Back on the old site a couple of years ago I started a thread seeking to find a song for each of the fifty American states. It’s taken a while but here’s the opportunity to do the same for the counties of England (other parts of the UK may follow). Just post a song that somehow represents your chosen county.
As someone Staffordshire born and raised and still a resident, here’s Bill Pritchard with “Trentham” – site of the scenic gardens on the outskirts of Stoke on Trent. The song mentions various other areas of the city – I have a friend in Sneyd Green, drive up Milton Road to work and occasionally take a coffee at the Staffs Wildlife Trust centre on Westport Lake. I have no idea where the video was filmed but it’s at least sixty miles away from the eponymous gardens. But anyway….Trentham represents Staffordshire. What about your county?
List of counties in the comments below.
You Kent Always Get What You Want
The Wurzels – Good Old Somerset
also Somerset
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdFmsURncFg
Beat me to it, Kid. Surely Somerset’s anthem.
For Yorkshire can we have this. ‘In Yorkshire near Rotherham’
Bedfordshire
Berkshire
Cambridgeshire
Cheshire
Cornwall
Cumbria
Derbyshire
Devon
Dorset
Durham
Essex
Gloucestershire
Hampshire
Herefordshire
Hertfordshire
Kent
Lancashire
Leicestershire
Lincolnshire
Middlesex
Norfolk
Northants
Nothumberland
Nottinghamshire
Oxfordshire
Rutland
Shropshire
Somerset
Staffordshire
Suffolk
Surrey
Susssex
Warwickshire
Wiltshire
Worcestershire
Yorkshire
I have taken a couple of liberties here – only one Yorkshire and only one Sussex for example – but there need to be some lines drawn or we’ll be looking for a song to represent the Soke of Peterborough and good luck with that one
I am from Shropshire.
Irene Wilde by Ian Hunter. Like him, I spent too much time hanging around Barker Street Bus Station.
I aspire to have a song for every county in my repertoire. I’ve only got a third sorted so far, but by a country mile my favourite is my Shropshire song.
Bill Caddick’s Cloud Factory – inspired by Coalbrookdale Power Station, I’ll have you know.
Simon Nicol: Over The Lancashire Hills
I grew up on the London-Essex border. I preferred London.
Surrey Seems To Be The Hardest Word
Kent Help Losing You
Devon
Devon is a place
A place where nothing
Nothing ever happens.
Suffolk Little Children
Our Favourite Shropshire
Too Drunk To Suffolk
Middlesex and Drugs and Rock & Roll
Beds. too big without you
Cumbria – M’Lord – Cumbriaaa
Too Many Broken Herts
I’ve done it before and I’ll do it again:
Essex on Fire. Preferably by the Kings of Leigh-on-sea,
In think we are going to struggle here because I don’t think we have county pride in the same way an American might in terms of the state where they’re from. Yorkshire, Cornwall and at times Essex seem to stir up a bit of emotion from people that come from there. Otherwise, the country is an irrelevant municipal compound.
I don’t think there’s any chance of getting songs that name all the counties but @ernietothecentreoftheearth used the bus station in Shrewsbury to represent Shropshire and I think it could be possible to do similar for other counties. Hergest Ridge for Herefordshire for example; or Hoover Factory for Middlesex.
How about this for Sussex?
Take That – relight my Fife? (My coat is already on)
I’m not from there, but here’s Farrah, summing up Scarborough, out of Yorkshire..
Multum in Parvo
Here’s the fabulous Rutles for Rutland.
Of course the folk tradition is packed with songs that namecheck english towns and counties, with, to add confusion, different versions often having different place names. Because the OP used staffs, where I live, I’ll have to do Sussex, with John Wesley Harding’s Sussex Ghost Story. Which isn’t trad. He wrote it.
One for Northumberland
(Just realised I could have used Blyth Power’s Guns Of Castle Cary for Somerset as well)
and Cumbria, if there was a decent recording of their song Carlisle on YT
and they do Dorset as well!
I have clearly spent too much of my life listening to Blyth Power. In addition to the above, we could also have
Vane Tempest for County Durham
City Of Morpeth as an alternative Northumbrian track
Rowan’s Riding for Lincolnshire
I’ll stop now
Well…….living down here in Cornwall off the top of my head I suggest :
Padstow by the Rankins
The London Apprentice by Ralph McTell ( a village a couple of miles south of St Austell where he lives)
Cornwall Blank by America but not sure if it refers to this Cornwall
Lands End by Jimmy Webb but the place in California and not the UK!
