Good evening all...

Hope you all like and will post the site:

http://www.hadfield.ca/Waltz/Bush_Pilot_Song.html

Also:



Bush Pilot's Song
   
I spent 15 years living in Manitoba, near Winnipeg. That’s when some friends turned me on so completely to wilderness travelling. I did many canoe trips into the rivers that flow west into Lake Winnipeg (there are many of them, arranged like rungs of a ladder up the 300-mile length of the lake’s eastern shore), and quite a few of these were fly-in trips. A number of us would get together for the adventure, we’d book an Otter from Northways Aviation, or Whiteshell Air Services, and off we’d go, fly-in and fly-out. (This is the only way to canoe!)

In the course of time I met many of these pilots. Also, I make my living as an airline pilot and I came to know many more who had left the bush for the “big time,” flying the jets. But on layovers, over a few beers, as they talked about the northern places they’d once flown to, a note of nostalgia would creep in – tinged perhaps by an unspoken regret. Then one told me of his brother who had come south, tried the “blue suit flying,” and abandoned it and returned to the north. This was the spark I needed (I’ve always admired people who go their own way), and Bush Pilot’s Song came into being.

As my floats touch the water, the sun’s behind the trees.
And the lake is barely rippled by the evening’s dying breeze.
I tie up this old Otter – pull the engine tent on tight,
For the first load of tomorrow will be airborne at first light.
[Chorus]
And I fly---y, up north most every day,
And I fly---y, it’s always been my way.
I’ve been up here for far too long but I still like what I see,
‘Cause I live here in the north, and the north lives here in me.
First there was a Vickers, next a Moth on floats,
A Fokker and a Fairchild and an Norseman hauling boats.
Stuff it in, tie it on, we’d haul it all away.
The kind of northern flying, I’m doing here today.

So I start this 1340, and it rumbles into life.
You can see the blue smoke flying, but soon it idles nice.
And when I hit the throttle, the water turns to foam, 
I love the way it drops away and leaves me free to roam.
[Chorus]
You know the men I fly with, mostly end up south.
They chase the blue-suit flying. They seem to have no doubts.
And though I have been tempted, I need no other call,
From break-up in the springtime, to freeze-up in the fall.

I have flown with dead men – their bodies cruelly torn.
And over Berens River once a baby girl was born.
The rich men from Chicago,
The quiet, steady, Cree.
(No matter) who they are from near or far they all have flown with me.
[Chorus, repeat the last 2 lines, and end]

© 1999 by Dave Hadfield

ALSO:

http://www.timhus.ca/lyric_pages/BPB03.html

BUSH PILOT BUCKAROO

Words & Music by Tim Hus
Copyright Tim Hus Music 2008

From a lonely little airstrip it’s always a long trip
To the far away outposts and back
The cloud cover’s high and the barometer’s on the rise
As I look to the tattered wind sack
In the first light of day I’ll be winging away
To a place where I always feel free
Away on my route I’ll be thinking of you
Sweetheart don’t worry ‘bout me

Chorus:
I fly an airplane across the barren terrein
I bring supplies and the mail
Way out on the brink I might be the only link
So may the fair skies prevail
Twenty-one years high above the frontier
Somehow I always made it through
I’m an Arctic aviator and a Northern navigator
And a first rate bush pilot backaroo

Bridge:
I trust my instincts on shortfield landings
Through sleet and snow and overloads
I’ve flown Norsemen and Beavers and everything in between
On wheels, on skis, and on floats

Instrumental

It was the brothers Wright who first brought us flight
And it took my feet right off the ground
High up in the wind where the birds had only been
To a world up there among the clouds
But always beware and always take care
Icarus flew too close to the sun
Sweetheart don’t worry that won’t happen to me
My silver wings are made from aluminum

Chorus:



Enjoy...

Cheers...Happy Landings...Doug
 
   
   

I'm a tad disappointed Doug. When I first read this I thought you had written the song.

Goodly morning all...

Thanks Steve for posting that "Link" as I think there are a couple of sites where one can hear the songs.

I can do them on the piano and organ but I have been doing them for some time.

Sorry Doug, that is one thing I am not, a "Song Writer".  I usually find a ditty that I like and then put my own words to the tune.
Unfortunately some of my ditties could not be typed out here as you can well imagine.

It was interesting when we were going through music sheets and song books that were our grandparents and parents.

You folks would know better than I but there were some song sheets my grandfather had put aside, I remember him singing them with my great uncle and father while they were at the piano.
They were songs sung in the mess by the lads of the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War.  Most of them were Canadian songs.  I do not have that music here right now as we left it behind but some of those songs I have never heard of.  Will type out a list to see what you folks think. 
I do know several of them were to the tune of "Off we go into the Wild Blue Yonder" which was published years later I believe for the United States Air Force but with different words.
Some of the RAF and RCAF songs sung in the mess during the Second World War were very good as well.

Each RFC, RAF, RCAF, RAAF, RNZAF and the RNAS now the FAA Squadrons used to make up their own songs to be sung in the mess, they still do I believe.
It was lots of fun being around the piano with a great group of folks who all shared the same passions, singing and aeroplanes.   

I do believe that is why I enjoyed the Airline and Bush Flying so much.  We still had a lot of war time pilots who brought that tradition with them and instilled it into the company.
We used to do company outings, twice a year, everyone that was not working.  We would go to the beach in the summer as a group and in the winter to someone's cottage or farm that had a pond for a good friendly game of ice hockey.  It was a company family thing and it made for a great time.
Today airlines have just got too big, too commercial and many pilots do not even know their fellow aviators in the same company.  It is a shame because music brought and kept most of our lot together.   

Here is a "Link" to a couple of sites that shows a lot of WW1 and WW2 songs...many have not heard in years.

http://www.spiritofcanada.com/veterans/songs/wwi/

Also:

http://members.shaw.ca/kcic1/songs.html

Cheers...Happy Landings...Doug

patchz wrote on Aug 7^th, 2010 at 5:52pm: