David Harley's Songs: Recent Episodes
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Information about two new sections to my Substack publications: one specializing in music, the other in verse. There will be others, since it occurs to me that not everyone who is interested in some of my output will want to read all of it!
‘Wrekin‘ is a song I wrote several years ago that happens to demonstrate some of the tonal possibilities of Nashville tuning/stringing in a second guitar part.
By way of supporting a forthcoming article on Nashville tuning for a folk magazine, which I’ll flag here when it appears.
In the meantime, I did write a short book on the topic…
Posted to Substack: a music link associated with a forthcoming article on Nashville tuning, on which I wrote a book a while ago.
It demonstrates one way in which the technique can be used.
Visiting the FB group Folk 21 for the first time in years, I found out that the group is in the process of closing down, and is asking people to leave the group. Having had to remove 4-500 individuals from another group one by one, I’m not surprised that the admins don’t want to do that for several thousand people… If you’re a Folk 21 member who hasn’t visited lately, you might want to check back and do them a favour!
David Harley
- Floorsinging for Beginners update
A very old document that I’ve been promising to update since 2018.
Once upon a time, Neil Corbett of the Bracknell Folk Club asked on uk.music.folk:
“What would be your top 3 tips for aspiring folk club floor singers? I’d lke to put a top 10 tip list on our Bracknell Folk Website.”
However, the response was so enthusiastic that it seemed a shame not to use all the advice that was offered, so I suggested putting together an FAQ. In fact, this is less an FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) document than a tipsheet, but we hoped it would be of use. The site on which I was keeping it disappeared several years ago, and in fact I’d forgotten about it until I came across it in a dark corner of my network. There are probably a lot fewer folk clubs around than when we put this together in the late 1990s, but I’ve been to enough open mic nights and jam sessions subsequently to believe that there are still people who are new to singing in public who might find it of some use, even if references to cassettes seem a little quaint in the second decade of the 21st century.
David Harley
“The ideal candidate doesn’t have a 9 to 5 mentality.”I have an idea I may have stolen that line from the very talented artist/illustrator/author Andrea Benko – ah, apparently I did. (As well as plundering Oscar Wilde’s dramatic oeuvre for the title of this article.) However, I really did have a departmental manager in A Certain IT Unit – at a medical research charity, if it matters – who dropped a very similar remark into the conversation when he took me to the pub for an informal getting-to-know-you chat.
“I can’t say this, but I’d be very disappointed if my staff always left the office at 5pm sharp.”
Fast forward a decade and a half. I was in a hotel in Bratislava. I was on one of those conference mini-breaks where you spend three days in the US, one at home, three more in the Far East, then two more somewhere in Europe. Of course, I’m not even trying to calculate the additional days spent travelling. But this time I’d left home in the early hours to travel halfway across England to get to Heathrow, waited around there for several hours, then taken not one but two flights to get to Bratislava because there wasn’t a direct flight. So I was ready for an early night. I don’t speak Slovak (or even Czech), so local TV was probably not going to keep me awake.
Unfortunately, I hadn’t yet turned my work phone off – in fact, I rarely did in those days.
DDDDRRRRNNNNGGGG!!!!!!!
It was a PR droid-in-charge (of something or other, but not me…) in the US, wanting me to talk to a high-profile journalist/influencer about some current security brouhaha. And he, fresh as a McFlurry on a bright morning in San Diego, couldn’t believe that an ageing security maven a million time zones away was in bed, rather than jumping at the opportunity to talk security to a professional sceptic who was always going to adapt anything I said to him to fit his preconceptions*.
“But it’s only 9pm over there!”
I should have told him to go forth and multiply (after sharing a couple of home truths about whose manager he wasn’t), but I’ve always been too polite for my own good, and I did do the interview. And I was quoted in such a way as to fit the journalist’s preconceptions…
By the time I actually retired, that cellphone had gone to the great Cellphone Warehouse in the sky, but one of the first habits I broke myself of was leaving my cellphone on overnight. If you need to talk to me urgently, use my landline. If you don’t know my landline number, it’s not ex-directory, but you probably have no reason to speak to me urgently anyway.
*I’m not going to name the journalist, who is, after all, a very competent writer with a genuine understanding of security issues. All I can say is, “he’s not the Messiah, but he’s far from the naughtiest boy in the media.”
David Harley
Some years ago, I was contacted on behalf of the British Library to ask if I’d be willing to contribute some or all of my recorded songs to the Sound & Vision collection. I was, of course, happy to do this, and forwarded sound files as albums were released, until I stopped getting a response as the files were offered for transfer. Eventually I realized that this must have been because of the serious ransomware attack carried out against the Library in 2023.
Seeing a reference to the Sound & Vision catalogue today, I took the opportunity to see whether any of my work had become available again to BL reader’s pass holders. Well, a couple of my books apparently are in the Interim Catalogue, though I didn’t have the patience to check through all the Harley-related references for work specific to me rather than all the various David Harleys et al listed there. (It’s extraordinary how many of us there are…) But it seems that the Sounds catalogue is not yet available, though it may be restored sometime this year.
To be honest, I probably won’t get to hear when and if my music does become available again. I don’t have a Reader’s Pass because they only allow access to archived material to visitors in person, and London and Yorkshire a both a long trip from where I live. So if you really want to see what music of mine is still around, for the moment your best bet is still Bandcamp. Though given the present state of the world, who knows how long that will still apply?
David Harley
Revisiting ‘The Little Drummer Girl’ a few days ago was an uncomfortable experience, given recent events in the Middle East, though it’s a decent example of Le Carré’s writing skills. Immediately afterwards, I got much more pleasure out of reading ‘Terry Pratchett – a Life with Footnotes’ and thinking for at least 15 seconds that I might attempt an autobiography. However, I eventually decided that I’d rather read Pratchett’s biography than mine, despite the sadness that clouded his final years. Still, there have been some moments of joy in my own life that I wouldn’t swap for anyone else’s memories. (I wonder if you know who you are!)
Yes, there’ll probably be a tune for this sooner or later: I don’t think it’s great poetry.
**Sometimes I lie awake,****Cataloguing my mistakes,****Catastrophizing in the night:****Caught up in night terrors****Review comedies of errors:** **The ones I sometimes call my life.**
**And yet there've been sweet dreams****Among the nightmares and the screams,****Good love and good music on the way.****I've tried to keep to the Highway Code,****And though I'm running out of road,****I hope there aren't too many fines to pay.****David Harley**
Very rough demo of a heavily recast variant on a traditional theme. It’s unlikely to stay unaccompanied.
https://dharley.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/hanging-tree.mp3[or]
https://whealalicemusic.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/hanging-tree.mp3
**Hangman stay your hand awhile, Just you let me beYonder comes my father dear, He's come to pay my feeSon, I didn't bring no silverAnd I won't pay that feeI just came to see you hangingFrom that gallows treeHangman, stay your hand awhileDon't you tie that nooseI think I see my mama comeWith gold to turn me looseI've got no gold or silverAnd I can't pay that feeI just came to see you hangingHanging from the gallows treeDon't put that noose around my neckJust you let it beYonder comes my sweetheart dearShe's come to set me freeHoney did you bring silverOr gold to pay my fineAnd save me from this bitter ropeAnd save this soul of mineI sure ain't paid your fineIt does no good to curseNo silver in my pocketNo gold in my purseNo one's riding through the nightIn hopes to set you freeBut I'll be watching as they hang youFrom that hanging treeI'll be laughing as they cut you downFrom the hanging tree**
There is, of course a multitude of songs where the potential hanging victim is saved by his/her sweetheart paying his fine (The Gallows Pole, The Prickly Bush etc.), and others where there’s no option of paying his way out of the execution (Derwentwater’s Farewell, The Sheffield Apprentice), or it’s too late to derail the process (Geordie/Georgie) but I didn’t remember one where the sweetheart, presumably in revenge for some slight or injury, came to watch with no intention of effecting a rescue. Maybe at some point I’ll write about the backstory…
[In the 1980s I was working 8-5 as a wood-machinist (which is why my right thumb is now shorter than my left thumb – in those days you weren’t considered a woodworker until you’d lost at least part of at least one digit) while still supplementing my income as a semi-pro musician. It’s not an accurate representation of one particular gig, but as a general impression of a semi-pro soloist’s experiences in London, it might have some merit. (Maybe at some point I’ll dredge up some recollections of my adventures with bands in London, but those were generally less demanding and manipulative than the West Midlands circuit – see below.)]
