Songs and Poems
In addition to composing many tunes Richard Churchley has written many songs and poems with which he has entertained audiences in the folk world and elsewhere. He has also translated various Cajun songs from French into English to make the meaning more accessible for English audiences and also translated songs into Cajun French to make them less accessible. Richard's own songs and poems cover a wide variety of topics from serious love-songs and ballads about the First and Second World Wars to light-hearted ditties about growing old and going on holiday. Richard has also endeavoured to promote and re-interpret the nearly-lost songs composed in the early twentieth century by his great-uncle, Walter Clapper, a pigdriver and notable character from Middle Piddle in the Vale of Evesham. Titles such as 'I Got Some Braces Bust In Two' and 'The Piddle Panther' have proved popular with modern audiences.
Many of Richard's own songs and poems reflect his interest in nature, the countryside and events in local history.
Here is an example of one of his historically-based songs concerning one man's plight circa 1800 when parliamentary enclosure in his village robbed him of his land. This is based on various events which took place in Warwickshire and North Gloucestershire.
Tomorrow We Sail with the Tide
written by Richard Churchley, 1991
Chorus:
Tomorrow we sail with the tide
Tomorrow we sail with the tide.
They're taking us away
To a place called Botany Bay.
Tomorrow we sail with the tide.
1
When our parish was enclosed the usual law applied.
When our parish was enclosed the usual law applied.
The gentry took the best
And we had to share the rest.
When our parish was enclosed the usual law applied.
Chorus
2
Though times were hard I still had to provide.
Though times were hard I still had to provide.
Food for my family,
But the keepers, they caught me.
Though times were hard I still had to provide.
Chorus
3
Our poverty has landed me inside.
Our poverty has landed me inside.
The gentry, they robbed me,
But they're still walking free.
Our poverty has landed me inside.
Chorus
4
What lies there beyond the ocean wide?
What lies there beyond the ocean wide?
A strange land far away,
Where the sun beats down all day.
What lies there beyond the ocean wide?
Chorus
Richard is now working on an anthology of poems reflecting his love of nature and the countryside. Here is a recent example, written in August 2003 about an evening visit to Cannock Chase, having just witnessed his local cricket team, Astwood Bank CC, winning an exciting cup match.
Cannock Chase
August 11th, 2003
After the excitement of the day
We walk.
A walk in the still, summer evening air.
After the heat of the day
The air is ripe with rising scent of August heath.
The quiet expanse.
Only distant sounds.
Bats flitting; fallow deer, wary,
Look then flee.
The churring of the nightjar
As darkness falls.
Nature, you and me.