GORDON BOK
BECAUSE YOU ASKED
I keep a very large repertoire alive; I’m
always learning or making songs, because they reflect my changing understanding
of the world. They feel like a great herd of horses that need to be exercised.
And I feel a strong need to do that, because they seem to exercise different
parts of myself. That’s why I have never done two solo concerts the same.
I take about two hundred songs with me on a typical three-week tour and will practice and perform most of them. On the next tour, about half of those songs will be replaced by others. So when you ask me for an old song in a concert, I may not be able to bring it to hand or voice in the time we’re given.
These are some of the songs you have requested or asked me to record. You’ll
note the preponderance of chorus songs; I’m always proud that you and I are
still part of a singing tradition. Luckily we’ve built a strong musical
community at home, and enjoy helping each other with our various projects, so
local friends are filling in for you on this recording. Here you go then, and thanks for asking.
Recorded and engineered by Bruce Boege, Limin Music, Northport, Maine
With additional recording by Hamilton Hall
Mixed by Bruce Boege, Gordon Bok and Anne Dodson
Mastered by Grey Larsen at Grey Larsen Mastering, Bloomington, Indiana
Produced by Gordon Bok and Anne Dodson
Cover photograph by Gordon Bok
Programming by Carol Rohl
Graphic design by Ken Gross
Where possible, I print the oldest sources I have of these songs, no matter how much they differ from the versions that came to me.
In this recording The January Men and Then Some are:
Gordon Bok, Bill Huntington, Jamie Huntsberger, Bob Richardson, Carol Rohl, Langley Willauer, Ivan Stancioff, Judith Simpson, Dan Beckman, Kat Logan and Jim Loney
© 1986 Jan Harmon
Gordon – vocal & 12-string guitar
Will, Matt, Kat, Jim, David, Anne –vocals
An early, off-season visit to Yosemite by Jan and a friend inspired this song.
High along the John Muir trail from Whitney toward Star King
Lon and I set pace to reach Yosemite that spring
And like some dream of Gulliver we spied El Capitan
Night fell like talus from the stone and Loni said to me
Douse the fire, but keep the flame, 'til morning warms old Tuolemne
Douse the fire, but keep the flame 'til morning warms old Tuolemne
Black bear roamed the tamarack from Cloud's Rest to Cock's Comb
And where Tananya caught the moon Loni said to me
Douse the Fire, but keep the flame 'til morning warms old Tuolemne
From dogwood and Sequoia stands we climbed the Vernal Trail
By Big-leaf Maple shine with mist we scaled the Bridal Veil
And when Half-Dome, the hooded hawk set her shadow free
We doused the fire but kept the flame 'til morning warmed old Tuolemne
Douse the fire, but keep the flame 'til morning warms old Tuolemne
Now I know around Cathedral Peak the seasons cloud and clear
Still when all the darkness falls, it's Loni close to me
Douse the Fire, but keep the flame 'til morning warms old Tuolemne
Douse the Fire, but keep the flame 'til morning warms old Tuolemne
© 1965 Gordon Bok, BMI
Gordon – vocal & 12-string guitar
Will, Matt, Kat, Jim, David, Anne –vocals
I made the tune when Capt. Havilah Hawkins pointed to Hay Island and said “Can you make a tune as simple as that island?” Hence the Hay Ledge Tune. Later, heading east toward Isle au Haut with a young friend asleep below who’d had a hard day, I put the words together.
If I could give you three things, I would give you these:
Song and laughter and a wooden home in the shining seas
When you see old Isle au Haut rising in the dawn
You will play in yellow fields in the morning sun
Sleep where the wind is warm and the moon is high
Give sadness to the stars, sorrow to the sky
Do you hear what the sails are saying in the wind's dark song?
Give sadness to the wind, blown alee and gone
Sleep now: the moon is high and the wind blows cold
For you are sad and young and the sea is old
If I could give you three things, I would give you these:
Song and laughter and a wooden home in the shining seas
© Charles Flowers circa 1880s, from the Penguin Australian Songbook, compiled by John S Manifold [Penguin Books 1964]
Gordon – vocal & 12-string guitar
Will, Matt, Anne – vocals
I think I first heard this from Dave de Hugard, whom I’ve never met, but whose singing has taught me a lot over the years. A sad commentary, but one repeated over the years in many countries. The last double verse was found a few years ago by Bill Scott of Warwick, who thought to look in Charles Flowers’s journals, which his family had kept. It is not commonly sung.
Come, Stumpy, old man, we must shift while we can
All your mates in the paddock are dead
We must say our farewells to Glen Eva's sweet dells
And the hills where your lordship was bred
Together to roam from our drought-stricken home
Seems hard that such things have to be
And it's hard on a horse when he's naught for a boss
But a broken-down squatter like me
And the banks are all broken, they say
And the merchants are all up a tree
When the bigwigs are brought to the bankruptcy court
What chance for a squatter like me?
No more shall we muster the river for fats
Or spiel on the fifteen-mile plain
Or dash through the scrub by the light of the moon
Or see the old homestead again
Leave the slip-railings down, they don't matter much now
For there's none but the crow left to see
Perching gaunt on the pine as though longing to dine
On a broken-down squatter like me
And the banks…
When the country was cursed with the drought at its worst
And the cattle were dying in scores
Though down on me luck, I kept up me pluck
Thinking justice might soften the laws
But the farce had been played, and the government aid
Ain't extended to squatters, old son
When me money was spent, they doubled the rent
And resumed the best part of the run
And the banks…
It’s a mighty hard ride till we reach the divide
With the plain stretching out like the sea
But the chances seem best in the faraway west
For a broken down squatter like me
Well, they left us our hides and little besides
You have all I possess on your back
But stumpy, old sport, when we boil our next quart
We’ll be out on the Wallaby Track
And the banks…
MY IMAGES COME
© 1983 Don Cooper, New Mutant Music
Gordon, Will, Matt, Kat, Jim, David, Anne –vocals
I got this song from my old friend, Bob Stuart. Only this year did I have the chance to hear Don’s singing of it – that’s well worth a listen.
My images come
From the people who do the work
From the people who sing the songs
From the people who get along
A bottle of rum
For the demon what always lurk
For the demon what do me wrong
For the fury what is my wife
For the struggle what is my song
Chorus:
It get me down but only
A little look around and I find
That I am not so lonely
We in the same boat brother!
My images come
From the pleasures I had before
From the pleasures I'm still to know
From the pleasures my dreams provide
From the pleasures what I bestow
A bottle of rum
For the trouble what's at my door
For the trouble where' ere I go
For the misfortunes what I abide
And for the courage I'm trying to show
My images come
From the woman what's on my knee
From the woman what's in my head
From the woman out in the sun
From the woman what shares my bed
A bottle of rum
For a broken love's misery
For a love what has grown so dead
Expectations my life's undone
For illusions what I've been fed
My images come
From the world in which I live
From the world I love so well
From the world of change and light
From the world of which I tell
A bottle of rum
For the feelings I cannot give
For the feelings what fears impel
For the screams of a fraughtful night
And for the time what is spent in hell
WILLEM
© 1985 Gordon Bok
Gordon – Spanish guitar
Carol – harp
I originally made this tune for a film pilot with my friend and colleague, Eton Churchill. Our local instrumental group “Small World Orchestra” enjoyed playing it and polished it up some, and I named it after one of our number, Will Brown, a shipmate of many musical (and other) voyages, because it felt like the way he seems to dance the days with such grace and kindness.
CHANGING TIMES
© 1985 Dan MacArthur, BMI
Gordon – vocal & 12-string guitar
Will, Matt, Kat, Jim, David, Anne, Holly -vocals
From my dear MacArthur family of Marlboro VT, whose love and work has kept so many traditions of music, building and land care alive and healthy in the world that feeds us all.
first chorus:
The grasses grow tall until the hay it is mown
Then the fields lie still till the new seed is sown
Many children standing here have watched the grass wave in the wind
We're the ones who stand here now but many others will again
Long, long ago these fields and the crops that they grew here
Might decide a family's fate for another coming year
Like the grasses that grow tall and get cut down for hay
So generations moved in here, made their marks and moved away
second chorus:
And the fields lie still till the new seed is sown
Many children standing here have watched the grass wave in the wind
We're the ones who stand here now, but many others will again
After clearing off the land and piling up their long stonewalls
They walked for miles for the seed, then they hoped the good rains fall
And when the rains come down right and all the crops grew tall and strong
Families had enough to eat for another winter long
(first chorus)
Perhaps the time will come again when these fields will mean more
And we'll learn to care for them as others did so long before
And like the seed that's newly sown and springs to life with sun and rain
People's lives may grow to know the value of these fields again
(second chorus)
We're the ones who live here now, but many others will again
EASY AND SLOW
Traditional
Gordon – vocal & Spanish guitar
Carol – vocal
I probably got this from the great British American singer, David Jones. I thought I got it from Tommy Makem – but when cornered, he denied that. So much for memory.
It was down by Christchurch that I first met with Annie
A neat little girl and not a bit shy
She told me her father had come from Dungannon
And he'd take her back in the sweet bye and bye
And what's it to any man, whether or no
Whether I'm easy or whether I'm true
As I lifted her petticoat easy and slow
And I rolled up me sleeves for to buckle her shoe
Now, in city or country, a girl is a jewel
And well built for gripping, the most of them are
But any young fellow would sure be a fool
If he tried it the first time, to go a bit far
We wandered by Thomas Street down by the Liffey
The sun was long set and the evening grew dark
And along Whiteman's Bridge, and by God, in a jiffy
My arm was around her, out there in the park
So if you go down to the town of Dungannon
You may search till your eyeballs are empty and blind
Be it sitting or walking or running or standing
A girl like Annie you never will find
GO EAST
© 2003 Nadine Laughlin
Gordon – vocal & Spanish guitar
Nadine lives with her family in the woods of New Hampshire. She made this astonishing song for her daughter, who had lost her best friend. I thank her for writing it, and I thank our mutual friend, Alouette Iselin for knowing to send it to me when I needed it. Nadine sang it on a CD called “Beautiful Mystery.”
You should go east, into the day
There’s nothing left to do, nothing to say
But go east into the light
Nothing in the world can make this right
You should go south, into the heart
To the love that brings us here and tears us apart
But go south, into the fire
Watch the ashes fall and the smoke go higher
And I will walk beside you as far as I can go
Let your tears baptize me as they flow
Let this path of sorrow let us know
We are always together, and alone
You should go west, into the dream
You don’t have to know what it means
But go west, into the dark
Look into the night for a guiding star
No north, into the cold
Find a mountain stream and look for gold
Go north, right into this loss
Climb up to the top and look across
And I will fly beside you as far as I can go
Let your tears baptize me as they flow
Let this flight of sorrow let us go
Where we’re always together, always home
JOCK STEWART
Anon
Gordon – vocal & 12-String guitar
Will, Matt, Kat, Jim, David, Anne –vocals
My name is Jock Stewart – I’m a canny-goin’ man
And a roving young fellow I’ve been
So be easy and free when you’re drinkin’ wi’ me
I’m a man you don’t meet every day
I’ve got acres of land, I have men at command
And I’ve always a shilling to spare
I take up my gun, with my dog I do go
Along by the banks of the Tay
So fill up your glasses with brandy and wine
And whatever the cost I will pay
© 1976 Gordon Bok, BMI
Gordon – vocal & 12-string guitar
Anne - vocal
For some reason people have been asking for this song recently. It’s about a boat-delivery from Connecticut to Maine. You can read the whole soggy story in the Folk Legacy songbook Time and the Flying Snow.
Here I am, man, all alone again
Anchored away the hell and gone again
Another mile from another town
Wind Northeast and the rain coming down
Home is the sailor, home from the sea
A home for the mildew, friend to the flea
I don't care, man, I'm happy
I got an old fat boat, she's slow but handsome
Hard in the chine and soft in the transom
I love her well; she must love me
But I think it's only for my money
And I don’t mind staying and I don’t mind going
But I’m some dam tired of rowing
No more tobacco, no more cheese
I'm sprung in the back and lame in the knees
It's a damned good thing I'm easy to please
There ain't nothing in town on a Sunday
You know, I got milk and I got ice
I got home-made bread, a little old, but nice
Everybody puts their cooking hat on
When you tell 'em you're leaving in the morning
Yes, I got coffee, I got tea
I got the beans and the beans got me
I got tuna fish, I got rum
I got a two-pound splinter in my thumb
So I'll take my toddy and my vitamin C
And the radio for my company
Oh, me. I got the hydrogen peroxide blues
“Well mercy, mercy, I do declare
(If) half the fun of going is the getting there”*
Mercy, Percy, you better start rowing
'Cause the other half of getting there is going
*Quote from Ken Hicks
A SONG FOR ANGELA
© 1995 Bill Gallaher, SOCAN
Gordon – vocal, 12-string guitar & viol da gamba
Bill Gallaher says, “The NFB docu-drama For Angela, told the story of a young First Nation Cree girl in Winnipeg who was on her way to school one day on a city bus, with her mom, when they were harassed by three white teenage boys. This was done with such utter cruelty that it put thoughts in the little girl’s mind no child should have to bear. That night, feeling profoundly ashamed of her heritage, she slipped quietly into the bathroom where the scissors were kept, and cut off her beautiful braids. The scene was so moving it stirred my soul.”
A cold wind's blowing, Angela
Do up your coat against the chill
And pay no mind to things you hear
They're mindless calls of whippoorwills
I know some hurtful words were said
And that they made you feel ashamed
They've got you tangled in their web
Don't let them cause you so much pain
But believe that time can heal the hurting
The shadows disappear, and so will the scars
One day you'll look inside and know just who you are
Thought sometimes the seeing isn't easy, Angela
Angela, those pretty braids you wore
As shiny black as ravens' wings
Lay cut and scattered on the floor
One day you'll grow them back again
One day your pride will rise and soar
And you will let them grow again
TURNING TOWARD THE MORNING
© 1975 Gordon Bok , BMI
Gordon – Vocal & 12-String Guitar
The January Men And Then Some - vocals
This is probably my most requested song in concerts. I tend to sing it as a seasonal song, but those who request it tell me it’s not. It started as an attempt to answer a letter from a lady I did not know well, who was having a hard time facing the thought of winter.
My singing of this has been influenced by my friends Dave Mallett, who sang it faster than I, and Megan MacArthur, who left off the last verse. I have taken their folk process (folk wisdom) to inform my present singing.
When the deer has bedded down and the bear has gone to ground
And the Northern goose has wandered off to warmer bay and sound
It's so easy in the cold to feel the darkness of the year
And the heart is growing lonely for the morning
Oh, my Joanie, don't you know that the stars are swinging slow
And the seas are rolling easy as they did so long ago?
If I had a thing to give you I would tell you one more time
That the world is always turning toward the morning
Now October's growing thin and November's coming home
You'll be thinking of the season and the sad things that you've seen
And you hear that old wind walking, hear him singing high and thin
You could swear he's out there singing of your sorrows
When the darkness falls around you and the Northwind comes to blow
And you hear him call your name out as he walks the brittle snow
That old wind don't mean you trouble he don't care or even know
He's just walking down the darkness toward the morning
It's a pity you don't know what the little flowers know
They can't face the cold November, they can't take the wind and snow
They put their glories all behind them, bow their heads and let it go
But you know they'll be there shining in the morning
Now, my Joanie don't you know that the days are rolling slow
And the winter's walking easy, as he did so long ago?
And, if that wind should come and ask you, "Why's my Joanie weeping so?"
Won't you tell him that you're
weeping for the morning?
LUZ DE LA LUNA
© Papi Galan
Gordon – Spanish guitar
Carol – harp
My wife, Carol and I always have requests for this kind of music, and this is one of our favorites. It was recorded in 2003.
IF I WAS A DOG
© 1995 Colm Gallagher, ASCAP
Gordon – Vocal & 12-string guitar
Will, Matt, Kat, Jim, David, Anne –vocals
I got this song from Tommy Makem. I think he told me that Colm used to play bass for him in NY City. Colm also made the words for “I Held a Lady,” an old favorite of mine.
If I was a dog I’d wag me tail, I’d sit me down beside the fire
And the girls could pat me on the back or anyplace else their heart would desire
I wouldn’t be after chasing cats, I wouldn’t go baying at the moon
I wouldn’t have time for things like that
If I was a dog, what I’d be doing!
Oh-ho, oh-ho, if I was a dog I’d have me day
Oh-ho, oh-ho, wouldn’t I be waggin’ me tail
If I was a dog I’d eat of the best and only the best that money could buy
I’d go down to the butcher’s shop and I’d lick the leg of the butcher’s wife
I’d be dining on filet mignon and pelican fingers and lobster fins
And delicate frogs, if I was a dog I wouldn’t go rooting in nobody’s bins
I wouldn’t be after chasing sheep, I wouldn’t be after hunting hares
I’d prefer to be home in me sleep or digging a hole to God knows where
I wouldn’t be after pulling the sled like huskies up in the Yukon do
I’d prefer to be home in me bed with a Pekinese, Poodle or Kerry Blue
And woe betide the fool that tried to spay the wife or neuter me
Before I’d let him away with that, by God I’d show me pedigree
I’d put up a hell of a fight and wouldn’t that be a sight to see
One strategic nip, the neuterer becoming the neuteree
And sooner or later I’d father a litter and teach the little ones how to be
And if any of them tried to get smart, be-God, I’d chase the lot of ‘em up a tree
So if you’re walking along the street and an elegant dog you happen to see
Steppin’ it out, give us shout; you could be you and that would be me
WALTER’S GARDEN
Written by Garic Barranger © 1998 NARP, BMI
Gordon – Vocal & 12-String guitar
Will, Matt, Kat, Jim, David, Anne, Holly –vocals
I learned this from the singing of Rose Anne Bivens, one of Garic’s musical partners, on the delightful CD, Rose Anne Bivens’ “Walter’s Garden.” Garic says, “the song grew out of litigation in which a group of Louisiana prisoners sued the state as a result of appalling conditions at Angola, our state prison. I represented a good number of the parties plaintiff and Walter was one of them. Walter was our “mole” inside the prison campus (poetically referred to by the residents as “the Farm”) and kept us informed about just what the officials were up to from day to day, until he became so sufficiently annoying that the powers that be stopped his [asthma medication.]… [Y]ou know the rest. The story in the song is mainly true except that part in the last verse that refers to “a suit for wrongful death” following Walter’s passing; the fact was that he had no heirs to file a suit on his behalf, so the song is his only memorial.”
We are planting Walter’s garden in the coming of the spring
When the fear of frost is over, we are plowing over clover
To be planting Walter’s garden where the sweet birds sing
I read the file on Walter Smith who died inside the jail
His breath was made of ashes and his cheek was colored pale
His teeth were amaryllis except where they were black
And his morals were as crooked as the pretzel of his back
Now he had always had the asthma in his file it said
And the only thing that helped it was the fresh Columbian Red
So he planted half an acre and watered it with tears
Til the sheriff caught him hoeing it and gave him seven years
Now we’re….
So they threw him in Angola in a rusty, rolling chair
Where he could suck to heart’s content the un-Columbian air
But with every breath that Walter took the phones around him rang
In the offices of journalists where no birds sang
He filed lawsuit after lawsuit til the courts concerned themselves
With our Devil’s Island prisons in their Devil’s Island dells
And he made the state spend money on medicines and brick
And for doctors in the hospitals to heal the prison’s sick
And he made the state remember, for a little while at least
The forgotten men in prison in the belly of the beast
And we’re planting….
So in Technicolor language Walter Smith reviewed the tales
Of the day to day atrocities that populate our jails
Til they took away his medicine and set his asthma free
And he breathed his life out on the phone while he was calling me
So I review his folder and remember Walter Smith
I file a suit for wrongful death and seem to catch a whiff
Of the crop that Walter planted in his half acre of ground
And reaching for my Dictaphone I try to turn the world around
And we’re planting….
JENNY IN THE ROADSTEAD
© 2011 Gordon Bok, BMI
Gordon – Vocal & Spanish guitar
Inspired by a carving I did years ago showing a young woman on the foredeck of a workboat, staring into the wind. Finally got curious enough about her to explore it with a song.
Jenny's anchored off in
the roadstead[1], now,
lying to a three-inch rode[2]
She should have been gone on the morning tide but now the whole damn day's
grown old
She's sitting on the foredeck, windy and cold, with the west wind making on
And that dumb-fool deckhand she's dreaming on has slipped his cable and gone
Oh,
Jenny, let the damn-fool go, there's a good man down the line
You're bound to meet him on the next short-tow, and he's going to
treat you fine
All those years growing up on the water, working in your daddy's crew
You've been barge-hand, deckhand & engineer: there ain’t
a damn thing you can't do
So now you're the skipper and your own damn boss, but the boss gets lonely,too
She gets to thinking that any young buck is the best that she can do
Oh,
Jenny…
You're strong and able, canny and kind, you're the best thing he'll ever know
And that west wind's strolling along your deck, singing: Come on, Jenny, let's
go
Now you're the skipper and your own damn boss, and the boss gets lonely, too
But don't you be thinking that any young buck is the best that you can do
Oh,
Jenny…
Hit
the air[3]
now, fire up the Cat, throw in the gear to the windlass
Haul that big old anchor on board, and go on about your business
Oh, Jenny-with-the-wind-in-your-hair, just lay this day aside
Lay your head on the cool west wind, and catch your own sweet tide