08:00: Stagger into work under the weight of at a brace of guitars and a very small PA. (itemized below) and a couple of small but heavy rucksacks, stuffed with accessories. The rucksacks, not me.
12.00-13.00: lunchtime sandwiches in the wood-mill followed by a turn or two around the fretboard in the hope of being relatively ready to play later on. This, of course, is accompanied by banter from a couple of passing chippies about sharing the workplace with Eric Clapton, and how do I manage to play two guitars at the same time? (Answer: the same way you work a screwdriver and a chisel at the same time…Different tools for different jobs…)
17.00: Clock off and stagger over to Tube station, even more unsteadily after a healthy eight hours of honest labour (less one hour for lunch and 20 minutes for tea-breaks). Presuming that non-carnivorous fodder won’t be available at or near the venue (at that time I was vegetarian), so invest en route in a healthy, invigorating bag of greasy, warmish chips before taking train and/or other transport to some far-flung corner of the Metropolis. Well, maybe not that far-flung, since I hardly ever found myself playing South of the river. But there are plenty of places in North London that aren’t blessed with a convenient Tube or overground station, too.
18.45-ish: Reach nearest station/bus-stop to the venue. Search rucksacks in hope of finding London A-Z among assorted jack-leads, batteries, foot-pedals, set lists, spare strings, power leads and sockets, not to mention cassettes and poetry chapbooks that no one will want to buy.
18.55-ish. Find A-Z in anorak pocket. Set off for an invigorating game of Hunt The Venue.
19.30-ish: crawl into the right pub, aching in every muscle from a day spent shoving timber around and an early evening burdened with guitars, amplifier and accessories. The organizer hasn’t arrived and the upstairs room is locked, and the landlord won’t let me in there on my own. So I sit in the bar trying not to get drunk and incapable even before the organizer arrives. I now have nothing to do except examine my stage fright (which is in prime condition) and worry about whether I should reorganize my set list. By about 20.30, my muscles are less bothersome, but those chips are sitting very heavily on my digestive system, and my second pint is having a similar effect on my bladder. Of course, I haven’t been to the loo as I don’t want to leave my gear unguarded.
20.45: The MC has arrived. My muscles start to complain again as I carry my gear up to the room, unaided, of course: the MC is weighted down with the key, a small cashbox and the membership register. I start to set up. About two minutes in, the MC decides that there are already enough people there to start the evening and off he goes. I finish stuffing jack-leads into any old socket and get out of the way, resigned to spending the first few minutes of my set alienating my audience by finishing off setup instead of talking to them. Down to the bar to get another pint and fantasize about escaping. I now have nothing to do but revisit my set list, obsess about stage fright and wait for some warning that I’ll soon be on.
21.30: Still waiting for early warning when MC says “And now for our guest for the evening…” He gets my name wrong, but then so did Time Out, which sometimes can’t be persuaded that I’m not Steve Harley or (inexplicably) Vin Garbutt*. City Limits and Melody Maker generally don’t mention it at all, or put the gig down as being on a different day or at a different venue. It was, of course, arranged too late to get it into Folk London.
And… well, it’s a gig. I’m not usually as bad as I was frightened of being, occasionally I’m almost as good as I wanted to be. Usually, no one heckles persistently, or calls me out on minor fluffs, I don’t get too drunk to play or remember my words, and there is a small but not too hostile audience, though there was on one occasion an unpleasant exchange of words in the interval with someone who seems to think that I must be some sort of bizarre, bearded drag artist, or maybe an aging rent boy.***
Even better, the organizer isn’t usually reluctant to pay me, which is a nice change from when I played with dance bands – the organizer in those days eagerly seized on any excuse to reduce the fee. “You only played two and a quarter hours.” “You were too loud.” And my favourites: “I thought you were a country and western band” and “I thought I was paying for a five-piece!”
If only it wasn’t such a long way home…
- To be fair, my friend Josephine Austin, who organized a yearly poetry festival in Hastings at which I regularly read my own verse (for many years alone, but in later years as a double act with my daughter), introduced me at least once as Steve Harley, which at least gave me the opportunity for a fair-to-middling adlib about his being my grandfather. To be even fairer, she knew the Cockney Rebel bloke as well as me, so a little confusion under the stress of compering was understandable and forgivable.
Less forgivably, I’ve become aware through various experiments with ChatGPT that while it does a fairly good job of impersonating me in the context of writing about security, it gets hopelessly confused between me, Steve Harley, and another musician called David Harley. Certainly, I won’t be encouraging it to write my songs.
I suppose it makes a change from having my surname misunderstood. On one memorable occasion in a hospital in Windsor I was called by no less than three surnames, none of them mine…
I don’t have a copy, but there is a photograph somewhere of me reading at the Hastings festival with my very small daughter in my arms, she holding a balloon animal someone had given her earlier. I’m not sure whether the squeaking of the balloons added to or detracted from the impact of my immortal verse. When I mentioned this to the poet and songwriter Bernard Puckett, in two of whose bands I played for a while, he reminded me of the dangers of working with children and animals, especially both at the same time.
** Vin was a lovely chap (much missed in the folk world) and a great performer and songwriter, and we once spent a happy half hour or so together on Shrewsbury station while he checked out with my newly-acquired tenor banjo, but our respective approaches to music were very different.
*** As I remember it – and it was many decades ago! – the gentleman in question buttonholed me in the bar to give him a light and then asked what was going on in the room upstairs that people (admittedly, not many of them) seemed to be migrating to. When I said “only me” he seemed to think I was propositioning him. Sadly, my best responses came into my head ten minutes after I’d just shaken my head angrily and walked away.
‘Keepsake Mill’ from the new ‘Farewell Reunion’ album by myself, Dave Higgen and Nancy Higgen (masquerading as the New Prize Silver Jug Band) is scheduled to go into the ‘Here We Are’ section of Stuart Green’s show ‘The Folk Club’ (on various platforms as shown below) on and after the 5th of February.
The show broadcasts as follows:
Folk Friday Radio www.facebook.com/folkfridayradiostation/
Every Weds 6.30pm (Repeat Sunday 2pm)
Folk Music Notebook The Folk Music Notebook – Home
Every Thurs 10pm ET / 7pm PT / UK Fri 3am & 11am UK
West Norfolk Radio
Saturday 7pm UK Time [West Norfolk Radio]
Mixcloud
Every show is available to catch up on The Folk Club
By David Harley, Dave Higgen, and Nancy Higgen, masquerading as the New Prize Silver Jug Band.
There’s a certain amount of genre hopping here, but no actual jug band music. Come to that, no brass/silver band either. Next time, maybe.
Back at the end of the 60s at college in North Wales, Dave and I, among others (including Sally Goddard, better known more recently as part of the Canadian band ‘Atlantic Union’, and Paul Dunderdale, last heard of teaching music on the Isle of Man) occasionally gigged under a name that cheekily parodied that of a local silver band. When Dave and I started (via the wonders of internet connectivity) to record together, it seemed appropriate to resurrect the name (but dropping the name of the real silver band!)
Farewell Reunion (name taken from one of Dave’s songs) is currently available only from Bandcamp, though it may get streamed at some point. No hurry for that, since it’s unlikely that any of us will live long enough to make the threshold for payment from Spotify etc…
Dave Higgen: engineering and production; bass, drums/percussion, keys, guitars, vocals**, any instruments unaccounted for.
David Harley: octave mandola, most of the guitars and impersonation of other things with strings (but not the harp), vocals*.
