Hampshire Songs

On Saturday 4th October, Tangle and Anne Winter will share our guest spot and present a number of songs that George Gardiner collected locally.

As Tangle, Angie Sanders and John Bentley perform together a harmonious variety of acoustic-based music, ranging from 60's standards, through to modern country/folk with a few ragtime/blues and comic songs thrown in for good measure.

Angie plays piano, guitar and bass guitar. Classically trained from an early age in piano, she gained her harmony skills whilst singing with various choirs. John plays acoustic 6 and 12-string guitars; self-taught for 20 years or more. His style ranges from rhythm guitar when accompanying Tangle's vocals to intricate ragtime/blues finger - picking.

Anne Winter returned to the folk music scene, having spent 30 years as a publican in Oxford. She now has the time and the inclination to renew her interest in singing. She revived some the traditional songs she sung back in the late 60s and early 70’s and immediately became popular. She has built up quite a repertoire many traditional songs, including those collected locally by George Gardiner.

Traditional folk songs and ritual dances were handed down the generations, shared by families and friends, they were rhythm to work and a news service around the country.

The advent of machines brought the musical box and the pianola, then the gramophone and the local picture house. Family musical evenings, village concerts and sing-alongs in the pub suffered badly; live music suffered a mighty blow.

Dr. George Gardiner shared the fears expressed by Cecil Sharpe that a whole swathe of culture was being lost and in the years 1905 – 1907 he scoured the Hampshire to save it. Collectors throughout the British Isles mirrored his efforts and the songs are now held in the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library by the English Folk Dance and Song Society in London.

Gardiner collected in Titchfield from Thomas Bowers, William Stockley, William Burgess and Mr. Windsor. His method was to first meet singers to get the lyrics and then send in his team of musicians to note down the musical score. Looking at his original notebooks suggests that they met at the Fisherman’s Rest.

The Village Song

Buttercup Joe is locally assumed to be the village song and some 50 years ago it was still sung regularly at every opportunity. Titchfield with its strong community spirit is just the sort of place for the song to have originated, it even mentions Fareham in the lyrics, the bad news is it has cropped up all over England with slightly different words. There was even a version sung in the forces.

George Gardiner found the source for his collection in Ichen Abbas, near Winchester but it was suggested that the song originates from the London music halls. There were many more songs, some exclusive to this area.

Come along and sing your local song or just come along.