From the Captain's Quarters: Nobby's Nautical Nuggets

Sheer shape wondrous old fashioned boys along the hardest side from evil gorge to wonderful heat em all the line Secure the barrels down below find them tie and lash em this vessel, she is certified shipshape from Bristol Fashion.

Hello and welcome to episode 25 of Shipshape and Bristol Fish Fashion, a podcast brought to you by the Nova Scotia Bristol.

Hi, my name is Augie and I'm a member of the Port of Bristol Shanty Crew and your host of this podcast.

This podcast brings you all of the work of the Port of Bristol Shanty Crew and also it kind of lifts the lid on the shanty world, bringing you any news and interviews from shanty groups and shanty singers.

On this month's episode we pop down to the captain's quarters where we're going to spend some time with Nobby where he imparts us with a bit more of his shanty knowledge.

We also hear from Ash, who is our resident signaller, to give us an update on the news and reviews of the Port of Bristol Shanty Crew.

Hey, how are you doing?

I cannot believe that we are now in February and every day that passes we seem to have a new gig that features on our events list.

We as the crew are looking forward to a busy 2026.

Can I just take this opportunity to thank you for your continued support in listening to this podcast?

Yes, this is episode 25.

It's a great opportunity to reflect on the journey that we've been on.

And if you've only just discovered this podcast or.

Well, once you've finished listening to this episode, remember there's plenty more that you can listen to in our back catalog.

You'll get to hear from the crew, some of our backstories, you'll get to hear from some of our gigs and when we've been out and about.

And we've also got some really great interviews with well known shanti singers from around the UK and from around the world.

A little bit of a podcast news story for you and a big thank you to the Nova Scotia Bristol who once again has agreed to sponsor sponsor this podcast for another year.

If you've not been down there.

It is an incredible, wonderful pub down by the dockside in Bristol and it's a real must.

I'll include a link in the show notes so you can go and look it up before you go along.

But I promise you it's a great treat.

It's a lovely little pub, it's vibrant and it's rich in history of the nautical Bristol history.

And I know plenty of shanty singers have seen sang there in the past and that's why we use it now as our normal rehearsing location and our normal residency when we do gigs that are intimate with you guys.

Also, kind of take an opportunity to make sure that you get your diaries out and save the date because on the 9th and 10th of May we will once again be hosting the Real Ale and Shanty Festival in Bristol.

It's going to be hosted once again in the Freemasons hall on park street and we've already got a load of shanty singers that are really keen to come along and sing and entertain you.

So please do save that date in your diary.

And hot off the press we have a very special guest joining us.

He is a chap who is a big fan of this podcast and has already been a guest on this show.

He's also a friend of the Port of Bristol shanty Crew.

He's internationally acclaimed to have written many shanty songs that are sung by many shanti cruise from across the uk.

If you've not managed to guess who he is, then I can proudly tell you that the one and only Tom Lewis will be joining us for both days at the Real Ale and Shanty Festival.

We look forward to welcoming Tom to Bristol, who was spending time with us outside of the Ale and Shanty Festival, but will also be entertaining you guys.

So remember, save the date on the 9th and 10th of May, come along to our Real Ale and Shanty Festival in the Freemasons hall in Park Street.

So let's pop down to the Captain's quarters and listen to our very own shanty man Nobby Die.

And he's going to impart us a little bit more of his shanty knowledge.

Afternoon shanti singers, sea song singers and all other singers that may be listening.

This is a podcast.

It's a bit delayed, but I've been held up in dry dock with a very nasty cough and cold.

However, back in Brixham, the sea air has cleared my throat somewhat.

However, I'll be all croaky and nasally, but it doesn't matter.

And I'm going to begin with It's a poem in actual fact, I wrote in about the 70s called on Prince Street Stairs.

As I sat on Prince Street Stairs, I heard the sound coming over the cobbles of wagon and horses.

A ship passed by, bound on an outward course.

It was a summer's morning.

The bells were ringing at Redclyffe calling the congregation to Sunday prayers.

But I, a young boy, was quite content to watch the ships from Prince Street Stairs all along the quay were tierces of baccy and casks of rum While down the reach came the sound of a fiddler and a sailor beating a drum.

There was a crew at rest around the bits in the morning haze Weary for a voyage of a hundred and fifty days she was handsome and sleek like one of the clipper kind an ocean racer, a flying fox no better you will ever find.

Now here she lies at the quay in Bristol Town in oily waters muddy and brown Far from the winds and the clear ocean air I wish I could sail with her Far from Prince Street Stairs and hear the music of the sea and sailors singing with the wind in her royals and the watch bell ringing as she races along through the ocean breakers Singing the song of her proud Scottish makers Her figurehead charging like a Highland clansman through spindrift and diamonds Making a safe passage for every ship's hand.