Nancy Higgen: vocal on ‘Mad as the Mist and Snow’***
Here’s the tracklist. You don’t have to buy anything to listen to tracks.
- Anywhere (Harley)*
- Summer (Higgen-Harley)**
- Old White Lightning (Harley)*
- Bourgeois Domesticity (Higgen)**
- A Rainy Day Blues (Harley)*
- Mad as the Mist and Snow (W.B. Yeats-Higgen)***
- Who Do You Think You Are? (Harley)*
- Alone (Higgen)**
- Hannah (Upcountry) (Harley)*
- Ugly (Higgen)**
- Keepsake Mill (Robert Louis Stevenson-Harley)*
- Farewell Reunion (Higgen)**
- Paper City (Slight Return) (Harley-Higgen)*
- Lachaise (Higgen-Harley)*
Taking off my musician’s hat to masquerade as an author, I’m very pleased to be included on the Cornish Writers site. (To be fair, the bio does include a link to my book on Nashville tuning.)
However, what I really liked about the whole thing was doing this interview, which was a lot of fun. (Mostly, but your mileage may vary.)
David Harley reveals much more about himself and his writing than anyone will ever want to read.
Not many of my books are music-related, but those that are included in the collection of links here. There’s more information on the individual books here, if you’re interested. Well, somebody might be…
David Harley
My country right or wrong? I don’t think so.
“Buller, buller, buller” is reportedly the Bullingdon Club rallying cry with which Boris Johnson greeted fellow ex-members before the reputation of the club became so toxic that even he claimed to regret it.
“Little Britain” is less a reference to a TV show that I’ve never actually seen than to the myth of “plucky little Britain” standing alone against its enemies during two World Wars.
Thames House and Vauxhall Cross are the headquarters of MI5 and MI6 respectively. I don’t believe that either organization is unequivocally evil, but clearly both are tainted by political pragmatisim. Sanctions against Russia since the invasion of Ukraine have been selective, and the UK government is even more selective when it comes to criticizing the activities of political allies.
I prefer not to go into detail about the unspeakable far-right agitators and politicians, or the so-called patriots who seized upon the deaths of innocent children in Southport as an excuse for rioting and looting.
‘Perfidious Albion’ is a term that’s been used to describe Britain’s duplicitious political behaviour at least as far back as the 19th century.
Anyway, I’m too old and feeble to be much of an activist nowadays, but at least I can still vent my spleen in song. At least, I don’t think it’s illegal yet, though another four years of Tory repression might have changed that.
This song was finished today, so it’s obviously an imperfect performance (and one word has already been changed since this recording). ‘Castles’ is now ‘apartments’.
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/little-britain.mp3Or:
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/little-britain.mp3Little-Minded BritainThe flags are out in Downing Street to show that we’re the best
The Buller Buller Bullies take it all, and sod the rest
The greedy ones unmasked in the corridors of power
Still claim they’re just like us, in their apartments and their towers
Please don’t make me live in Little Britain
With the bullies and the liars without shame
I don’t want to end my days with those who say that it’s OK
To spit on anyone who’s not like them
Thames House is taking tea, and so is Vauxhall Cross
With the traitors and the ones who pull their strings
The oligarchs still thrive, money still has the last word
Whichever way the pendulum swings
Don’t make me live in Little-Minded Britain
Where the racists pose as patriots and devils pose as saints
Please don’t let me die in Little Britain
Among the hopeless victims of the rage that knows no shame
Don’t make me live in Little-minded Britain
Albion still perfidious is no safe place to be
Please don’t let me die in Little Britain
This is no place to meet eternity
Words and music (c) David Harley
I landed badly from a leap of Faith
And Faith no longer talks to me
Though I tried rewriting history
Her story won’t let me be
Cash to ashes, rust to dust
Go for broke and end up bust
The devil drives, where needing must
Dream of love, and fall in lust
Maybe I don’t have the jealousy gene
Maybe Jean’s just not the one
To paint my world a lighter blue
And continue what’s begun
Cash to ashes, rust to dust
Go for broke and end up bust
The devil drives, where needing must
Dream of love, and fall in lust
I was happy with the crumbs from her table
With no dough of my own
But lately I’ve been begging for Mercy
Only Mercy doesn’t want to know
Cash to ashes, rust to dust
Go for broke and end up bust
The devil drives, where needing must
Dream of love, and fall in lust
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/rust-to-dust-2.mp3OR:
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/rust-to-dust-2.mp3
Words and music by David Harley.
Now with a fuller guitar accompaniment, and an instrumental improvisation that may find its way into the final version.
There are many stories about Wild Eadric or Edric, his defiance toward the Norman invaders and eventual capitulation (seemingly historical fact); his marriage to a fairy princess; his imprisonment in the Shropshire Hills, emerging when England is in peril, and his association with the Wild Hunt. The Devil has long been associated with Shropshire, too, the Devil’s Chair being a rock formation on the Stiperstones.
The lyric arose from a sour conviction that in the 21st century we are in as much danger from the misdeeds of politicians and oligarchs, the rise of social media misinformation, and a badly broken electoral system, as we are from dictators in other countries. Like the witches and demons who select their king before the Devil’s Chair on the longest night of the year, it sometimes seems we are only allowed bad electoral choices.
The words have changed slightly since the original recording, as I wanted to make them less UK-centric. I’d like to think that in an age of incoming global catastrophe (and I don’t only mean Trump’s promise to abolish voting), Aedric’s remit might have widened.
In stately halls the dreams are bought and sold
The promises will melt like fairy gold,
While high up there among the Shropshire Hills
Wild Eadric sleeps, his bride beside him still:
Satan sits upon his midnight throne
In judgement on their archaic flesh and bone
The spirits summoned to the Devil’s Chair
Elect their leaders for the coming years.
The Devil surely looks on with a grin
As we condone the enemies within:
The conmen and their masters far and near,
Still feed upon our misery and fear.
Where is the Wild Hunt now? What will it take
To rid this world of devilry and hate?
The song:
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/fairy-gold-3.mp3or:
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/fairy-gold-3.mp3The improvisation:
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/fairy-gold-instrumental.mp3or:
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/fairy-gold-instrumental.mp3
Words and music by David Harley.
Now with a basic guitar accompaniment. (The eventual version will be more ambitious, but needs work.)
There are many stories about Wild Eadric or Edric, his defiance toward the Norman invaders and eventual capitulation (seemingly historical fact); his marriage to a fairy princess; his imprisonment in the Shropshire Hills, emerging when England is in peril, and his association with the Wild Hunt. The Devil has long been associated with Shropshire, too, the Devil’s Chair being a rock formation on the Stiperstones.
The lyric arose from a sour conviction that in the 21st century we are in as much danger from the misdeeds of politicians and oligarchs, the rise of social media misinformation, and a badly broken electoral system, as we are from dictators in other countries. Like the witches and demons who select their king before the Devil’s Chair on the longest night of the year, it sometimes seems we are only allowed bad electoral choices.
The words have changed slightly since the original recording, as I wanted to make them less UK-centric. I’d like to think that in an age of incoming global catastrophe (and I don’t only mean Trump’s promise to abolish voting), Aedric’s remit might have widened.
In stately halls the dreams are bought and sold
The promises will melt like fairy gold,
While high up there among the Shropshire Hills
Wild Eadric sleeps, his bride beside him still:
Satan sits upon his midnight throne
In judgement on their archaic flesh and bone
The spirits summoned to the Devil’s Chair
Elect their leaders for the coming years.
The Devil surely looks on with a grin
As we condone the enemies within:
The conmen and their masters far and near,
Still feed upon our misery and fear.
Where is the Wild Hunt now? What will it take
To rid this world of devilry and hate?
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/fairy-gold-2.mp3or:
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/fairy-gold-2.mp3
Not a song of mine, this time.
Now with added Harley (review of Paul Cowley’s excellent single) – Folking.com’s monthly cumulative review of EPs and singles.
…never does me any harm. Those of you with musical ears might suffer a bit though.
