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Moving On Song

from Freeborn Man by Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger

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I was expecting one of my children, y’know, one of my babies, and my son ran for the midwife. In the time he was going after the midwife, the policeman came along. ‘Come on!’ he said, ‘Get a move on! Shift on! Don’t want you here on my beat.’ So my husband says, ‘Look, sir, let me stay. My wife is going to have a baby.’ ‘No, it doesn’t matter about that,’ he says, ‘you get off.’ They made my husband move and my baby was born going along while my husband stayed on the road ... born on the crossroads in my caravan. The horse was in harness and the policeman was following along, y’know, drumming us along. Born on the crossroads. (Minty Smith, Gypsy woman. Recorded in a field in Cobham, Kent, 1964)


alternative title: “Move Along, Get Along”
words and music: Ewan MacColl

lyrics

Born in the middle of the afternoon
In a horse-drawn wagon on the old A-5;
The big twelve-wheelers shook me bed,
‘You can’t stop here,’ the policeman said,

Chorus: ‘You’d better get born in someplace else,
So move along, get along!
Move along, get along!
Go! Move! Shift!’

Born in the tattie-lifting time
In an auld bow-tent near a tattie field;
The farmer said, ‘The wark’s all done,
It’s time that you was moving on, (chorus)

Born on a common near a building site,
Where the ground is rutted by the trailers’ wheels;
The local people said to me,
‘You’ll lower the price of property, (chorus)

Born at the back of a blackthorn hedge,
When the white hoar-frost lay all around;
No eastern kings came bearing gifts,
Instead the order came to shift. (chorus )

The winter sky was hung with stars
And one shone brighter than the rest;
The wise men came, so stern and strict
And brought the order to evict. (chorus )

Wagon, tent or trailer born,
Last month, last year or in far-off days;
Born here or a thousand miles away,
There’s always men nearby who say: (chorus )

credits

from Freeborn Man, released September 20, 1983
Ewan MacColl - vocals
Peggy Seeger - guitar
Calum MacColl - guitar, backing vocals
Dill Katz - bass
Neill MacColl - backing vocals
Hamish MacColl - backing vocals

Produced by Neill MacColl
Engineered by Nick Godwin
Recorded at Pathway Studios, London

license

all rights reserved

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Ewan MacColl London, UK

This site is maintained by the MacColl family, aiming to make Ewan's catalogue available to download.
Ewan MacColl is known to most as a songwriter and singer, but he was also of significant influence in the worlds of theatre and radio broadcasting. His art reached huge numbers through the folk clubs, greater numbers through his recordings and untold millions through the radio. ... more

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