Ballad Of Bodmin Pill by New Model Army
Another good one for Cornwall would be John Surman’s “Saltash Bells”.
Stunning! Never heard of him, but gonna be investigating for sure. Ta!
I was born and raised in Saltash, you know
That’s interesting, KD.
And John Surman is from just the other side of the Tamar, in Tavistock.
Some time ago I wanted to do a whole series of alphabetical Pevsner-style threads about the culture of UK counties and started researching Aberdeenshire. I soon realized it was a fool’s errand – most places wouldn’t have much in the way of musical legacy, and a few metropolitan counties would have too many. So I’m glad this is here – thanks, Walker!
My own birth county, Worcestershire is home to the fair village of Salwarpe and of course
Edward Elgar, John Bonham, Robert Plant, Ariel Bender, Jim Capaldi, Dave Mason. None of them seemed to have come up with the goods for a locally-referenced song, although I toyed with the idea of Over The Hills and Far Away, Stairway To Heaven and John Barleycorn Must Die because of vague references to the west.
There are a couple of nice classical pieces:
A Worcestershire Song Cycle by Ian King (http://iankingmusic.co.uk/album/211684/a-worcestershire-song-cycle-samples-digital-download)
and this rather romantic composition by Julius Harrison (Bredon Hill)
Eliza Carthy wrote a song called Worcester City, but it’s very folky (McGonnagal-style twisted sentence constructions) and it doesn’t really reference the city beyond the first line.
So I’m going the other way from Salwarpe – to Droitwich with this classy number I found:
A pedant writes. Eliza Carthy didn’t write Worcester City. It was one of the songs collected by Percy Grainger in 1908, sung by Joseph Taylor.
Thanks for that.
If only you had included Clifford T Ward. One of his most keening lines is here
‘How is Worcestershire? Is it still the same between us?’
Can we have Irish counties?
Here’s Ralph McTell with the lovely From Clare To Here
Oh the Green and Red of Mayo
Defined as a Province, rather than a single County
But any excuse to post this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4C5e346QvRQ
I’m no kitten
“Tall drink of water, she’s a Norfolk waterfall”
Ryan remembers Beth:
(It was either that or the Singing Postman 🙂 )
Moving to Norn Iron, it’s Van and the Chieftains with Star Of The County Down
Bedfordshire, oh Bedfordshire…
Shirley Collins, Berkshire
https://youtu.be/Fv5-1AgxIYg
Loads of songs about Maidenhead in the folk canon, of course.
Dorset – Pilsdon Pen, by the Imagined Village. Its a hill near Beaminster (Beh-minster, or Bemster), with an Iron Age fort on the top. Simon Emmerson of the band lives nearby, and regular walks up the hill with his dog inspired the tune.
So here’s where we are at the moment (ignoring the Irish counties which I’d thought could be another thread and – with apologies to Salwarpe – also ignoring “Droitwich – Rock City” :
Bedfordshire – Up The Wooden Hill To …..
Berkshire – The Berkshire Tragedy
Cambridgeshire
Cheshire – Cheshire Kitten
Cornwall – Padstow/The London Apprentice/Baallad of Bodmin Pill/Saltash Bells
Cumbria
Derbyshire
Devon
Dorset – Trooper Shaw/Pilsdon Pen
Durham
Essex – Essex is Crap
Gloucestershire
Hampshire
Herefordshire – Hergest Ridge
Hertfordshire
Kent
Lancashire – Over The Lancashire Hills
Leicestershire
Lincolnshire
Middlesex – Hoover Factory
Norfolk – English Girls Approximately
Northants
Nothumberland – Alnwick and Tyne
Nottinghamshire
Oxfordshire
Rutland – Between Us
Shropshire – Irene Wilde
Somerset – Good Old Somerset/Glastonbury Song
Staffordshire – Trentham
Suffolk
Surrey – (Tenuously) The Surrey with the Fringe on Top
Sussex – Sovereign Light Cafe/Sussex Ghost Story
Warwickshire
Wiltshire
Worcestershire – Bredon Hill
Yorkshire – Spencer The Rover
One for Hertfordshire.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9E4GoAq_zh8
(Hatfield 1980 – Everything But the Girl)
Ooh! Ooh! How could I forget? (Not exactly a song, but my native county – Suffolk for you others – needs representation.)
…and another song for Suffolk.
“The Suffolk Miracle” by “Trad Arr.”, given a bit of a makeover by Jim Moray.
Also frequently known as “The Holland Handkerchief”
Just bet me to it.
