The Parson & the Songmen

Send us Fan Mail In this latest episode of The Parson and the Songmen we find The Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould at something of a loss.  Some research into the Reverend Gentleman carried out by Mike earlier in the year led to the discovery of an article that Sabine wrote in 1894 for a lady's publication. The article explained that he was finding it difficult to obtain songs sung by women for h...

Send us Fan Mail Hello and welcome to the 67th (yes, you read correctly...) episode of The Parson and The Songmen! In this episode we thought it was high time that we visited the home of Sabine Baring-Gould - Lewtrenchard Manor - on the western edge of Dartmoor in Devon. These days, Lewtrenchard Manor has a life as a luxury hotel, but it's history stretches back some 900 years. Baring-Gould i...

Send us Fan Mail Hi Folks, We thought it would be fitting to continue to celebrate this very special time of year by revisiting Series 2, Episode 2 of The Parson and the Songmen series. Like Series 2, Episode 1, which we uploaded for you last week, this podcast tells the story of another famous Cornish May celebration - Flora Day, held in Helston every year on, or around, the 8th of May. Summer is...

Send us Fan Mail Hi Folks, and a Merry May Day to One And All! In a fit of May Day frivolity, we thought it would be fitting to revisit S2 1, released on May 1st 2024, which took us to the Padstow May Day celebration, tells  winter that enough is enough and... Summer Is A-Coming Today! Oss Oss Wee Oss! Support the show https://gofund.me/48985b32 PLEASE VISIT TO MAKE A DONATION TO THE RUNNING COST...

Send us Fan Mail ...Or does he? Visit The Castle in Bude, on the North Cornish coast, and you will see a substantial building that has been resting happily on sand dunes for nearly 200 years! Mike has been a volunteer at The Castle Museum and Heritage Centre for a number of years and thought it was high time that he did a podcast on the history and inhabitants of this amazing building.  These four...

Send us Fan Mail Well here we are, it's been a while, but here is the second episode in the fourth series of The Parson and the Songmen! One of the themes for this series will be to explore Sabine Baring-Gould's other interests, apart from folk song collecting, and in this episode we explore his fascination with all things supernatural... So for those of a delicate nature, then be prepar...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome to this first episode in the fourth series of The Parson and the Songmen! We kick the series off in fine style by meeting Cornwall-based singer/songwriter Chris Hytch and hearing some of the songs from his band Annown's CD 'A Half A Face'. Chris has a passion for Cornish folklore and history and has the uncanny knack of being able to take an old, old story,...

Send us Fan Mail A Happy New Year to you and welcome to this third compilation of songs (and tunes) from the shows! We have a varied selection for you, some reminding you of spring, the festive season and, as always, a fair dollop of the Reverend Sabine Baring Gould. Here is the track listing, or click on CHAPTERS (above) if you want to go to an individual track.  1. The Jolly Wagoner - Mike Boswo...

Send us Fan Mail Season's Greetings One And All! Welcome to the festive sixtieth edition of The Parson and the Songmen! In this episode we tell the story of a special carol service that takes place every year in the Stratton/Bude area of North Cornwall to keep alive a very special set of carols peculiar to the area. Mike and Jon recorded this year's service so expect some carols that you...

Send us Fan Mail If you do celebrate, you may well have noticed that Yuletide is nearly upon us... But, if you did need reminding, then this episode of The Parson and the Songmen will do just that for you! There are plenty of Christmas and Winter Solstice customs and traditions out there, but this edition will hopefully open your eyes and ears to some that are (almost) peculiar to Devon and Cornwa...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome to Series Three, Episode Twelve. All we will say about this episode is that it involves some early Twentieth Century song collecting, a very enigmatic song collector and two wheeled transport. Listen on... (By the way, and still trying to be all secretive, if this episode does tickle your taste- buds and you want to find out more then please visit https://bobandgillberry.c...

Send us Fan Mail At this time in November we remember the sacrifice that hundreds of thousands of British soldiers made with their lives as they fought in the First World War (and remember that millions died overall). Many songs are associated with this war, but are there songs connected to earlier battles? The simple answer is "Yes" and in this episode Mike collects together some of tho...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of The Parson and the Songmen we join Mike at Ashwater Church, in the far west of Devon, for a day of 'ringing and singing'. One Day In October are the first four words of a very special song that the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould collected, telling of a bell ringing competition that took place at Ashwater church some two hundred years ago.  For the last t...

