Gitchee Gumee

Program Notes

“Gitchee Gumee is a song cycle for baritone and piano inspired by the tragedy of the Edmund Fitzgerald, a Great Lakes freighter that sank on Lake Superior during a storm on November 10, 1975, resulting in the loss of all 29 crewmembers. The title is derived from the Ojibwe (Chippewa) Indigenous tribe of North America, who used the term to describe Lake Superior as “Big Sea” or “Huge Water”. The term first gained prominence in 1855 when it was used in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s The Song of Hiawatha, and found a renewed audience when Gordon Lightfoot used it in The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, which dominated FM radio during the autumn of 1976.

“The cycle is composed of three sets of lyrics, sung by three generations of men belonging to the same family, each in first-person narrative. Although the specific characters depicted are fictitious, the lyrics use an amalgam of various crewmembers’ narratives during the period of the Edmund Fitzgerald, including colorful stories of working on the Great Lakes, the close bonds among fellow crewmembers, and the mysterious allure of a maritime career.”
–Daniel Neer

Mvt. 2: Song of the Crewman

Gitchee Gumee
Daniel Neer

I. Song of the Father

He was born on Easter while I was out on a bulker
Headed towards Taconite Harbour.
The cook baked a cake when he heard the news,
And the boys filled the galley with cigars and beer.
He was restless and headstrong from boyhood on up,
But the gig on the Fitz gave him peace.
He loved a life on the Lakes…a chip off the old block.
They say it broke in two when it went down,
Just off Whitefish Bay.
The Witch of November swallowed up my boy
In waves forty feet high.
We heard about it on six o’clock news:
November tenth, Nineteen-Seventy Five. 

II.   Song of the Crewman

November gales of green-foam swell, churning up my past,
A hungry wind claws at my soul, deafening to the last,
My Nemesis, this icy-bitch, numbs fast the pain of death,
As memories play across my mind, a chapter with each breath,
This steel ship twists around my life, until a calm awakes,
And then I’m under, joining the Great Lakes. 

         Sixteen years old Dad taught me how to shave,
         Bought me a razor and a can of Barbasol,
         Bragged to his buddies down on the docks,
         Said he’d make a man out of me,
                  See my face, full of foam, bathroom mirror:
                  Now is the time I become a man. 

         Nineteen, joined the Corps, Semper Fi,
         Fresh meat, off the bus, Camp LeJeune,
         Sweaty hot restless youth melting in the sun,
         Uncle Sam said he’d make a man out of me,
                  See my face, lean and strong, Sergeants shades:
                  Now is the time I learn to fight.

          Twenty-two, home from Korea, met the love of my life,
         Stunned at first sight by an angels loving smile,
         Future clear, loving wife, house full of kids,
         Whispered in my ear she’d make a man out of me,
                  See my soul reflected in heaven-blue eyes:
                  Now is the time I learn to love.

          Thirty-eight, laid-off so I joined the Lakes,
         Trained as a Deck Hand like my Dad and Granddad,
         Topside work, winches locked, cargo hold of taconite,
         Captain said the Fitz would make a man out of me,
                  See my work polished bright, shiny brass bell:
                  Now is the time I learn to sail.

         Forty-three, holding tight, white-knuckled shock,
         Ankle deep, flick’ring light, ship breaking up,
         Listing hard, howling fear, rivets popping loose,
         Gitchee Gumee shrieks she’ll make a man out of me,
                  See the truth staring back, shipmates face:
                  Now is the time I learn to die.

November gales of green-foam swell, churning up my past,
A hungry wind claws at my soul, deafening to the last,
This steel ship twists around my life, until a calm awakes,
And then I’m under, joining the Great Lakes.

III. Song of the Son

They raised the bell on the Fourth of July.
The corroded sun-kissed relic broke the surface
Of Superior’s green-blue bubbly,
Its first brilliant clanging shocked all of us
On this most sacred place.
With crystal insistence it rang,
Again and again,
Free from its 20-year grave,
Triumphant in its resurrection.
And mom, gripping my arm
With nervous vindication,
Wiped away a breeze-swept tear
From her crow-footed squint,
Feeling the hole in her heart,
Thirty years wide,
Heal with each clarion ring.
My father used to polish that bell.

©Daniel Neer, NeerSighted Productions. Text reprinted with permission.