John Goodluck’s The Suffolk Miracle (1974) would fit the bill also recorded by Jim Moray.
Not really songs, but John Betjeman ought to be able to help us with a few places. As a poet he’s very good on the Metropolitan line and my home county of Middlesex. Here’s Bootle: in Greater Merseyside?
The Met Line goes through Neasden which is in Greater London rather than a county, But that won’t stop me posting Willy Rushton with this old chestnut.
Another form the Folk canon
Lincolnshire Poacher
Whistling Roger Whittaker – Durham Town
Cambridgeshire
The Floyd – Grantchester Meadows
Kent
Show of Hands – Keys of Canterbury
Hampshire.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0HcDmjiIYE&nohtml5=False
(Mike Oldfield – Portsmouth)
Here’s a couple for Nottinghamshire and Northants.
Both by Fairport Convention.
Sandy Denny’s”Fotheringay” (actually spelt Fotheringhay on the map) in Northants and “Nottamun Town” (another by the elusive Trad Arr.) for Notts.
Both from the same album, “What We Did On Our Holidays”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8cNUN7cg3Q
Kent.
Oxfordshire
Wiltshire? Oh Afterword, we have been slacking.
“In the west end of Derby lives a working man”
And also Derbyshire:
A less tenuous one for Surrey, dear old Boxhill
Or…
Still short of:
Cumbria
Devon
Gloucestershire
Leicestershire
and Warwickshire
“My friend he’s a salesman up in Leicestershire”
Inevitably, it’s the great and soon-to-be-late Family.
Devon? Look no further than John Smith : Axe Mountain and Salty & Sweet
Song To The Cirencester
Anything by Bucks Fizz.
(Reader’s Voice: “Especially that one where they rip the girl’s skirt off”)
Has anyone read “Engels England” by Matthew Engel, wherein he visits and writes about all 39 counties of England?
I hope it’s good, because the hardback has been sitting on my shelf for a year now, and I still haven’t got around to reading it…
Another one for Nottinghamshire?
Albion Dance Band – The Merry Sherwood Rangers. With added crumhorn!
Stackridge perform a song called February In Shropshire on their Pick of the Crop live album. You will have to take my word for it as it is not on YouTube.
Another contender for Lancashire.
The Lancashire Hotpots – Lancashire’s For Me (Lancashire Day Song)
By Gloucester docks I sat down and wept by Ashley Hutchings. Alternatively Severn Meadows by Ivor Gurney, although he may be less familiar to most folk, having died nearly 80 years ago.
Half Man Half Biscuit’s album ‘Trouble Over Bridgwater’ (Somerset) features the ‘Ballad of Climie Fisher’, and contains a very specific Wiltshire reference;
‘So it passed that on October the 3rd 1995, he took to the stage at the Duke Of Marlborough pub in Amesbury, on the south-eastern edge of Salisbury Plain’.
HMHB can also give us a song for Bedfordshire, albeit far more tangential than their usual namechecks. Whiteness thy Name is MeltonIan mentions the Slough of Despond, fictional but thought to be based on somewhere close to John Bunyon’s home.
Cumbria, well almost
Yes I know it’s not really.
The Cumberland Gap is a narrow pass through the long ridge of the Cumberland Mountains, within the Appalachian Mountains, near the junction of the U.S. states of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee.
The Yetties – Dorset is Beautiful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQyR-FXJCLk
http://www.newstatesman.com/node/156463
Warwickshire Lad,
Coventry is in Warwickshire, geographically if not politically, so how about Ghost Town. I accept that residents of Leamington Spa etc may not be entirely thrilled by this choice. The Coventry Carol might placate them.
Just thought of this toe-tapping hit which mentions both Lancashire and Yorkshire. The video though is more than a tad past its Best By date.
Love Herts
This playlist was fun to do.
A few more still to add.
Thanks KFD. Can always be relied upon for the playlist. I make it that’s all of the counties covered. Next time – parliamentary constituencies.:-)
This thread generated some wonderful songs @walker1. Several by artists that I hadn’t heard of, so I’m now enjoying listening to them at a leisurely pace.
But which county has had the most songs written about it?
I’m sure that Durham must be on the shortlist as it has the Unthanks, Prefab Sprout and several other artists who are keen to name-check local places.
No shortage of songs bout Memphis, but Langley Park doesn’t get mentioned so often. Thanks to Paddy it’s now world famous. OK, Afterword famous.
The Venus of the soup kitchen. Exquisite!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1JCuoYTM14