Anyway, ‘The Folk Club‘ is playing my ‘Song of Chivalry’ in the ‘Here we are’ section of their upcoming show, along with tracks from Ezra Biggs and Ann Radcliffe.
Here’s where you’re in danger of hearing it:
- Weds 31st July 7pm Burwell Radio [UK Only] Rpt. Sunday 1pm
- Thurs 1st Aug [10pm ET / 7pm PT ] [Fri 3am UK – Rpt Fri 11am] Folk Music Notebook
- Sat 3rd Aug 7pm West Norfolk Radio
- Subsequently on Mixcloud (show 204)
Also available as a single on Bandcamp. As always, you don’t have to buy it hear it! There’s another version here, where the guitar accompaniment is in Nashville tuning.
When M’Lord returned / To his sheets of silk
And his gentle lady / Of musk and milk
The minstrels sang / In the gallery
Their songs of slaughter / And chivalry
The rafters roared / With laughter and boasting
Goblets were raised and drained / In toasting
The heroes of Crécy / And Azincourt
Or the madness / Of some holy war
The hawk is at rest / On the gauntlet once more
Savage of eye / And bloody of claw
Famine and fever / Are all the yield
Of the burnt-out barns / And wasted fields
The sun grins coldly / Through the trees
The children shiver / The widows grieve
And beg their bread / At the monastery door
Tell me then / Who won the war?
Slide guitar version of the well-known spiritual (Sometimes I feel like a) Motherless Child. [Roud 10072] Probably from the Civil War era or earlier.
I don’t sing it, but a common first verse is:
Sometimes I feel like a motherless child x2
A long, long way from my home
Not to be confused with Motherless Children or the blues Motherless Child or several more recent songs.
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/motherless-child.mp3Or:
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/motherless-child.mp3
Words and music by David Harley.
For the moment, just an unaccompanied vocal while I work on another project. The words and music are mostly there, but I need to work on an accompaniment when I get back to it. There are many stories about Wild Eadric or Edric, his defiance toward the Norman invaders and eventual capitulation (seemingly historical fact); his marriage to a fairy princes; his imprisonment in the Shropshire Hills, emerging when England is in peril, and his association with the Wild Hunt. The Devil has long been associated with Shropshire, too, the Devil’s Chair being a rock formation on the Stiperstones.
The lyric arose from a sour conviction that in the 21st century we are in as much danger from the misdeeds of politicians and oligarchs, the rise of social media misinformation, and a badly broken electoral system, as we are from dictators in other countries. Like the witches and demons who select their king before the Devil’s Chair on the longest night of the year, it sometimes seems we are only allowed bad electoral choices.
In London Town the dreams are bought and sold
And yet they melt away like fairy gold,
While high, high up among the Shropshire Hills
Wild Eadric sleeps, his bride beside him still:
Satan sits upon his midnight throne
In judgement on their archaic flesh and bone
The spirits summoned to the Devil’s Chair
Elect their leaders for the coming years.
The Devil surely looks on with a grin
As we condone the enemies within:
The conmen and their masters far and near,
Still feeding on our misery and fear.
Where is the Wild Hunt now? What will it take
To rid this land of devilry and hate?
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/fairygold3.mp3or:
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/fairygold3.mp3
Definitely a work in progress (hence the change of title, and shortly, audio)…
Words and music (c) David Harley
I landed badly from a leap of Faith
And Faith no longer talks to me
Though I tried rewriting history
Her story won’t let me be
Cash to ashes, rust to dust
Go for broke and end up bust
The devil drives, where needing must
Dream of love, and fall in lust
Maybe I don’t have the jealousy gene
Maybe Jean’s just not the one
To paint my world a lighter blue
And continue what’s begun
Cash to ashes, rust to dust
Go for broke and end up bust
The devil drives, where needing must
Dream of love, and fall in lust
I was happy with the crumbs from her table
Just a loser with no dough
But lately I’ve been begging for Mercy
Only Mercy doesn’t want to know
Cash to ashes, rust to dust
Go for broke and end up bust
The devil drives, where needing must
Dream of love, and fall in lust
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/rust-to-dust.mp3(backup)
https://whealalice.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/rust-to-dust.mp3
Hearing this version on radio, there was some distortion I felt needed to be reduced if not eliminated. The replaced version here is hopefully a little better. The remixed version is also in the process of being uploaded to replace the version on the Bandcamp album ‘Brookland Voices‘.
D.
This is very much a work in progress: a single verse and a tune that may well change over time. The verse will almost certainly not be expanded, but it will probably constitute just one section of a larger piece with quite a lot of instrumental music, though the verse may be left a capella.
For a rather different approach to a similar visualisation, see Philip Larkin’s An Arundel Tomb.
I’m not sure if it’s coincidental that while I was posting this LinkedIn suggested that I might be interested in a post as Obituaries Editor for a medical journal…
Effigies
Once more they lie together
Not an atom’s width apart
Where none disturb their slumber
For there is no beating heart
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2024/05/effigies.mp3Backup:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2024/05/effigies.mp3
Nothing to do with the Spice Girls or reality TV: I’ve had the basic idea for this kicking around for at least 30 years, but I finally put the words into something resembling a final version. This is a single take recording: I’ll hopefully come back to it when I’ve learned it properly, but this is Harley in country blues mode, so it’s never likely to be particularly polished… The guitar is a D’Angelico archtop, but it doesn’t sound particularly jazzy because, since it was done in one take, the acoustic sound is mixed in with the DI-d electric sound. I rather like it, but your mileage may vary.
Words and music, such as it is, by me.
https://dharley.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/who-do-you-think-you-are.mp3Backup:
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2024/04/who-do-you-think-you-are.mp3I came home last night, just about the break of day
She’s got her suitcase packed, just about to make her getaway
She said, well now baby, who do you think you are
You stayed out all night, don’t know what you came back for
Five long years my baby walked the line
Now she’s gone, long gone, since she found out I was playing double time
She said, well now baby, who do you think you are
You stayed out all night, don’t know what you came back for
Down at the courthouse, fell down on my knees
Said I love you babe, won’t you forgive me please?
She said, well now baby, who do you think you are
You stayed out all night, don’t know what you came back for
Wrote her a letter, wrote it on my knees
Babe I learned my lesson, won’t you come back please?
She wrote back,
Well now baby, who do you think you are
Got my eyes wide open, don’t know what I’d come back for
David Harley
It’s always nice to get radio play (thank you again, Ian Semple, for playing ‘A Rainy Day Blues’ today on Coast FM!), but I’m particularly looking forward to being played on this one, just because of the name of the show.
I hope no one will expect me to go all punk…
David Harley
I know it’s hardly five minutes since the last album, but I’ve actually been working on this one since last year.
Brookland Voices started as another vaguely folky album, but somehow Messrs Yeats (subsequently moved to the ‘Swan Songs’ album) and Housman elbowed their way in. Then I found myself with all these improvised or semi-improvised guitar pieces, some of them played on electric rather than acoustic guitar, and they do seem to dominate the album. In fact, while I would never claim to be any sort of jazz guitarist, this is probably as near to a jazz album as I’ll ever get. To be fair, ‘South Wind’ and ‘The Water is Wide’ are instrumental versions of traditional songs/tunes.
‘Severn Years In The Sand’ is a version of a song that seems to have arisen during World War II among units that saw service in the Middle East. ‘The Knocker Up’ and ‘It Ain’t Gonna Rain are actual folk songs. ‘When I Was In Love With You’, ‘Far In A Western Brookland’, ‘When I Was One-And-Twenty’ and ‘Blue Remembered Hills’ are settings of verse by Housman. The song ‘A Rainy Day Blues’ and the other instrumentals are my own, including ‘Chivalry’, which is an instrumental based on my own ‘Song of Chivalry’.
I’ve put this up before, but this is a version with electric guitar that I quite like. More jazz than blues, perhaps: I even played it on an archtop guitar.
