Silver Dagger from Turnstone by Gigspanner Big Band
I've always thought this to be one of the very saddest folk songs. No melodramatic murders here - just the stunting of a young life before it has hardly begun because of the unprocessed hurts of the past. I find it all the more powerful for the brevity of the lyrics. When people are looking for folk songs that have contemporary relevance, this is a good place to start - a story that's as new as it's old, and familiar to us all.
Squeezy John suggested we have a go at this one during a rehearsal - I happened to know the lyrics, having always loved the Joan Baez version. We changed the time signature, Phil came up with a dobro lick that gave us a contemporary feel, and we were away.
Hannah Martin
Tracklist
| 3. | Silver Dagger | 6:05 |
Lyrics
Don't sing love songs, you'll wake my mother
She's sleeping here, right by my side
And in her hand, a silver dagger
She says that I can't be your bride
All men are false, says my mother
They'll tell you wicked, loving lies
And the very next night they'll court another
Leave you alone to sigh and pine
My daddy is a handsome devil
He's got a chain five miles long
And on each link a heart does dangle
Of another maid he's loved and wronged
Go find another tender maiden
And I hope that she will be your wife
For I've been warned and I've decided
To sleep alone, all of my life.
Credits
Traditional arranged by Gigspanner Big Band
License
All rights reserved.
The Gigspanner Trio are Peter Knight (fiddle), Roger Flack (guitars) and Sacha Trochet (percussion).
The Gigspanner Big Band adds in John Spiers (squeezebox), Philip Henry (slide guitar) and Hannah Martin (fiddle, banjo)
"The multi-talented six-piece soar on their most accomplished album yet, led by the exceptional fiddle-playing of Peter Knight" ... "a faultless cavalcade"
4 stars The Guardian