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Sleeve Notes :
This
record is an attempt to capture, in words, sound and music, something
of the fast disappearing world of the 'narrowboat' and the people whose
lives were inextricably bound to the boats and the canals on which they
worked and travelled.
Many articles associated with the boats
and the boatman's way of life are preserved in private collections or
waterways museums. Many of their stories, traditions and way of life
have been captured in print. The unique and colourful decoration of
their boats have been photographed and copied. Yet it is a fact that as
these remarkable men and women leave the canals their world will die
with them.
Many of the words of the narrow boat people have never been written
down and the pronunciation varies as one travels. Almost impossible to
write, they can however be captured precisely by the microphone and
recording machine. The recent and increasing interest in the canals has
come almost too late; already the owners of some of the voices on this
record have gone, nevertheless it has been possible to use material
from the BBC Sound Archives, together with more recent radio and
television recordings, to weave this tapestry of sound.
Nostalgia is inevitable. For those who have known the canal some little
time, there are familiar references, sounds and voices - for those who
have just discovered our inland waterways, this is an opportunity to
make the acquaintance of the people whose whole life was involved with
narrow boats.
Birth, learning, courting, marriage, living, working, dying - and
laughing, loading, locking, tying up - waiting; this was life on the
narrow canals as described by the voices of boatmen, lock-keepers,
lengthmen, tollkeepers and those who managed and looked after them. |