I dreamed of the day I might go to sea Waving goodbye to my folks on the quay with my sailor suit and my seaman's chest I'd stow my gear along with the best Ready to sail far to far distant lands of elephants, tigers, lions and fierce Greenland bears Away from my home in Prince Street Stairs I'd visit countries both hot and cold if one day I became a sailor bold and in my dream of voyage to foreign shores I would find riches bright and gold in great store A thousand miles from Bristol and old Prince Street Stairs and in my dreams on Prince Street Stairs I dreamed away all my childhood cares and that was just a childhood really Childhood memories or things about you to sit around Think I'd love to go to sea and never did so you can sit on Prince Street Stairs which is at the bottom of the swing bridge by the.

What's the name?

By the box.

Then the Industrial museum.

The spring.

The swing bridge would open and close and the ships would go through.

And very often used to sit there and just watch them come through the narrow gap.

The sound of Provider of Newlyn came about in November 1995, just getting up to go to work.

And on Radio 4 came the announcement that a trawler had gone down off of Lundy Island.

There were no survivors.

The Morning of Monday 6th November is a time I shall remember.

I heard it all on the morning news.

The voice so chill described the views.

The provider, she went down a hundred miles from New Lintown.

And the next verse comes up is near Lundy Shore or that was found were nets in boxes on the fishing ground near to midnight as landsmen sleep the provider sank into the deep the.

Provider, she went down a hundred miles from Newlyn Town on shore the town.

Light shone so brightly the moon her ripples wavered lightly across the sea in the air a signal sent the Coast Guard knew just what it meant the.

Provider, she went down a hundred miles from Newlyn Town.

Lifeboats and vessels raced to the sea but found wreckage only where the Provider had been Three brave fishermen all gone down on the Provider from Newlin Town.

The provider, she went down a hundred miles from Newlin Town.

The Bristol Channel is a lonely place at midnight off the heartland race Bleak seas rolled in the morning light but of three fishermen there was no sight.

The Provider, she went down a hundred miles from Newlyn Town and down beneath.

The green blue waves Is a dark and deep sea grave where three men rest their bold brave head Upon a soft and sandy bed the provider, she.

Went down a hundred miles from Newlin Town the provider, she went down a hundred miles from Newlin Town well, this.

Is a song from Nova Scotia in the old whaling days when tourists went out from Portland, Maine to the fishing grounds in the Grand Banks.

And it's a song I found in a folk song book, Folk Songs of North America by Adam Lomax, printed by castle London in 1960.

Words were by a fisherman called Fred Wallace and it was published in the Canadian Fisherman's Magazine in 1914.

O come all ye hardy hideakers that.

Winter fishing go and break the seas.

Upon the banks in stormy winds, in snow and ye who love her driving Come listen to me Lay of the.

Run we made from Portland in the Mary El McKay.

Now it starts with the chorus and ups the chorus.

We hung the muslin on the run the wind began to blow 20 hard Nova Scotia men Chock full of Portland rum Mainsail forest' l jibbin jumbo on that wild December day As we pass.

Cape Elizabeth and slug for Fundy Bay.

O come all ye hardy attachers and.

Winter fishing Go and brave the seas.

Upon the banks in stormy winds in snow but ye who love her draw heaving Come listen to me lay up.

The run we made from Portland on.

The Mary El McKay.

It's a song I really quite like us to do with the Port of Bristol shanty crew and add it to our Nova Scotia repertoire.

Well, this song is called Boston harbor.

And I got it from.

Not in 1990 from a great bloke called Shanti Jack, real name Pete Hazelden.

He was organizer of the whole shanty festival, which the Rev Will Remember many times over.

And we used to have a great time going up there.

And he was a tugboat engineer, Shanty Jack in the port of Immingham on Humberside.

And he also sang it at the Bristol Sea shanty Festival in 1990.

From Boston Arbor we set sail Wind were blowing a devil on a gale with the ring tail Said all about a risen mast and the rue Britannia.

Plowing up the deep With a big.

Bow wow Tow row row rolly right all day.

Up come the skipper from.

Down below says look aloft, lads, look a low it's lookalo and it's lookaloft.

And it's coil up your ropes, lads Fore and AF With a big bow.

Wow and a tow row wow F roll.

Day, Boston Arbor.

Good old song.

Obviously it has an American attachment to it.

It's also recorded on Sea Songs.

Enchant is by Topic Record, and that was by the Waterstones.

The Watersons.

Watersons, that's right.

Captain Waugh was the first to print this song in his pioneer collection of sea songs in shanties, which I've got copies of, obviously.

It is evidently the words of a seaman and was very popular between 1860 and 1870.

It is a fo' Cs' song, a four bitter, not a shanty.

The bow wow wow chorus is borrowed from an influential musical song of the mid 19th century.

Another song which if I to run past you, really, I first heard at the Holford Arms Folk Festival.

