Ann Howdon at The Bridge Folk Club - Buy Broom Besoms (Trad)

Ann Howdon at The Bridge Folk Club, 20 May 2024
Buy Broom Besoms (Trad)
Buy Broom Besoms (or Buzzems) is a well-known Tyneside song from the early 1800s. It was probably by that prolific writer, anon, but it could have been written by a blind fiddler from Newcastle upon Tyne, England, called Willy Purvis. Certainly, if he didn’t write it, it was a great favourite of his
Willy lived and died in the All Saints poorhouse in Newcastle and he was a very well-liked character around the town. He would call in at lots of the local alehouses to play his fiddle and he was never short of a free drink
The version that is sung most often (as is sung by Ann in this video) has the five verses that were printed in the Northumbrian Minstrelsy in 1882. Willy Purvis would sometimes earn more drinks by adding extra verses to popular songs such as this to advertise local businesses - and the alehouses, of course. There are at least another seven known verses that might have been written by him