(The Bonny) Shoals of Herring - Luke Kelly

Shoals of Herring
(Ewan MacColl) With our nets and gear we're faring On the wild and wasteful ocean. Its there that we hunt and we earn our bread As we hunted for the shoals of herring

O it was a fine and a pleasant day
Out of Yarmouth harbor I was faring
As a cabinboy on a sailing lugger
For to go and hunt the shoals of herring

O the work was hard and the hours long
And the treatment, sure it took some bearing
There was little kindness and the kicks were many
As we hunted for the shoals of herring

O we fished the Swarth and the Broken Bank
I was cook and I'd a quarter sharing
And I used to sleep standing on my feet
And I'd dream about the shoals of herring

O we left the homegrounds in the month of June
And to Canny Shiels we soon were bearing
With a hundred cran of silver darlings
That we'd taken from the shoals of herring

Now you're up on deck, you're a fisherman
You can swear and show a manly bearing
Take your turn on watch with the other fellows
While you're searching for the shoals of herring

In the stormy seas and the living gales
Just to earn your daily bread you're daring
From the Dover Straits to the Faroe Islands
As you're following the shoals of herring

O I earned my keep and I paid my way
And I earned the gear that I was wearing
Sailed a million miles, caught ten million fishes
We were sailing after shoals of herring

Category:

Music

Tags:

• folk
• world
• music
• luke
• kelly
• dubliners
• mccoll
• fishing

[opaldove]

The wonderful Luke Kelly!! You can hear every single word that 'The Master' sings...best folk singer ever!!

RIP Luke and thank you for posting this bigmanio

[joeygsmom]

WOW this is just incredible, hes got that great voice, but also so much sincerity, you believe hes experienced this lifestyle.

[GrahamCarter1000]

This version is great in it's own way. Ewan never wrote it or performed it with the word Bonnie in it though....that was added by The Dubliners.

[gaconnochie]

@Ptarmi I'm sure you are right. And there were fishermen from all up the east coast england and Scotland working out of Yarmouth plus all the Scottish lassies gutting the fish. I did hear someone say once that Bonnie was an unusual word for a Norfolk fisherman to say, and that perhaps that was MacColl's own poetic license, but I suppose Norfolm men would possibly pick up some of the lingo from the incomers too.

[Ptarmi]

@gaconnochie Interesting, thanks. However, given Ewan's politics, I'm sure he wrote this song for Fishermen, everywhere. Cheers, Dick

[gaconnochie]

@Ptarmi "this song was inspired by the Fishermen of the N.E. of England" Ewan wrote the song after meeting and interviewing for some length of time a fisherman from Norfolk called Sam Lerner. Ewan tried to get the words as close as possibble to Lerner's own expressions. So inspired by an East Anglian fisherman not the fishermen of the north-east.

[wildangus999]

saw him in germany when i was in the army brill banjo great band dubliners

[Mell1888]

God given talent, you feel every emotion under the sun listening to the great mans voice.

[amerrycelt]

the wonderful Luke Kelly..when times are tough or your feeling down i flick through youtube and listen to the great man..the big bushy red haired bearded rebel putting his heart and soul into his music soon lifts my spirits.

God rest and bless you Luke Kelly.

[tony10396861]

@Mayqueen1805 His granny was scottish, both his parents were Irish.

[MORGANTHEMOON1]

Nobody sings this like Luke

[keleeds]

@TZEITEL10 , I am from North Shields (2:25)  an engineer, the herring was landed at lots of ports on its journey south, the lasses followed the boats gutting herring like lightning, when they werent gutting they were knitting, jumpers for their blokes. One of my mates was on the coal burning drifters and one day they had collectively shot a line of net 40 miles long, the sea would be blue from the herrings oil, and in older times the paddle tugs would tow the sailers from harbour to the wind.