Joan Baez - Silkie Lyrics

Simple, unadorned, and perfect.

I’m 58 and Joan Baez’s singing has been an anchor in my life since I was 10. Who’d have guessed that I’d be listening to the haunting ballad of the Silkie with my own grown up daughter by my side.

Breathtakingly beautiful!

Memoirs of my adolescence
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

I find this the most beautiful version of this ballad. It brings me to tears every time; no one has a happy ending here.

voice like a bell

Best version of this song ever,beautiful voice

I’ve had a crush on her since I was 6 and still do, I’m 58.
There is no songbird that can compare.....
No super model can stand in her shadow...
Most importantly I love her beliefs and integrity....
She never falters....
She is more beautiful today for her eternal strife for goodness....
Thank you
Ps.. I believe a silkie or a seulkie is a merman(male mermaid) the scots have a word for everything!

Actually, it should be "selkie", haha.

This song is so very strange, but I was enchanted by it when I first heard it in 196? Still am. Wow, we have similar likes among Joan’s songs....Thank you for sharing :)

I was around 14 years old then and got this record , used to play it on my head phones before I went to bed at night , it stuck with me forever , I am now 70 … Bob

me too, we are the same age. Listening to this I couldn't help but sing along.

Yes, just wish the folk era was back again and there will never be a other Joan Baez

I 'm a little younger than you, but I also started listening to her at about 12 yrs old.I loved her voice and saw her live several times.Her voice is almost painful, because it's so beautiful and haunting.I don't understand the plot of this song, though.I could never understand all the lyrics then, when there was no way to find out what they were, except by listening. I had to stop listening to her because a lot of her songs were so sad and even gruesome.She has an amazing voice though.

Little Nothing
by Joann Flanagan

St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

Syf was your name origonally
Till you took service in the House of di Fatinelli.
Syf they christened you in your hometown.
In Lucca you lost your name and gained renoun.

St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

In the Italy of your day
When girlchildren went out to play
At their innocent childlike games
Folks added "Zita" to their names.

St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

In the di Fatinelli House they showered you with blame.
They never called you "Sif" Or "Sifzita",
Only Zita as if you had no name-
As if you were "Noone" or "Nobodyzita".


St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

It's such a pity
You lost your name in the City
Of Lucca where you found a job
Under conditions that tempted anyone to sob!
Would tempt anyone to kill,to rob!

St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

It was Nobodyzita do this!
Noonezita do that!
Your ignorance is a bottomless abyss,
You illiterate hick! You Scullian brat!

St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

Now great folk pray to you,
Name their daughters Zita
with no great ado ,
Light candles to you too!

St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

We don't say "St. Zita of Lucca",
But rather "Lucca,St.Zita's city."
Where she led a hard but holy life,
As we request not offer pity.

St. Zita,pray for us,
So we'll get to Heaven
Without a fuss!

One of the great songs on her first album. Terrible, pitiless and utterly memorable.

A french version of "The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry" here : https://youtu.be/jKYTRZz4IU0

Merveilleuse!

Pero que hermosa voz. Tan pura y angelical :)

The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry

Child Ballad #181
This ballad originated in the Orkney Islands. A "silkie" is a supernatural being who lives in the sea. They wear sealskins to travel through the ocean, and take them off when they are on land.


An earthly nourris sits and sings
And as she sings, "Ba lily wean
Little ken I, my bairnie's father
Far less the land that he steps in."

Then in steps he to her bed fit
And a grumlie guest I'm sure was he
Sang "Here am I, thy bairns father"
Although I be not comely

I am a man upon the land
And I am a silkie in the sea
And when I'm far and far from land
My home it is in Sule Skerry"

Then he has taken a purse of gold
And he has laid it on her knee
Saying, give to me, my little young son
And take me up thy nouriss-fee.

It shall come to pass on a summer's day
When the sun shines hot on every stone
That I shall take my little young son
And teach him how to swim the foam

And thou shalt marry a proud gunner
And a proud gunner I'm sure he'll be
And the very first shot that e'er he'll shoot
he'll kill both my young son and me.

Alas, Alas, the maiden cried
This weary fate's been laid for me
And then she said and then she said
I'll bury me in Sule Skerry.


Glossary
bairnie : child
grumlie : gloomy
ken : know
nourris : child's nurse
wean : young child

Thank you for posting this, especially with the definitions/translations!! Actually, it's Child #113, in Vol. 2. Not that anyone is gonna care haha but just thought I'd mention it:)

MrsGranpaws
Thank you dearly for sharing this. 🌹

Of course we care,,,facts accuracy truth always matter, In 1931 the Japanese shelled Shanghai,,while the great Karl Kraus was agonising about where to place a comma A friend reproached him and Kraus replied,,,if more people cared about where to place a comma the Japanese would not be shelling Shanghai, Extreme,,,maybe, But look now at the USA and weep for truth,,,and weep too for the Great Silkie

I have an LP with this song on it. That melody has stayed with me since the first time I heard it.

I first heard this song sung by Cindy Mangsen in Evanston, Illinois, in the late 1970s before a small group. The song quite took us out of our heads. IIRC (which I probably don't), the guitar work ended with the last words of the song. . Ms. Mangsen is still an active folk singer in association with her husband, Steve Gillette. The song is, IMHO, drop-dead beautiful.

NOBODY DOES THIS SONG LIKE JOAN

Joan is hard to top, but Judy Collins also has a wonderful recording of this.

Canta con una dulzura que nos llega a los más profundos del corazón. Eres única Joan Báez.

Joan's is a voice and a musical authenticity that has inspired and influenced generations of singers! What a gift to have her music and her commitment to social justice.......both unmistakable and uncompromised!

The EXACT same tune as the Byrds' I Come And Stand At Every Door.

Its an original tune from Orkney scotland that the birds may have borrowed

The song is from Orkney.

joan baez: genius

http://www.amazon.com/The-Seal-Prince-Sheila-MacGill-Callahan/dp/0803714866

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1235796/ book and movie dealing with this legend

They don't write treasures like this anymore.  Profound, magnificent and full of meaning sung by an angel's representative. Whatever Higher Power may exist I truly believe is smiling at you Joan.

Her voice was pure----beautiful! It epitomized the folk era---and so did she! Beautiful!

I had the very good of attending a concert of this magic women. Sadly she was banned from the venue for using the word -uck and she never allowed back. She transcends everything she put into words and music. Thank you for sharing your gift.

oops good fortune

Got curious about this song by reading "The Drifters" by J. Michener.

LOVE THIS HAUNTING SONG HAS ANYBODY DONE THIS SONG

Such a beautiful singer, she shaped my whole childhood, and is part of why I'm a singer..!

She shaped mine as well the sheer beauty in her vocals has brought me to tears over and again.her power and humor now.as an older musician..i named my younger son.partially after her Gabriel.as well as Peter Gabriel .another great.in his own special way.God Bless you ms Baez.for the songs.and the courage to sing them.

beautiful........and the version by Judy Collins is beautiful too........

An excellent version of this song is performed by The Corries

+olrepas And by the Try Yann in French. Ithink it is called the dauphin there.

What's the title of the Corries' version? Can't find it on the internet. And there's a version by the Byrds called "I come and stand at every door".

@sekainohana https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbhFlt0cRcs

PERDON QUE GENERO ES Y DE QUE PAIS ES LA MUSICA

El género es folk y es estadounidense

es folklorico de Escosia

I have 2 grandfathers from the Orkney's... and was brought up in the Hebrides... This is no legend  ... there are Silkie bloodlines all over the Highlands and Islands 

Hello Jamie.. this is a ballad of the event of a lady . delivering a baby without a husband...in those days it was a terrible event. So she then as the folklore says blamed it on a silkie who visited her bedroom. .After the birth the child was then "disposed' of. It was said that the silkie took the child to sea "to teach him how to swim the feam (foam)
Lots of little ones were born and most were reared and loved without a dad and so the silkie bloodline was born.
According to my grandfather my father was a silkie. Seals also visited the Isle of Man !
This is my interpretation, if anyone knows different please tell me

George Styer wow, thanks for sharing your "take" on this haunting and sorrowful ballad. I never thought of it that way. But it has stuck with me since I was 10 years old ... and that's a lot of years!

Maybe the part about the gunner (harpooner) represents her being safely married, and putting the silkie and the baby behind her, thus "killing" them.
(edit: maybe that's why it only required one "shot" to kill them both.)

Maybe there were some sightings of creatures that gave credence to this story. I'll just say that if my area believed this idea was credible for whatever reason, and I had a baby out of wedlock, I'd certainly spin my situation that way! So even if real silkies did come ashore and impregnate women (who knows?), there must have been at least some who were just riding the wave, so to speak.

Lucky if she could get a purse of gold from the guy, too! A little child support...

est ce celle que chante Anne Vanderlove?

The best singer of all times!
Yolanda of Budapest, Hungary!
Behind the Iron Curtain, in communism, she, her voice meant HOPE, FAITH, BEAUTY!
Thank you, God may bless Joan Baez!

God bless Joan Baez, and God bless you, too, Yolanda. May the world soon be free of the horrors of communism.

Thank you so much for posting this! I had the album long back. The melody is the same as another song that was very powerful, "Hiroshima."

She's amazing with whatever she sings. A million thanks!

Thank You Joan!!!!

Well, Granny, he did. Read the article on Wikipedia, or check out Joan Baez' songbook from 1964, where she credits James Waters with the composition of the melody. The lyrics were collected in Orkney in the 19th century, but the melody made famous by Ms. Baez et. al. was composed in the 1950s by my father-in-law.

Sorry, but it's the lyrics that are old (Child #113.) The older tune has been preserved, but Joan is singing the 1954 tune by Waters, which everyone but Jean Redpath seems to like.

There's another verse about the actual act of the gunner coming and killing "my young son and me".....

This tune is very old, and the lyrics as Joan sings them are partially Gaelic. It's about a mythical creature who can lives at sea but can visit on land and impregnates a woman, then comes to claim his offspring.

this is a very old song, I seriously doubt your father in law composed it! But it makes a nice story anyway. He may have adapted some verses perhaps??