Now, Holford Arms was a local festival of Bristol, like on the Bristol Chippenham Road, something like that.

And this used to be run by Maggie and Mike Starkey, who used to run the Green Dragon Folk Club, of which I was a regular member and singer.

And this song I picked up on my daughter's Fisher Price tape recorder and it was sung by a scotsman called Robbie McGregor.

Now, Robbie was getting on a bit then.

He must be, you know, floating around in one of the Scottish locks now, I'd imagine.

But he was great old guy and he sang this song and he said it was a calling on board song where crews were called on board, I would imagine in the fishing trade, because he come from somewhere around the west west coast before he ended up down near Chippenham somewhere.

And the song goes.

The goose is gone, Grey goose is dead and the fox from his lair in the morning who ring the bell Grey goose is dead and the fox from his lair in the morning who chant the requiem Greyhegoose is dead and the fox from his lair in the morning who lower him down where he goes is dead and the fox from his lair in the morning.

I have heard the song sung like.

From a landsman's version I hear about.

A Wilson's, a group from up Yorkshire way somewhere.

And it was different words, but that was Robbie's or part of Robbie's version.

I must see if I can find a recording that was sang at the Holford Arms Inn at the Holford Arms Folk Festival.

Great little festival because we'd always meet up with one of my favorite songwriters and singers at the used to sleep in his van.

London river was one of the songs that I first learned there, and I think most people know London river without me singing my nasal nasal version of it.

But it was great.

It was a great little festival, you know, you can pick up loads of different songs on a Fisher Price recorder, you know.

Much to my daughter's Disdain, the Mary A.R.

macKay had a great the great tradition of Anglo American sea ballads has never died out among the fishermen in sealers of the Maritime Provinces of Canada.

This salty verse, born on heaving spray, windswept decks, had its own way of being sung.

The attitude was mainly characteristic by one seaman, left hand deep on his waistband pocket and right hand gripping his glass, one shoulder as if to windward and feet well apart to meet the heave of the deck, Evidently eyes bent on the lookout at the foremast head and a voice pitched to reach that same foremast head with certainty against a fresh and rising breeze, Standing so as if he were at the wheel, the saved seaman would sing the ballad, omitting not a single course of that lively vessel nor a single order.

He sailed her from the dock, out of the harbour, down the coast, off to the banks, and then westerly again.

What I just realized I didn't mention Rod Sherman, who was the author of London River.

Great guy, as I said, used to sleep in his van at the folk festival and he'd get up and do his bit, have a few pints, go back to bed in his van.

Sadly, he's passed on.

No, but he was great.

And he said, why don't I sing Bristol river instead of the London River?

I said, well, I could do, but really it's fair to sing London river because that's what you wrote.

But he was a great guy, Rod, and we used to follow him, me and Broomhead, to many different festivals.

Have I got any more songs that I could add to this podcast?

Or does my wife want to ask me any questions or not?

Probably not, but she might do.

You never know with my wife.

I'm just looking at all of this.

I've got all my volumes here.

I've got eight volumes of songs.

Yeah.

That are all handwritten.

They're beautiful, actually.

And taken down from recordings or people, when I heard them singing, sat in the corner of a room.

Many of those old, like, folk club rooms, you know, it's great.

Really, really quite.

They're brilliant to look at and show a record of.

All a lot of your sea shanty life experience and the people you've known and different compositions of yours.

Yeah, yeah, there's lots.

So I got.

I don't know how many there are.

There must be hundreds, 6, 700 different.

Different.

Different songs.

Things written on bits of paper.

Yeah.

You know, as I say, the little sketches.

Yeah.

Little sketchy sketches are things you.

Yeah.

Sketch people.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Loads of things.

We have to put them together one day because it's, you know, you've done something.

I pass them on to the archives in the port shanty crew.

I think that's a better organizer first.

I think someone.

At least I hope someone would like them.

I'm sure they would.

They're fascinating, actually.

And it shows that it's like a work, you know, work in progress.

That you were sort of just adding to it on a really regular basis and.

Yeah.

You know, editing it and all sorts.

I felt what I can cope with at the moment.

Until the next time.

So sea songsters, shanty pickers, wherever you may be, across the world, across the sea, or even on dry land in a farmyard somewhere.

Bobby is the name.

If you need any more information about the songs, I'm happy to provide.

Lots of them.

Loads of them.

Hundreds of them.

I can vouch for that.

Yeah, I would never mind putting in a couple of little poems there.

I'd like to do some more there.

You've written many poems, songs and artwork.

Set this somewhere, wouldn't it?

Oh, yes.

Well.

I'll find it.

Find it and we'll add it in a minute.

But settle this from 1990.

Where were you?

Where was it for?

Yeah, 1990.

We were singing with the Harry Browns.

Okay.

It might have been a Bristol Sea shanty day sang.