Send us Fan Mail The poet John Keats called Autumn the 'season of mists and mellow fruitfulness'. A time for reflection and also a time when 'all is safely gathered in' before the onset of winter. Those words, of course, come from the harvest hymn We Plough The Fields And Scatter, and in this episode of The Parson And The Songmen we discover the origins of what we know as The H...

Send us Fan Mail 'Catch Me If You Can' is the title of a cassette tape, (originally released in 1978 and please search the interweb if you're too young to know what a cassette tape is) released by Pete Coe who spent a week in the company of a Cornish travelling family, recording songs and stories about their way of life in the early 1900s. Mike has known Pete since the 1960s in Birm...

Send us Fan Mail Hello and welcome back after our summer break! In this episode we focus on William Andrews, a shy farmer from Sheepstor, in a remote part of Dartmoor, Devon. Andrews was not only a farmer though, he was a skilled fiddle player, and was visited by The Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould in order to note down some of his tunes that would become known in time as The William Andrews Collecti...

Send us Fan Mail Join Mike for a very special 'Parson and the Songmen' this time around! It's not every day that you happen to get to the chance to have a chat with one of the world's leading mandolinists, composers and all round wit, but this is just what Mike did recently when he met up with Simon Mayor. Taken from Simon Mayor's biog on his website mandolin.co.uk Please...

Send us Fan Mail In this fifth episode of the third series of The Parson and the Songmen, Mike explores Sabine's second autobiography 'Further Reminiscences'. In the book he discovers a song that seems to have , astonishingly, escaped Baring-Gould's keen censorship in order to make his song collection, as he put it, 'fit for Christian ears to hear!'  If the song had b...

Send us Fan Mail Firstly, Many Happy Returns to The Parson And The Songmen as it celebrates its Second Birthday with its Fiftieth Episode! In this special episode Mike tells the story of how a song collected by The Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould made it into the British pop charts and peaked at No.3 no less!! What the Reverend Gentleman would have thought of Elvis (No.1), The Drifters (No.2) and Cli...

Send us Fan Mail The songs published in Songs From The West by the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould were wholly collected, or particular to, Devon and Cornwall. But what to do with the songs sent to him from other parts of England and beyond? Sabine never discarded these songs, but put them to one side as they were of interest and too good to be lost and these resulted in a new publication Join Mike n...

Send us Fan Mail The publication of folk songs collected by The Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould in Devon and Cornwall made them accessible to the general public, but left Sabine wondering just how he could reach an even wider audience? His answer was to get on the road for a series of 'gigs' that were were probably the first ever traditional folk song tour of England! Phew! Rock and Roll......

Send us Fan Mail Spring has arrived here in North Devon, and it would seem to have had quite an effect on Mike who is full of vim and vigour ( or possibly something stronger...) In this first episode of the the third series of The Parson and the Songmen we are back in Devon to celebrate spring, and there is a distinctive feminine theme running through the podcast. Confused? Well let's find ou...

Send us Fan Mail Hardly seems a year since the last compilation of music from the first series. But yer us be! Season Two is now complete and we'll finish off in viddy style with the now customary(!) selection of songs from the shows. Geddon Boy! Here is the track listing, or click on CHAPTERS (above) if you want to go to an individual track. The Highwayman Glory Of The West The Village Shop...

Send us Fan Mail Well, we've missed All Fool's Day by a day, but let's celebrate this custom anyway. In this podcast Mike takes a look into its origins and tells some stories about one of Cornwall's great historical pranksters, as recorded by The Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould.  Support the show https://gofund.me/48985b32 PLEASE VISIT TO MAKE A DONATION TO THE RUNNING COST OF THE...

Send us Fan Mail Recently, Mike went to visit the force of nature that is Moe Keast at her home in Bodmin, Cornwall. Moe is a traditional singer and storyteller and has been a regular at Bodmin Folk Club, with a short break for bringing up children, almost since the first evening in 1968!  Moe has been  a Cornish Bard for 25 years under the name of 'Myrgh Cana Hengovek' ,  translating as...