My mother used to sing this to me.

So did mine. She sang a lot of Child Ballads, not all of which I can find on YouTube. She taught me to sing them, too, but it's still painful to sing them so far, a year after her death. I love the Joan Baez version, the Judy Collins one, and the Maddy Prior one.

The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry
Çev.Halil ÇELİK
BağlantıBir anne oturur ve şarkı söyler,
Ve evet şarkı söyler o, lilly wean şarkısı,
“Küçük çocuk sadece beni bilir, çocuklarımın babası,
oğlumun yaşadığı yerden çok uzakta.

devamı
yorumokuyorumsanat.blogspot.com/2013/01/the-great-silkie-of-sule-skerry-balad.html#more

This song gives me goosebumps every time I hear it.

Me, too!

The Hikmet poem is about a little girl at Hiroshima. Pete Seeger and a couple of students adapted the poem to this tune, which Hikmet probably had never heard when he wrote the poem. This lyric is entirely different, and traditionally associated with the tune.

Great song ! Great thanks, indeed ! Well it the same in The Judy Collins Songbook page 25.
Both Joan and Judy sing this song very well !

Merci beaucoup !

quite right "arakeoftunes". It has a tradition tune which is nice to here but it probably never would have been a hit. Only version I can find on the internet is on You tube as : The Grey Silkie / the Norroway Maid

A bit hard to believe given that it had been collected by Professor Francis James Child in the 1870's and publish in his anthology of English and Scottish folk songs in 1882 well before Hikmat was born. Child had a huge collection of song manuscripts from around the world. When I was studying Celtic language at Harvard the classes were in Child's old library which I considered a privilege.

My brother (now gone to live with the Selkie) used to sing this in the mid-'60s. It's nearly identical to this version. Everyone learned by ear then: there was no sheet music. This plays on social stigma, i. e. if a woman didn't know her baby's father, she was either the town whore or had experienced a supernatural event. It also reminds me of Native American traditions where people turn into animals and vice-versa, and move back and forth between the earth and the spirit world. We're all one.

Sorry John, you are correct about the ballad but wrong about the melody!

I am very glad you posted this, arakeoftunes - I have been crediting your father-in-law with this tune whenever I have sung it for years. It's a beautiful setting and has entered so far into the traditionl that people in Orkney have argued with me over the tune's origin! I have only recorded the version with the tune recorded from John SInclair of Flotta in the 30s but I love them equally. Please give your father-in-law my thanks and good wishes.

Nazim Hikmet wrote the original poem

He may have claimed to have written the melody but for the past couple of hundred years here in Scotland we have known that both melody and song come from Orkney.

Wonderful tune...it was also used by The Byrds on their remarkable 'I come and stand at every door' track on '5-D'.

@meltzerboy
Unfortunately - at least in my book - her version doesn't even come close to Prior's. Have you found time to listen to Maddy's rendition of The great silkie of Sule Skerry?

Thanks Calliuz, I checked out Maddy Prior's version—haunting! Very nice.

I think about a 100 of the 13000 views are mine

This makes me think of my mystical wonderful sons...so much more than mortal

I've been listening to Joan Baez sing this since 1965 and I am still not tired of it. Wonderful. My first ever botfriend used to play it so thank you Tim Moss for introducing me to it.

When I bought the LP in 1962 and listened to this song, I had no idea what Joan was singing about, but it sounded so good!!... YouTube brought to life for me.

Beautiful song. Nadine

My mother sang this to me as a bairn; this and many other songs.

It's a Scots, particularly Island tradition that some people can change into Seals - 'Silkie'.

Joan Baez mother was Scots, and most of her singing is in that tradtion, particularly the use of 'grace notes'

This song has the same power now as when I first heard it on Joan's eponymous album in 1960 (Oh, and that was some album. Everything on it was incredible). Her perfect voice and intonation make it unforgettable.

This melody was composed by my father in law, James Waters, who lives in northern Vermont. The lyric is a traditional poem that he set to music, and if you have a look at the Joan Baez Songbook, published in 1964, she credits him with composing the music.

so glad i have come across this woman, amasing

Thanks for posting this. Last time I looked, no one had. One of her most haunting songs. :-)

thanks im always searching for this song,my mom used to play this record.
it reminds me of Karan casey's "she is like the swallow" another beautiful woman's balad

Im always searching for this song!My mom used to play this record. Yay!

Thanks,Scout4Me1, for putting this song back up! I've really missed it after it was taken down.

This was the first song I learned to play on guitar. A simple set of cords but it meant so much to me. Joan Baez, the best!

A far more haunting version is executed by Maddy Prior on her 1999 Ravenchild album - unfortunately that tune isn't to be found on YT (yet)

One of my all time favorites. A few years back I saw a beautiful sailboat with the name "Silkie" emblazoned across her transom. Kicking myself for not thinking of that name for our boat. Love love love Joan Baez.

a song that I particulary love because it is about persons who are very "different". I have make a french translation that I'll soon try to sing on my channel. thanks so much,
Jean