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> A.L. Lloyd > Songs > Walker Hill and Byker Shore

Byker Hill

[Trad. arr. Martin Carthy]

This was sung by Martin Carthy as title track of his and Dave Swarbrick's 1967 album Byker Hill, reissued on their compilation album This Is... Martin Carthy. A BBC(?) television broadcast from this time can be found on the DVD Fingerstyle Guitar Vol. 3. A version recorded live at McCabe's Guitar Shop, Santa Monica, on 17 February 1990 is on Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick's Life and Limb, on Martin Carthy's Rigs of the Time, and also on the Topic anthology English Originals. Both versions are on the massive 4CD anthology The Carthy Chronicles. Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick also played this on their 1992 video 100 Not Out and in 1976 as an instrumental on Dave Swarbrick's first solo album, Swarbrick. A further version from Martin Carthy's 60th Birthday Concert in 2001 at the Apollo Theatre, Oxford, was included in the Dave Swarbrick anthology Swarb!.

Martin Carthy said in the Byker Hill sleeve notes:

The tune of Byker Hill sung here is not the one sung traditionally. It is a Northumbrian dance tune in 9/8, unusual in that instead of being divided into three threes as are most other 9/8 tunes, it is divided in three twos and one three and appropriately called The Drunken Piper. The words are an amalgam of a version I learned years ago while playing with the Thameside Four, and the version sung by A.L. Lloyd.

A.L. Lloyd's somewhat shorter version is called Walker Hill and Byker Shore with the title words the opposite way round from the commonly known one. It was included on his Transatlantic LP of 1966, The Best of A.L. Lloyd. (On the LP and its sleeve it is called Walker Shore and Byker Hill but Lloyd actually sings Walker Hill and Byker Shore.) The album sleeve notes comment:

At holidays and festive times, miners of the English north-east would gather with their families to dance on the coaly green. If a piper was there, well and good. If not, they would dance to their own singing. The tunes were nearly always pipe tunes, the words floating verses loosely strung together. Versions of this song were published as long ago as 1812, and the song has been undergoing changes ever since. The inescapably north-eastern tune is in a fetching “additive” 9/8 (2+2+2+3), an unusual rhythm in western Europe though perhaps not quite so rare as was once thought.

Another Lloyd recording of unknown date from Peter Bellamy's archive can be found on Classic A.L. Lloyd. This album's sleeve notes said:

As Walker Pits it was first printed in John Bell's Rhymes of Northern Bards (Newcastle upon Tyne, 1812). It is sung here to the north eastern dance tune My Dearie Sits Ower Late Up.

Byker Hill is also on the first Young Tradition recording. And a very lively interpretation of Byker Hill by The Barely Works is on their 1990 debut album The Big Beat and on the World Music Network anthology The Rough Guide to English Roots Music.

Lyrics

Byker Hill version	Life and Limb version
If I had another penny I would have another gill And I would make the piper play The bonny lass of Byker Hill	If I had another penny I would have another gill I would make the piper play The bonny lass of Byker Hill
Chorus: Byker Hill and Walker Shore, me lads Collier lads for ever more, me boys Byker Hill and Walker Shore, me lads Collier lads for ever more	Chorus after each verse: |: Byker Hill and Walker Shore Collier lads for ever more :|
Me Ginny she sits out over late up Me Ginny she sits out over late up Me Ginny she sits out over late up Between the pint pot and the cup	When first I come into the dirt I had no trousers nor pitshirt Now I've getting two or three Walker Pit done well for me
It's down the pits we'll go me marrers It's down the pits we'll go me marrers Well try our wills and use our skill To cut them ridges down below
Chorus
Me Ginny she is never near Me Ginny she is never near And when I call out, “Where's me supper?” She orders up another pint of beer	Me Ginny she's never here Me Ginny she's never near Oh when I call out, “Where's me supper?” She orders up another pint of beer
When first I come into the dirt I had no trousers nor pitshirt And now I've getting two or three Walker Pit done well by me	My Ginny she sits over late up My Ginny she sits over late up My Ginny she sits over late up Between the pint pot and the cup
Chorus
Hey Ginny come home to your little baby Hey Ginny come home to your little baby Hey Ginny come home to your little baby With a pint of beer all under your arm	Hey Ginny come home to your little baby Hey Ginny come home to your little baby Hey Ginny come home to your little baby With a pint of beer all under your arm
The poor coal carter gets two shillings The deputy get half a crown And the overman gets five and sixpence That's just for riding up and down	The poor coal carter gets a shilling The deputy gets half a crown The overman gets five and sixpence Just for riding up and down
Chorus
	The pitman and the keelman trim To the dance they do begin They drink bumble made from gin They dance the Elsie Marley
Geordie Johnson had a pig And he hit it with a shovel and it danced a jig All the way to Byker Hill He danced the Elsie Marley	Geordie Johnson had a pig And he hit it with a shovel and it danced a jig All the way to Walker Shore To the tune of Elsie Marley
	If I had another penny I would have another gill I would make the piper play The bonny lass of Byker Hill

A.L. Lloyd.'s Walker Hill and Byker Shore

Chorus:

Oh, Walker Hill and Byker Shore, me boys
Collier lads for ever more, me boys
Walker Hill and Byker Shore, me boys
Collier lads for ever more

My lassie she sits over late up
My hinny she sits over late up
My Ginny she sits over late up
Betwixt the pint pot and the cup

And down the pits we'll go me laddies
And down the pits we'll go me marrers
Well try our will and use our skill
To cut them ridges down below

Chorus

My lassie she is never near
My hinny she is never near
And when I call out, “Where's me supper?”
She orders up another pint of beer

Hey Ginny come home to your little baby
Hey hinny come home to your little baby
Hey Ginny come home to your little baby
With a pint of beer all under your arm

Chorus

The poor coal carter gets two shillings
The deputy get half a crown
And the overman gets five and sixpence, lads,
Just for riding up and down

Chorus

Acknowledgements

Transcription by Garry Gillard and Reinhard Zierke.