Score.

Belinda Kempster and Fran Foote sang Bushes and Briars on their 2019 album On Clay Hill.

Marisa Jack & Davy sang Bushes and Briars on their 2019 EP Bring Us In.

Cooper and Toller sang Through Bushes and Through Briars on their 2023 album A Number of Work. They noted:

Roud 1027. We found this song in the Southern Harvest reprint of Frank Purslow’s collection of songs from the Hammond and Gardiner manuscripts. Like the tune for The Sheepstealer, it was sung by George Dowden of Lackington, Dorset in September 1905. Notwithstanding the notes in Southern Harvest, which say “Oral and printed versions vary so little both in tune and text…”, this was a new tune to us for this song. Maybe you’ll see it as a sympathetic depiction of shy people in love, or maybe you’ll get frustrated and want to shout at the two of them to just get on with it.

Sam Lee sang Bushes and Briars on his 2024 album Songdreaming. He noted:

What does it mean to be in the presence of a species and their song, knowing their voice is fast being silenced? Bushes and Briars was composed in response to the many hours I’ve spent in the company of the nightingale; listening, singing with, and devoting attention to their iconic voice. These uncountable hours are always spent in that complex awareness that this once immortal tune will likely be gone from our land in a matter of years; a unique emotional situation for humans to find ourselves in. This song is a meditation on what appreciation in the age of extinction is. Bushes and Briars, woven out of the Essex folk song collected by Vaughan Williams, with its string arrangement nod to his Lark Ascending theme, was first heard by Vaughan Williams in 1903, sung to him by a 70-year-old Essex labourer. He remarked on the song that he “felt it was something he had known all his life”. The same has been said of hearing nightingales; so foreign yet so familiar. Curiously the song’s original theme of rejection, unrequited and impossible love has so many resonances with my own relationship to this bird. A species so rare, so vulnerable, so exquisite, and so impermanent, how do we attend to the sentiments a situation like this creates? How do we celebrate these birds? What grief do we allow ourselves to express? What accountability and responsibility do we hold to their safeguarding and cultural acknowledgement? Bushes and Briars opens this album as a triumphant adoration of nature, but also an alarm and rallying call to love, protect and reckon with what we have to lose.

Sandy Denny’s Bushes and Briars on her album Sandy is a completely different song.

Lyrics

Bushes and Briars in Stephen Sedley: The Seeds of Love

Through bushes and through briars I lately took my way
All for to hear the small birds sing one evening in May.
I overheard my own true love, her voice it was so clear,
Oh long time have I been waiting for the coming of my dear,
For the coming of my dear.

Sometimes I am uneasy and troubled in my mind,
Sometimes I think I’ll go to my love and tell to him my mind.
But if I should go to my love what should my love say then?
It would show to him my boldness and he’d ne’er love me again,
And he’d ne’er love me again.

Once upon a time I had colour like a rose
But now I am as pale as the lily that grows.
Like a flower in the garden my beauty is a-gone,
Don’t you see what I am come to by the loving of a man,
By the loving of a man.

So come you pretty fair maids a warning take by me
And never build your nest in the top of any tree.
For the green leaves they will wither and the roots they will decay
And the beauty of a woman it soon will fade away,
It soon will fade away.

Eliza Carthy and Nancy Kerr sing Bushes and Briars

Through bushes and through briars I’ve lately made my way
All for to hear the small birds sing and the lambs to skip and play,
All for to hear the small birds sing and the lambs to skip and play.
I overhead a female, ner voice it rang so clear,
Long time have I been waiting for the coming of my dear,
Long time have I been waiting for the coming of my dear

Sometimes I am uneasy and troubled in my mind,
Sometimes I think I’ll go to my love and tell to him my mind.
But if I should go to my love my love he would say “nay”.
If I show to him my boldness he’d ne’er love me again,
If I show to him my boldness he’d never love me again.

Acknowledgements

Eliza Carthy and Nancy Kerr’s version was transcribed by both Kira White and Garry Gillard. Thank you!