One More Day
A well-known pumping or capstan shanty. The crew sings about the prospect of just one more day before reaching port.
Led by Bennett Konesni
Sung by the Gawler Family: Ellen, John, Molly, Edith and Elsie Gawler
I have evolved my own lyrics of this song over many years of singing it. Definitely check out some other versions for more verses- there are a ton of options.
Don't you hear the old man growling?
One more day!
And don't you hear the mate a-howling?
One more day!
Don't you hear the capstan pawling?
One more day!
And don't you hear the pilot bawling?
One more day!
Chorus:
Only one more day, my Johnnies!
One more day!
Well, come rock and roll me over
One more day!
Only one more day a-hauling
And can't you hear the gals a-calling?
Only one more day a-furling
And only one more day a-cursing
Well, we've sighted the anchor, Johnny
Well, we're close aboard the port, Johnny
And put on your long-tail blues, my Johnny
We'll leave her without sorrows, Johnny
Only one more day a-pumping
Only one more day a-bracing
Well, we're homeward bound today, my Johnny
We'll leave her without sorrow, Johnny
A classic capstan shanty, sung while walking around the capstan to raise the anchor. "One More Day" captured the feeling every sailor knows well: counting down the last days of a long voyage. Published in multiple 19th-century shanty collections.
One More Day is a great worksong, and though it is a sea shanty (sung aboard ships to bring up the anchor, the sails or while manning the hand-pumps) it is a corker in any setting. I first heard it while working as a deckhand on schooners in Penobscot Bay in Maine, sung by Susan Hickey, a co-worker of mine on the Schooner J&E Riggin. And it seems to be a well-enough known song. It's on Mystic Seaport's seminal album "American Sea Chanteys" and is in Stan Hugill's classic book "Shanties of the Seven Seas."
Hugill implies that the song probably came from the boats plying the rivers and canals of early America. Apparently it then made its way to the deepwater ships where he learned it. Nowadays it has been adapted with guitars, banjos, even hurdy-gurdies, but by far my favorite renditions are a cappella with rousing choruses.
There seem to be two versions of the song, one a "Leaving Shanty" and the other a "Homeward Bound Shanty." The lyrics of the songs give it away: one is about being just a day from home, the other being a day from leaving your lover for a long voyage. I like the homeward bound version better, but I've heard that the leaving shanty is older. It has the words "row me over" which apparently was specific to rowing people across rivers, where "rolling" (in the homeward bound verses) is a classic bit of old sailing terminology.
Whatever the case, here's why I like it:
1. Super-simple response part in the melody: "One more day." Anybody can sing it, and you can't forget it once you've heard it.
2. It's authentic. This one comes from the great collection of simple call-and-response songs that were used on ships to help get through hard work on long journeys. If Stan Hugill sang it, it's the real deal.
3. Interesting Melody. Something about the way the notes move in this one. It's deceptively simple. It all rests within one octave and but for a few jumps it moves reliably down. But there is a stateliness to the melody and its rhythm that makes me want to sing it.
4. Great harmony possibilities. The simplicity and dependability of the melody (it generally goes where you think it will) means that it's really easy to sing harmonies, especially the final cadence.
5. Endless opportunities to invent verses. The response line in the chorus gives song leaders a nice long breather to get creative and find that rhyme. And the response in the verse does the same thing, (only it's shorter) in case you still haven't got one! It's this charitable quality that many sea shanties have for inventive song leaders.
Roud 704
- Stan Hugill, Shanties from the Seven Seas (1961)
- Stan Hugill, Shanties and Sailors' Songs (1969)
- Cecil Sharp, English Folk-Chanteys (1914) (as capstan shanty)
- W.B. Whall, Sea Songs and Shanties (1910) (as halyard shanty)
- Joanna C. Colcord, Songs of American Sailormen (1938) (as windlass/capstan)
- Richard Runciman Terry, The Shanty Book (1921) (as capstan)
- Frank T. Bullen and W.F. Arnold, Songs of Sea Labour (1914) (as halyard)
- Davis and Tozer, Sailors' Songs or "Chanties" (1887) (as pump shanty)
- Tony Hall (1977, released on Fieldvole Music CD reissue 2007)
- John Tams on The Home Service (1984) and The Reckoning (Topic, 2005)
- Martin Simpson
- Bella Hardy on Battleplan (2013)
- Faustus on Death and Other Animals (Westpark, 2016)
- Albion Band (various incarnations)