I was presented with The Dudley Boys by Brian Kelly sometime in the early 1990's as a photocopy from a North English chapbook, he himself not being able to do anything with it. I have never it heard it sung myself and have yet to see it in print. It is almost like a shanty and has all the hallmarks of a work song. That is to say it comprises one-bar solos in common time interspersed with choruses in 3/4. I can imagine it being sung heroically and vigorously. There are some eleven verses of both the heroic and cowardly deeds performed by the Brave (sic) Dudley Boys, presumably miners or rural workers in North Worcestershire in the 1840's.

Lyrics