What did I say?

Oh, yeah.

Ezekiel River, John Kanaka.

Sammy's gone a sailing.

I'll just, you know.

Around the Bay of Mexico.

That's another good song.

Hey.

Round the Bay of Mexico Way up Susiana Mexico is the place that I'm going to Round the Bay of Mexico.

Nice one to do that.

Brilliant.

I think you've got More than one set list though that you've kept.

I got loads upstairs.

Yes, I know.

So, yeah, I mean there's.

Yeah.

Looking back in it.

Yeah.

We'll put all this together sometimes so that people can appreciate all the lovely things that you've done.

Yeah.

Anyway, I'll leave you to your bit of history here.

Really.

Yeah.

You know, where they were collected and things.

You know, all my collection of Sea Fox Smith.

Oh, my word.

Poems and songs.

You know, it was great because Tom Lewis, that great, lovely friend of ours, Tom Lewis, I first heard singing Seafop Smith songs a few years ago now.

And one of one good ones that he done, which I'd love to love to hear him sing again, is something like 150.

Days out from bank or something like that.

Anyway, I must look it up.

He's great, great man.

I know, right.

From one great man to another.

Tommy Lynn, if you're listening.

Love you dearly, Nobby.

Okey doke.

You ready to sign off now?

I think.

Okay, I'll give me old babber, me old darling meal, Cornish pasta.

Look forward to seeing you again very, very, very, very, very soon.

Bye bye.

Thanks, Normy.

And I'm so pleased that you've managed to feel a little bit better that you could take part in recording that segment for us.

And a big thank you to his wonderful wife who supported him behind the scenes and.

And of course featured a little bit at the end.

So let's now pop down to the Signaller who is once again voiced by the legendary Ash, who's going to give you an update of the news and reviews of the Port of Bristol shanty crew.

Yo ho ho me hearties.

It's the Signaler here with all of the news and reviews from the Port of Bristol chancy crew.

So like a lot of people, January saw most of the crew in dry dock.

I'm not sure the majority committed completely to dry January, but we were certainly quite quiet.

The only gig we did during January was at the Nova Scotia at our, what we like to call residency, where we sing on the last Sunday in the month.

And I can't think of a better place to perform shanties down by the harborside in a pub full of people drinking beer and enjoying themselves.

So we intend to continue doing that singing at the Nova Scotia, seeing where Nobby spent his childhood jumping on and off of boats and being royally entertained down there by all of the guys.

So moving on to February, we've got three or four gigs.

We're ready to push the boat out Again, the first one we're doing is in on the 5th of February over in Thornbury for the Stroke association.

And we would obviously always like to help out anybody that feels that they can raise a couple of Bob by having us sing for them and talking about people raising a couple of Bob, having us sing for them.

We've.

We're doing a private gig the next day.

It's for the great people at Oakland Construction who are always very generous to give us booking fees and money to come and sing.

And I think this is about the third time we've sung for them.

And I have to say I do applaud their determination and commitment to sit through another performance by us.

It does really take a lot to have us back three times and we are very grateful for their generosity.

The last gig of the month is on the 21st of Feb. We are performing Memories at the Barn at the Now See Folk Club in aid of Dementia.

Tickets are on sale now and I'm sure those guys would love to see as many people coming along to support that great charity as is possible.

So a quietish month, January starting to ramp up again in February.

We look forward to seeing everybody during February and moving towards longer nights and not quite so dark mornings and when we'll really be back in full force as the spring kicks in.

So this is the Signaller signing off from the Port of Bristol Shanty Crew.

Bye.

Thank you, Ash.

And we as a crew look forward to those events and hopefully meeting one or two of you out and about.

So that's it for this month's episode of Shipshape and Bristol Fashion.

Another plea.

If you are a member of a shanty crew that love to promote what you're up to, then please do get in touch.

We would love to feature on this podcast because we know it's great to feature not just us, but to also promote what you get up to.

So if you are in a position that you'd love to promote an event or a bit of an update of what you're up to, then you can do that by featuring on this show.

The best thing to do is pop over to our website, which is shipshapepodcast.co.uk if you click the contact button or the contact link, you can then get in contact with me and we can then just arrange what that would look like.

Ultimately, what you need to do is just record a little bit of audio, even just on your phone, send it to me and I will make it feature on a future episode that is timely for you.

So thank you once again for listening.

And that's it for this month.

Fair winds and following seas, and we're welcome back on board next month.

Shipshape and Bristol fashion boys along the harbor side from even gorge to underfall we'll even haul the line Secure the barrels down below Bind and tie and lash em this vessel, she is certified Shipshape and Bristol fashion so haul away, me laddie boys Haul away, you're free Haul away, me laddy boys and save a drink for me Haul away, me laddie boys Haul away, you're free Haul away, me laddie boys and save a drink for me.