Ballad to a Herring Girl

by Sarah Dew, Charlotte Oliver - The Dark Store

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about

Ballad to a Herring Girl forms part of 'The Dark Store', an Arts Council-funded, hour-long radio ballad. It is a collection of spoken word and nine original folk songs, highlighting the significance of hidden labour and the lives of essential workers throughout history to the present day. Woven out of many threads, from historical texts to testimonies gathered during online writing sessions during lockdown, the stories told include that of a governess, the herring girls and miners, as well as contemporary supermarket and ‘dark store’ workers, a Glaswegian lorry driver, and NHS nurses in the pandemic. All of which have been worked into poetry, folk music and song by a collaboration of writer Charlotte Oliver and composer Sarah Dew.
The Dark Store provides a platform where voices are heard and invisibility is challenged, respect is promoted, and the creativity and spirit of those working in the dark is celebrated.

lyrics

Ballad to a Herring Girl
Just slit it and pull out its guts, my girl,

Just slit it and pull out its guts,

It’ll make you shudder when you start,

Slicing slimy flesh apart
,
Ripping out each clotted heart
,
And the stink of fish begins.

Just slit it and pull out its guts, my girl,

Just slit it and pull out its guts,

But be careful of that wily knife,

‘Cos nobody wants a fingerless wife
,
It’s sharp enough to take your life,

And the stink of fish does cling.

Just slit it and pull out its guts, my girl, 

Just slit it and pull out its guts,

And your hands will chap and your cut will sting
,
When it meets the brine we clean them in
,
And you’ll be more careful to save your skin,

Then the stink of fish seeps in.

Just slit it and pull out its guts, my girl,

Just slit it and pull out its guts,

But be wary of the fishermen,

They’ll want to kiss you again and again,

And offer you warmth in the sleeting rain,

And the stink of him will cling.

Just slit it and pull out its guts, my girl,

Just slit it and pull out its guts,

And you’ll know your trade this time next year
,
Then your mind can wander far from here
,
Whilst you slit and gut, year after year,

But the stink of the fish will win.

credits


Charlotte Oliver: lyrics
Sarah Dew: music and production
Vocals: Charlotte Oliver, Clare Shaw, Niamh Griffin-Shaw, Sarah Dew, Karen Chalmers, Sally Lidgley, Pat Edmond, Jaye Lewis, Nia Davidson
Additional violin: Clare Shaw and Niamh Griffin-Shaw
Clarinet: Charlotte Oliver
Knife sounds from freesound.org: scriptique, spanruc and jsharick.

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about

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The Dark Store Scarborough, UK

Sarah Dew is a sound artist and composer whose audio installations have been commissioned and broadcast on radio stations including BBC, Canada and throughout the UK.
Charlotte Oliver is a poet who has been commissioned to write poetry by such varied institutions as the BBC and Scarborough’s South Cliff Gardens. Her work has been published in anthologies and journals throughout the world. ... more

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