SONG
S FROM THE KEEKER SEAM
North-East England is famed for its coal-mining songs, common currency throughout the pito villages and communities, sme surviving from the mists of the industrial past, some composed within living memory. They are songs filled with humour, songs seething with anger at injustice, and songs brim-full of sadness and tragedy.
The story of “The Keeker Seam” is peppered and punctuated by such songs, and this selection represents a tiny few of them. There are many more of them to be heard, and many, many great singers and songwriters from the region to seek out and listen to.
THE KEEKER SEAM-
(Jez Lowe/Lowelife Music) – A new song, suggested by the title of the book but moreover inspired by conversations I’ve had with friends of mine, retired coal miners, who still dream of their time underground, and imagine the crumbling, deserted seams and roadways now, with only ghosts wandering through the silent darkness. In truth, most of them will be filled with deep black water from the under-sea workings of the East Durham coastal pits.
THE COAL OWNER AND THE PITMAN’S WIFE –
Written by a pitman called William Hornsby, from Shotton Moor, County Durham, at the time of the 1844 Durham coal strike. I learned it from my good friend Benny Graham.
THE PUTTER –
A song associated with Jack Elliott of Birtley, with lyrics steeped in the pitman’s language, terminology and humour, much of it impenetrable to laymen and outsiders.
THE COAL TRADE –
From “Allen’s Tyneside Songs” where it is credited to “Anonymous”, dated to the mid-1800s, and listed as being sung to the well-known local tune, “The Keel Row”, which I have transposed to a minor key for this arrangement.