Some days are like a melody
But I can’t seem to hold the key
I don’t mind losing
I just wish I had a little more to lose
So I spend my day trying to keep myself amused
Sitting here picking at a rainy day blues
I don’t mind losing
I just wish I had a little more to lose
It seems the road to fortune never ends
You play God all week and golf at weekends
I don’t mind losing
I just wish I had a little more to lose
And if we quit the rat-race we could have a ball
But you know those big wheels grind so small
I don’t mind losing
I just wish I had a little more to lose
You say you love me but it seems sometimes
You stuff my mouth with kisses and my ears with lies
I don’t mind losing
I just wish I had a little more to lose
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2024/03/a-rainy-day-blues.mp3Backup:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2024/03/a-rainy-day-blues.mp3
Does this man have nothing better to do with his time?
Here’s the summary:
I make no claim at all to be a cartoonist (let alone any sort of real artist). However, some people seemed to like my cheesy little cartoons (mostly IT-related), idiotic photos, and cheap sarcastic commentary, so I thought that I should start putting some of these ramblings together in the same place.
That place was the Dataholics blog, and much of this book was originally based on that content. Ironically, though, many of the cartoons have now been abstracted for other projects.
I parted company with most of the security industry in 2019 (though the recent book Facebook: Sins & Insensitivities did place me back in that arena, though not as a professional). That is, I supppose, why the Dataholics site has seen less use since then, and why what content has been posted is less like to have been related to IT security. On the other hand, much of it still has a connection to internet ephemera. Some of the content here comes from other blogs such as Parodies Regained while some hasn’t previously been made public at all.
And here’s the link…
A vaguely jazzy piece I first put together in the 80s, but I’m still trying to get it right.
It looks as if this version is going to be on the next album.
D.
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2024/03/blues-for-davy.mp3Backup:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2024/03/blues-for-davy.mp3
Swan Songs
Album cover
- Ten Percent Blues 03:42
- The Road 03:34
- Marking Time 01:38
- This Guitar Just Plays The Blues 02:49
- The Last Musketeer 02:31
- Orpheus with his Loot 02:27
- What Do I Do (About You) 02:05
- Rain 03:43
- Paper City 05:46
- Snowbird 04:44
- Swift Variations 02:11
- The Wild Swans at Coole 06:17
- Cornish Ghosts 03:49
- Hilltop Snapshots 03:38
- The Road to Frenchman’s Creek 02:52
- Song of Chivalry 03:58
In early 2023 an awkward medical condition brought it home to me that perhaps it was time to draw a line under any pretensions I have to live performance, so my appearance at the Lafrowda festival in St. Just on the 15th July marked a semi-official farewell to the live stage, not that I’ve played publicly much in recent years anyway. This album is drawn from the set list for that appearance, so it takes the form (mostly) of reinterpretations of familiar (to me, anyway) material rather than new songs.
I can’t promise that I’ll never be inflicted upon a live audience again (sorry!), and I’m certainly not promising that I’ll never record or write anything else, but this is, I suppose, an end to any thoughts I had of resuming my career as a professional musician when I retired from the IT industry in 2019.
Lyrics to ‘Marking Time’ by Fiona Freeman. Lyric to ‘The Wild Swans at Coole’ by W.B. Yeats. Other lyrics and all melodies by David Harley, as are all vocals and instruments.
I just caught up with the Readifolk Radio Show from Friday, where Ian Freedman kindly featured ‘Thomas Anderson’ among some great tracks from some great performers like Martin Simpson and Daria Kulesh. I’m quite pleased with the quality of my track, considering it uses multiple instruments recorded one track at a time on Garageband.
https://www.mixcloud.com/ianfreedman18/the-readifolk-radio-show-1st-march-2024/
As a matter of fact, the song got its debut at the old Reading Folk Club in the 70s, when I was one of the people involved in running the old club at South Hill Park in Bracknell. I recorded it in the 80s in London, at a studio in Camden, but I’ve never released that version: the Garageband version is much more recent.
The backstory to the song, which was based on an article by Ron Nurse, can be found here. It also gets quite a lot of attention in my book So Sound You Sleep, which can be found here.
Ron Armitage kindly played the track on Bolton FM recently , so it’s nice that people are still not too repelled by it!
David Harley
Intended for one of my occasional reviews for Folking.com, but it turned out that two of us had review copies.
(I don’t usually post reviews or links to reviews here, but as I don’t often post original music here at the moment, I thought I may as well put one here as well as my other music blogs.)
KEITH JAMES – Word Paintings (Hurdy Gurdy HGA2930)
It’s been a while since I heard and reviewed a Keith James album, so I was intrigued to find out what he’d been during the (very stressful, for all of us) interim. His album Word Paintings (due for release early in 2024) builds on his songwriting partnership with artist, ceramicist and writer Jenny Finch, previously heard on the 2021 album Can You Imagine? And what a very rewarding collaboration it is too. I understand from the review by Dai Jeffries for Folking.com that the final release may be different to the collection Keith sent to me last year as regards choice and order of tracks. I don’t have an up-to-date release date, but when I have a date and link I’ll post the information on this site.
The version of the album that I received featured 11 songs by Keith and Jenny as well as a song each from John Martyn and Nick Drake.
- Given Keith’s mastery of the nylon-strung guitar, it’s no surprise that ‘Postcard From Havana’ tells its absorbing story against a a musical background strongly suggestive of both Spanish and Afro-Cuban music.
- ‘Solid Air’ is the John Martyn jazz-flavoured classic first recorded in 1973: it’s remarkable how Keith gets under Martyn’s skin here, vocally and instrumentally, yet somehow makes the song his own, fitting entirely appropriately with the rest of the material here.
- ‘Nocturne’ is a dramatic, piano-driven song, with a suggestion of atonality here and there that adds to the overtones of desperation in the lyric.
- ‘Winter In Poitiers’ is more conventional in form and production: if the lyric wasn’t so very Keith James, you could almost imagine it sung by a Cliff Richard or Paul Young (and it might well have been a hit).
- ‘Currency Of Nations’ is a series of oblique, downbeat observations of ‘digital humanity’. Very effective.
- ‘The Lizard And The Butterfly’, with its electric guitar and solid percussion, is closer to rock than most of the tracks here, in a 60s sort of way. In fact it reminded me a little of Richard Fariña’s ‘Reno Nevada’, but in a good way.
- ‘Northern Sky’ is the other cover on this record, being one of Nick Drake’s songs. It’s a particularly fitting choice for the other cover on this album, in that ‘Solid Air’ was written for Nick. In fact, ‘Northern Sky’ seems to have been written while Nick was (briefly) living with John and Beverley Martin. Keith’s delivery here isn’t really that much like Nick’s, but has a fragility that seems fitting, given what we know now of that tragic talent.
- The enigmatic lyric to ‘The Photograph’ supplies its own series of snapshots, like a slide show or a video using stills “frozen in time”to support music. Fine music it is, too.
- The title of ‘Pram Wheels And Broken Lampshades’ sounds like something Tom Waits might have written, but the lyric subverts the premise of ‘Broken Bicycles’ and sets it into a livelier arrangement that is yet somehow more dangerous.
- Slide guitar and harmonica overlays give ‘Smoking Dog Café’ a blues-y vibe set against a lyric that somehow recalls the Beat Generation, or perhaps the generation of songsmiths (the Doors, the Grateful Dead et al) that absorbed those influences. I wouldn’t hate hearing some more like this.
- ‘Moment To Shine’ – the lyric echoes Keith’s stance as a climate change activist (as demonstrated in his Paradise Lost album), in a fittingly synth-heavy setting.
- ‘Sideways Smile’ is a bit of a surprise, given the seriousness and sophistication of so much of Keith’s output: a positive, poppy earworm. I love it!
- ‘She Bathes In Light’ reminded me a little, thematically of ‘She’s A Rainbow’, but has an richness of colour, imagery and humanity that evaded the Jagger-Richard song.
