REB 56 Narrow boats by Various


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Picture of albums Narrow boats (Various)

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Release pictures

Front cover
Picture of REB 56 Narrow boats by artist Various from the BBC records and Tapes library
Rear cover
Picture of REB 56 Narrow boats by artist Various from the BBC records and Tapes library

BBC records label code
BBC label

Label
BBC label


Release details

DetailValue
Catalogue numberREB 56
TitleNarrow boats
Artist(s)Various
Cover conditionGood
Record conditionVery Good Plus
BBC records label codeB
Item deleted?Yes
Released1969
Distributed / printed byE. J. Day Group, London and Bedford
Country of originUK UK flag
Media typePrimary
Media genreDocumentaries
View all other tracks listed as Documentaries.
Run-off codes / Shop bar codesRE + 56 + 1 BBC
RE + 56 + 2 BBC
My rating*****
Guest rating*****

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Number have1
What type of seller was used?Not recorded
Where can I buy this release?You may be able to purchase this release from the following websites (others are available!)
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All release pictures

Below is all the cover (front, back, middle and inserts if applicable) and label pictures I have for this release.
Front cover
Front cover of REB 56
Back cover
Back cover of REB 56
Label
Label Label

Tracks

Below is a list of tracks for this release.
Side & trackTrack and ArtistLength
A1Voices, sounds and songs of the canals
B1Voices, sounds and songs of the canals continued
Total length of media 0:00.

Reviews

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A good entry, I will include a full review asap!
Ratings
My rating3
Guest ratingCurrent average value is 3.

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Extra notes on cover, middle (gatefold sleeve) and any inserts

This record is an attempt to capture, in words, sound and music, something of the fast disappearing world of the 'narrow boat' and of 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 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 to late; already the owners of some of the voices on this record has 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 island 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.

Charlie Atkins, Leslie Moreton,
Harry Banister, John Roberts,
George Bate, Joe Skinner,
Alf Best, Rose Skinner,
Harold Garner, Ernie Thomas,
Joe Green, Herbert Tooley,
Tom Hickson, Jock Venables,
Jack James, Sister Mary Ward,
Sam Lomas, John Wooley,
Jock Moody and others, whose voices it has not been possible to identify.

DAVID BLASGROVE
David Blagrove sings and plays most of the music heard on this record. Born at Oxford in 1937 and brought up at Abingdon-on-Thames and then Reading on the same river and the Kennet and Avon, he has never lived more than a mile from navigable water except during his school days at Wantage, Berkshire, where there was only the Wilts and Berks canal, long derelict and, of course, out-of-bounds.

though originally articled to a solicitor, he left to work full-time on the South Midlands waterways as a boatman and as a lockkeeper. Before marriage curtailed his journeyings he worked loaded boats over most waterways connected with the Thames. He now lives in a waterside cottage at Stoke Bruerne on the Grand Union Canal where he has brought and restored a narrow boat to trading cndition and hopes to keep his hand in as a canal trader. For a living he teaches history at a nearby secondary school and hopes his pupils as well as his small daughter, will one day become as deeply interested in waterways as himself.

THE CANALS
Much of England's industrial greatness was a direct result of the system of navigable waterways that were built between 1760 and 1835.

The basic system was in the form of a cross jumping the four great rivers, Thames, Mersey, Humber and Severn, and within a period of about eighty years some three thousand miles of canal were constructed. At the centre of this cross there developed the industrial complex which surrounds Birmingham.

The inland navigations were created by a prodigious effort of human muscle; the pick, the shovel, the barrow and the tools of the mason and carpenter were used to undertake tremendous engineering feats. Tunnels, aqueducts, bridges and locks were built, each with its own elegant and enduring simplicity.

Though less than two thousand miles of the system carved out by the original navigators (the navvies) now remain, the canals are a living monument to the men who engineered and built them.

The traditional Narrow Boat - being seventy feet long and only seven feet wide - is, in spite of its extraordinary proportions, a beautiful craft, perfectly suited to its purpose. Horse-drawn, it could carry about thirty tons; the small cabin at the stern being home for the boatman, his wife and family.

The painted decoration of the Narrow Boat is obscure in origin, but surely be one of the few examples of folk art alive in England today.

the boats, built either of wood or steel or a combination of both, are now usually worked in pairs, and the diesel engine has replaced the horse; the leading boat, of modified design, known as the 'motor' tows the rear or 'butty' boat, a craft little changed for more than a hundred years.

Working the boats, usually a family affair, is not a job, it is life - husband, wife and indeed children working long hours all the year round; under these conditions education is meagre. Boat people seldom marry ''off the land'', and the years have bred a tough, independent people whose simple dignity and way of life is of life is of another era, and catches the imagination of many who seek calm reality in today's turbulent and facile age.

The record arranged and produced by Desmond Briscoe.
Editedd by Dick Mills.
Music collected by David Blagrove.
Cover photographed nu Hugh McKnight.
Map by Iris Segal.
Sleeve design by Roy Curtis-Bramwell.

This record could not have been made without the generous and knowledgeable help of many members of the Inland Waterways Association, and the indulgence of staff, past and present, of the British Waterways Board, and the canal carrying companies.

Further information

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