I already knew Keith as a fine poet and lyricist as well as a super-competent musician, but this collaboration is clearly working beautifully: while the arrangements and production (jointly executed by Branwen Munn and Keith himself) are as accomplished as ever. Some of the tracks here seem a little more accessible than some of his work, while retaining a poetic sensibility and musical scope that puts him closer to the Nouvelle Chanson heirs of Brel and Brassens than to mainstream rock.
If you know and love Keith’s work, you’ll certainly want to add this to your collection. If you’re not sure, I recommend that you give it a try!
David Harley
Artist’s website
Videos:
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- Northern Sky
- Solid Air
Having an article in the next ‘Folklife Traditions Journal‘ (out in March) and sporadically working on a(nother) folk-ish album which may have to be mostly unaccompanied, I’m starting to worry that people will start accusing me of being a folkie again. Though I picked up a guitar just now and my left hand appeared to be almost back to normal, so there may yet be quite a lot of guitar after all.
The article is based on a longer article on this blog, by the way. There is an article in the next issue Folk In Cornwall which is also based on that article.
Now I’ve looked more closely, I see that Rosie Upton and I both wrote about songs sung by our grandmothers. Editor Sam Simmons gets at least two bonus points for tagging the articles The Granny Awards.
David Harley
A work in progress. Now includes two vocal settings of verse from ‘A Shropshire Lad’ separated by a guitar solo. I think it needs more than this to raise the spirits a bit!
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2023/09/brookland-voices-3.mp3Backup:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2023/09/brookland-voices-3.mp3
Lafrowda photo Now released as a single on Bandcamp. (You don’t have to buy it to hear it!) Should appear on Apple Music etc. in the next week or so. First and probably last single from the forthcoming Swan Songs album, consisting mostly of recordings made as tryouts for a solo set with electric guitarat […]
An instrumental version, based on the unlikely assumption that several layers of Harley guitar are a Good Thing. [backup]
Working on my setting for Housman’s poem ‘Far In A Western Brookland’ I came up with an instrumental passage I really liked. I’m not sure it will fit in with the finished setting, but it certainly stands well on its own. Acoustic guitar in DADGAD. Backup:
Yes, after many decades of denying being a folk singer, I’ve made what looks from a distance like a folk album. In A Folkier Vein does, in fact, include my take on a few genuine folk songs, while other tracks make use of traditional(-ish) material. While several of these songs have been released before, the […]
The lyric is from Housman’s ‘A Shropshire Lad’ (LII), the tune is mine. I only recently realized that I hadn’t put it on any of my blogs. It’s likely to reappear shortly on an album, though. [Backup] Far in a western brookland That bred me long ago The poplars stand and tremble By pools I […]
A little guitar duet I improvised a while ago. It actually evolved from a multitracked version of Salley Gardens. I couldn’t get the tone I wanted from the main melody, but really liked some of the fills and frills, so here they are stitched into a short guitar piece. Maybe I’ll go back to it sometime […]
Back in the Dark Ages, I used to spend a lot of time sitting in the Refectory Lounge at what was then called the University College of North Wales, Bangor. No doubt I should have been in the library, but was likelier to be mistreating a guitar, often in the company of other guitar addicts, […]
The album Hands of the Craftsman has now been expanded to include some of the additional material made available in the book of the album. The number of tracks has been doubled, but the price hasn’t! That’s because although there are a couple of tracks there that were recorded recently, most of the additions are […]
I learned this from Ewan MacColl’s album ‘The Manchester Angel’. I think he collected it from the Dorset singer Caroline Hughes in the 60s, but Hammond also collected two very similar versions, also in Dorset, in the first decade of the 20th century. I noticed around then that the tune is clearly related to one […]
In the early 80s I contributed much of the songs and music (and some other bits and pieces) to a revue called Nice, if you can get it directed by Maggie Ford, which was centred on the world of work. Some of that material appeared more recently on the album Hands of the Craftsman. That album formed the […]
An instrumental I’m revisiting. I like the execution of this old version, but it’s not well-recorded. The version I’m working on uses electric guitar: I’m hoping that will be less muddy. Backup:
Backup: I’ve got me a golden needle to help me tie my threads I’ve got a bottle for my baby and a blanket for my head So lay down, mama, lay down and let me be Somehow I feel like old cold turkey has his claws in me If I had a silver dollar like […]
backup: Rough mix, for the present. A cheerful rock ‘n’ roll-ish ditty about the breakdown of the global economy, written in the very early 80s. These days I wonder which will go first: the economy, or the globe. I woke up with my mind’s eye facing your direction: I looked hard and I saw you […]
Backup: The Inclosure Acts enabled the passing into private hands land that had previously been designated as either ‘common’ or ‘waste’. This process preceded by several centuries the formal Inclosure Acts (which began with an Act of 1604) and continued into the 20th century, resulting in the enclosure of nearly seven million acres. While enclosure […]
Lots of promising music on Lafrowda Day – Saturday July 15th – in St Just (that’s St Just in Penwith, not the one in Roseland). Unfortunately for those with good taste, there’s also half an hour of music from me, but here’s a full list of what other music is happening as part of the […]
Backup: Close to where I stand on Trecobben Pilgrims walk St. Michael’s Way Few today reach Santiago Most will cease their journey at the Bay The Mount is rising from the distant water Yet barely seems an arm’s length away Causley on the road to Marazion Dreamed of one last summer in the Med Sheets […]
Backup: It’s late and the driver has nothing to say One more stop ahead On an endless highway One more place to be, and nowhere to stay For the road was the ruin of me The tour bus, the tranny, The fluffed chords of fame The days in the airport, the runaway train You don’t […]
Not the first song I wrote, but the first I kept. It was the late 1960s, I was still at school, and had just fallen in love with folk music. Backup: Rain, the gentle rain that hung upon the grass The autumn rain that touched the fields so early When the summer sun returns, will […]
Backup: A trace of your scent still lingers on my pillow And raises echoes in my memory And I believe you’re missing me almost as much as I miss you But I wish to God you could be here with me The sun will surely rise on another soft blue morning And lying in your […]
A farewell of sorts to my brief career as a full-time musician in the 1970s, which was even less glamorous than this song might suggest. Backup: Got a seat facing the engine So I don’t have to face where I’ve been Luggage on the rack, no reason to look back At all my wrecked and […]
This was a rehearsal for a gig happening in July, to see if the song would sound OK on electric guitar instead of acoustic, to save me lugging multiple guitars. But I like the harp-like quality of the arpeggios so much I thought I’d try recording it that way. This was a Taylor T5Z using […]
I thought I’d released this slide version, but apparently not. Anyway, I’ve done some tweaking in Audacity: I’ll think about a commercial release. He said, threateningly… The song must be a good 25 years old, though I’ve tweaked the lyrics a bit since then. No iPads in those days – the original lyric said ‘Amstrad’! […]
Revisiting this song for a book project, I suddenly realized the recorded version didn’t match the words. The ‘Cold Iron’ album has now been updated on Bandcamp, but here’s the MP3 version anyway. (Backup) I used to push pens in the City Being paid to milk someone’s cash cow I once served my time at […]
Around the start of the 1980s I went through a very theatrical phase (perhaps influenced by an uncomfortable amount of drama in my personal life!)and even did most of the original music (and a few other things) for a revue directed by Margaret Ford: those songs are the core of the Hands of the Craftsman […]
This is about the paranoia of living in London in the 1980s. It’s not a literal historical account. It used to be called London 1983, but it turns out some streaming services don’t like song titles that include dates. Go figure. I originally recorded it in the early 80s, but wanted to make some significant […]
Backup: Around the start of the 80s I wrote some dialogue and monologues and most of the original music for the ‘Nice (if you can get it)’ revue, directed by Margaret Ford. At the time it was put together and (briefly) toured, I was working by day for a company that built staircases (mostly). This […]
By Mike Wistow for Folking.com, a lovely review of my book So Sound You Sleep, available from Amazon here. (As paperback or as eBook.)
The Kindle edition of the book ‘The Vanes of Shrewsbury’ is available for free between today and Friday 24th February. And worth every penny.
David Harley
There’s now an expanded version of an article that used to be on this blog available as an eBook or paperback on Amazon. (I might reinstate the article at some point but it will require some editing, and certainly won’t contain anything like all the material the book does.) This is a short textbook on […]
A song about ‘the Welsh Robin Hood’ – a story I originally found and borrowed from George Borrow’s Wild Wales. Three traditional tunes for the price of one, but on the whole I think I like the Sheepstealer version best. There’s much more information about Twm (and the song) in my next book, Tears Of Morning. (local […]
Bored with the infighting in the leadership contest for the Party of Whateverness? Desperate for the next General Erection? Here, just for you, is a Party Political Broadcast. We’re coming, we’re coming for you, But don’t pay us any mind: Just watch the wall, my darlings, While we take you from behind. David Harley
This is based on an 18th century lyric protesting against the Inclosure Acts, usually called ‘The Goose And The Common’ or ‘They hang the man and flog the woman’. I put a tune to a version of that lyric some time ago, and it’s on my ‘Cold Iron‘ album. While the privatization of common and/or […]
I’ve been a little depressed at having to cancel a few dates this year because of ill health (including a Lafrowda fundraiser and the Weston-super-Mare Sea Shanty ad Folk Music Festival, unfortunately – shanties are not very Harley, but the event would have been fun). However, I’m very pleased to have been invited to support […]
Something a little different from me on the Poetry Archive YouTube channel. Yes, it’s a poetry video. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately) YouTube has done its favourite trick of keeping the volume as low as it can get away with, and I think I rushed it a bit. However, I suspect it will be on the […]
Nobody’s Song Original artwork by Kate Morley Guitars, bouzouki (don’t blink or you’ll miss it), vocals by David A. Harley All words and music by David A. Harley except ‘Thou Art My Lute’ – words by Paul Laurence Dunbar, music by David A. Harley All rights reserved. A mixed bag, but slowly catching up with […]
From an old tin cup (Words & Music by David Harley) A curiously old-fashioned song. The words have been hanging around for at least 30 years, and I can’t remember what prompted them. Backup: I’ve got this feeling that can’t be bad I’ve seen the end of feeling sad Thanking fate for a little […]
backup: A setting that combines poems by Robert Louis Stevenson and A.E. Housman. Needs more work, of course. Requiem (Stevenson) Under the wide and starry sky, Dig the grave and let me lie. Glad did I live and gladly die, And I laid me down with a will This be the verse you grave for […]
Backup: Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872 –1906), the son of parents who were slaves in Kentucky before the Civil War, was better known in his lifetime for writing dialect poetry and prose, but in recent years his more traditional writing has attracted more attention and respect. Maya Angelou borrowed a line from ‘Sympathy’ for the […]
A song written in the 1980s about the conflict Jorge Luis Borges described as “a fight between two bald men over a comb.” Words and music (c) David Harley Backup: The lads are on the march again: adrenaline is surging Through the arteries of power The gutter press is snarling, waving flags and beating […]
This site hasn’t really kept up with the ridiculous number of my album and single releases in the last year or two. No, I don’t expect them to keep me in my old age. If someone occasionally buys an album or even a track, that’s nice, but it’s really more about getting as many of the songs as possible out there in some reasonably structured, (hopefully) semi-permanent form. Just in case someone, sometime likes them enough to dig out the obscurities.
So here is a list of the Harley albums and singles currently available including content summaries These releases replace cassette and CD albums previously available (which is how they come to be released in such a short timeframe), and are at present digital-only releases. Right now, some of them are still only available from Bandcamp, but I’m working on that. Some may be the basis in due course for multi-media projects: for instance, I’m currently working on a music and verse project that will draw on some of the instrumental tracks from Back In Free Fall and Still In Free Fall, and an expanded multi-media version of Tears of Morning. The list below is just a barebones list of releases. (The links here are to the Bandcamp albums – the Available Albums link includes further links to other sources such as Apple Music.
- Strictly Off The Record‘ and ‘Further Off The Record‘ are slightly different ‘greatest hits’ collections. Admittedly I don’t actually have any hits, but these are the tracks/songs that have been listened to most, or have had radio play, or get asked for during live performances, or that other performers have expressed an interest in learning. They’re a good place to start (and finish, in most cases…) as they include 20 or so songs that are a pretty good cross-section of my better recordings.
- Moonflow VI was the first single. It’s an extended version of an instrumental included on Tears of Morning.
- Tears of Morning is a collection of songs with a Shropshire connection, including settings of verse by A.E. Housman and ‘W.H.B.’
- The single One Step Away (From The Blues) is one of a handful of tracks recorded for an album by Bob Theil, Don MacLeod, Pat Orchard, Bob Cairns and myself in the 80s. Unfortunately, the album was never released.
- The EP ‘View From The Top‘ features Don MacLeod, and consists of songs we perform (occasionally!) as a duo, written by us individually or together.
- The EP ‘Hands of the Craftsman‘ consists of songs and verse from the 1980 review ‘Nice…If You Can Get It’, directed by Margaret Ford, for which I wrote most of the original music.
- ‘The Game Of London‘ consists of stories in song of the city in which I spent some 25 years of my life.
- Ten Percent Blues‘ has tracks that mostly have a touch of blues, including a look back or two at my very short career on the road.
- The single: ‘How To Say Goodbye‘ is the song with which I considered embarrassing my daughter at her wedding.
- ‘Dinosaur Tracks‘ are mostly of demo quality, quite a lot leaning towards blues.
- ‘Cold Iron‘ puts together most of my songs of social commentary.
- ‘Kitsch And Canoodle‘ – songs of love, lust and obsession. Probably describes most of my current repertoire.
- Upcountry‘ – songs with a loosely rural theme, some in a country/blues/folk idiom, plus some settings of verse by Kipling, Housman and Yeats.
- Single: ‘Song Of Chivalry‘ – originally posted to try out a different distributor, but same version subsequently added to Bandcamp. NB this is not the same version as the one on Tears of Morning.
- Back In Free Fall – Part 1 of a collection of instrumentals that will be the musical backbone of a music-and-poetry project.
- Single: Back In Free Fall – a guitar piece played on my electro-classic, with a vaguely Renaissance feel.
- Still In Free Fall – Part 2 of the instrumental collection.
- Born To Be Mild: 1st Demo Album – first of a set of albums where the tracks are not really commercial-quality recordings, but I’m putting them out because I think the songs are better than the performances. If and when my health improves, I’ll certainly revisit some of them. The first batch is mostly my settings to verse by Housman, Kipling and Hood.
- The Duke Of Haphazard: 2nd Demo Album – second in the set…
- The Old Man Laughs – not part of the demo collection.
- Album: Demo Album 3 – still under construction.
- Album: Nobody’s Song – still under construction.
David A. Harley
This site hasn’t really kept up with the ridiculous number of my album and single releases in the last year or two. No, I don’t expect them to keep me in my old age. If someone occasionally buys an album or even a track, that’s nice, but it’s really more about getting as many of […]
The Lent (or Lenten) Lily is better known today as the daffodil. Words by A.E. Housman (‘A Shropshire Lad’ XXIX), tune by me. Backup: ‘Tis spring; come out to ramble The hilly brakes around, For under thorn and bramble About the hollow ground The primroses are found. And there’s the windflower chilly With all the […]
The Lent (or Lenten) Lily is better known today as the daffodil.
Words by A.E. Housman (‘A Shropshire Lad’ XXIX), tune by me.
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/lent-lily-2.mp3
Backup:
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/lent-lily-2.mp3
‘Tis spring; come out to ramble
The hilly brakes around,
For under thorn and bramble
About the hollow ground
The primroses are found.
And there’s the windflower chilly
With all the winds at play,
And there’s the Lenten lily
That has not long to stay
And dies on Easter day.
And since till girls go maying
You find the primrose still,
And find the windflower playing
With every wind at will,
But not the daffodil,
Bring baskets now, and sally
Upon the spring’s array,
And bear from hill and valley
The daffodil away
That dies on Easter day.
David Harley
A taster of sorts for the forthcoming parallel instrumental and verse project. ‘Back In Free Fall’ was (unusually for me) a quasi-classical improvisation played on my Yamaha electro-classic, just slightly cleaned up.
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2022/01/back-in-freefall.mp3
Backup copy:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2022/01/back-in-freefall.mp3
David Harley
A taster of sorts for the forthcoming parallel instrumental and verse project. ‘Back In Free Fall’ was (unusually for me) a quasi-classical improvisation played on my Yamaha electro-classic, just slightly cleaned up. Backup copy: David Harley
Words by A.E. Housman (A Shropshire Lad II), tune traditional arranged and adapted by David A. Harley. It’s more or less the A tune from the reel ‘The Rose Tree’. At some point I’ll probably combine it with a version of the reel.
Taster for an album.
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/loveliest-of-trees.mp3
Backup:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/loveliest-of-trees.mp3
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
David Harley
Words by A.E. Housman (A Shropshire Lad II), tune traditional arranged and adapted by David A. Harley. It’s more or less the A tune from the reel ‘The Rose Tree’. At some point I’ll probably combine it with a version of the reel. Taster for an album. Backup: Loveliest of trees, the cherry now Is […]
You might call this my Greatest Hits album, if I’d ever had any hits. It does include the four tracks released so far as singles, though, and most of the tracks are remixed and/or remastered. In fact, these are all songs that have attracted airplay in the UK and/or US, been requested at live events, […]
You might call this my Greatest Hits album, if I’d ever had any hits. It does include the four tracks released so far as singles, though, and most of the tracks are remixed and/or remastered. In fact, these are all songs that have attracted airplay in the UK and/or US, been requested at live events, or had significant numbers of plays where streamed or available in various video and audio formats. And anyway, I like ’em! Available from Apple Music, Spotify, iTunes etc.
All lyrics by David A. Harley; all music also by me except for ‘Here Tomorrow’, for which the music was written by Don MacLeod. All tracks recorded at Wheal Alice Music except where otherwise noted. All vocals and instruments (guitars, keyboards, bouzouki, banjo, mountain dulcimer) by David A. Harley unless otherwise noted below.
‘Carpentry’ is essentially the tune I wrote for my setting of ‘The Carpenter’s Son’ by A.E. Housman. The lyric to ‘Thomas Anderson’ was based on a 1970s article by the late Ron Nurse for Shrewsbury Folk Club magazine. ‘Long Stand’ and ‘Hands of the Craftsman’ were written for the 1981 revue ‘Nice…if you can get it’. Tracks 1, 2 and 20 were recorded at Hallmark, W1, 5, 10 and 18 at Centre Sound in Camden Town, all in the early 80s.
- Heatwave in the City (London 1983) – Piano by James Bolam. No, not that James Bolam.
- One Step Away (From the Blues). 2nd acoustic guitar by Don MacLeod, and acoustic 12-string guitar by Bob Theil.
- Let Me Lie Easy
- Carpentry II
- Ten Percent Blues
- How to say Goodbye
- Same Old Same Old
- Thomas Anderson
- Paper City
- Long Stand
- Diane (Going Out)
- Wrekin (The Marches Line)
- Song of Chivalry
- Cornish Ghosts
- Coasting
- Two is a Silence
- Sea Fret
- Hands of the Craftsman
- Her Own Way Down
- Here Tomorrow – Acoustic guitar and piano by Don MacLeod. Percussion by Richard Davy. Additional vocals by Lyn (Anna) Thompson.
Actually a different take on ‘Song of Chivalry’: not a major new project, but testing the water with a different distributor before inflicting a ‘Greatest Hits’ (irony intended) album on the world.
https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/davidharley/song-of-chivalry
David Harley
Actually a different take on ‘Song of Chivalry’: not a major new project, but testing the water with a different distributor before inflicting a ‘Greatest Hits’ (irony intended) album on the world. https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/davidharley/song-of-chivalry David Harley
The album ‘Upcountry‘ combines songs that lean towards Americana, blues and even country with more ‘traditional’ material including settings of verse by Housman, Kipling and Yeats, plus a couple of songs about Cornwall, where I now live. All songs by me except where noted.
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A Smuggler’s Song (Kipling-Harley) 03:14
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Wearing Out My Shoes 02:26
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This Guitar (Just Plays The Blues) 02:17
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Cornish Ghosts 03:39
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Hannah’s Gone Upcountry 03:44
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The Road To Frenchman’s Creek 03:27
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Whistle While You Walk 03:53
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Janey 03:22
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Gooseberry Blues 01:48
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Aftermath/Postcards 05:29
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Anywhere 03:12
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A Rainy Day Blues 02:24
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Tears of Morning (Housman-Harley) 02:46
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The Wild Swans at Coole (Yeats-Harley) 06:33
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The Pilgrim (Yeats-Harley) 02:24
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Woods In Moonlight 05:22
I wasn’t particularly planning to do any more Housman settings, but this one suddenly demanded my attention. It does require more work – some guitar, at least – but I think the melody is mostly there. And if you’re going to set Housman, I suppose you have to consider the ‘Land of lost content’. And having (half) done this one, there are two or three more I think I’d still like to put music to. We’ll see.
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2021/09/emastered_blue-remembered-hills.mp3
Backup:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2021/09/emastered_blue-remembered-hills.mp3
‘A Shropshire Lad’ XL
Into my heart an air that kills
From yon far country blows:
What are those blue remembered hills,
What spires, what farms are those?
That is the land of lost content,
I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again.
David Harley
You might call this a sketch for the end of summer… Definitely not intended as the final version. By way of an experiment, the guitar here is tuned to ‘B Standard’, like a baritone guitar.
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2021/08/woods-in-moonlight.mp3
Backup:
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2021/08/woods-in-moonlight.mp3
Sometimes your words at midnight stream through my memory
But your face is growing dimmer: I don’t know how it can be
That you’re gone from my life, yet you still haunt my dreams
And daybreak finds me wondering just what it all could mean
Walking through the woods in moonlight, there are no words left to say
I stumble blindly through the shadow as the long years slip away
And only now I realize that it’s too late to count the cost
And I can only write those words to make my peace with those I’ve lost
So many nights lost, lamenting all the days
Opportunity knocked, but that same night it ran away
Your voice in my ear, your breath upon my skin
Closer than sweat, warmer than sin
Another morning broken, and reconstruction fails
Once more my train of thought has gone completely off the rails
But soon the world will turn without us, and new days won’t be broken
By the words we should have said or the ones best left unspoken
https://dharley.files.wordpress.com/2021/08/emastered_crossing-the-bar-reed.mp3
Backup:
https://whealalicemusic.files.wordpress.com/2021/08/emastered_crossing-the-bar-reed.mp3
I’ve posted a guitar-accompanied version of Tennyson’s poem before, but it suddenly occurred to me in the middle of the night that it might sound nice with a free-reed accompaniment. Since I don’t play concertina etc., I had to fake it with a Yamaha keyboard.
Needs work!
David A. Harley
Available, as ever, on Bandcamp.
Kitsch and Canoodle
David A. Harley Songs of love, lust and obsession. Come to think of it, that probably accounts for my entire output.
All vocals and instruments by David A. Harley. Words and music for all songs by David A. Harley except ‘Quirks and Crotchets’, for which Alan Doyle wrote the tune, and ‘Back in the Day’, for which Alison Pittaway wrote the lyrics. Cover photograph by Jude Harley.
- Let Me Lie Easy
- A Rainy Day Blues
- Please
- Quirks and Crotchets (Doyle-Harley)
- This Guitar Just Plays The Blues 2021
- Her Own Way Down
- Back In The Day (Pittaway-Harley)
- This End of the 1960s
- Can’t Sleep
- Never Look Back
- New Ends and Sad Beginnings
- Two Is A Silence
- The Jailer
- What Do I Do?
- Song Without Warning
Wheal Alice Music WAM21-11