Tawney was born in Gosport, Hampshire. Perhaps because of the family tradition of maritime service, Tawney joined the Royal Navy at the age of sixteen, serving for thirteen years, several of which were spent in submarines. During this period he developed his lifelong interest in English traditional music. While still in the Navy in 1957, he performed on an Alan Lomax radio show broadcast on Christmas Day, Sing Christmas and the Turn of the Year. He appeared on television on the following Easter Sunday. It went well and soon he had a weekly television spot and a networked show, Watch Aboard. Encouraged by these successes, Cyril left the Navy early in 1959 to become a full-time professional musician and broadcaster. He earned his living in this way for 44 years, making him Britain's longest-standing professional folksinger. Tawney continued to work in broadcasting and had a weekly radio show, "Folkspin." Meanwhile, he researched the traditional songs of southwest England and 20th Century Royal Navy songs. In the early 1960s he established his first folk club in Plymouth, where he met his wife Rosemary. He founded the West of England Folk Centre and was instrumental in setting up folk clubs in other places in the region. He is often referred to as the Founding Father of the West Country folk revival. His song The Oggie Man written in 1959, appeared on the album A Cold Wind Blows on the Elektra ’66 label. It reappeared in 1971 on the Decca Record Company Ltd album The World of Folk. The song tells the story of the demise of the 'Oggie Man' from the Devonport Naval Dockyard, at a time when old-fashioned "fast food" was being replaced by the more modern purveyors of hot dogs . The Oggie Man had until that time offered his oggies to sailors returning from sea, or from shore leave, from a box at the Albert Gate of the dock. It has been suggested that the sale of oggies here dated back to the 1700s. The first verse of "Oggie Man" runs
And the rain's softly falling and the Oggie man's no more. I can’t hear him calling like I used to before I came through the gateway and I heard the sergeant say "The big boys are a coming, see their stands across the way" And the rains softly falling and the Oggie man's no more...
In addition to presenting traditional ditties, Tawney composed a number of his own songs, the majority being written when he was in the Royal Navy and relating to that period – for example, Chicken on a Raft, which belongs to the call and response style of sea shanties. The song makes reference to an unpopular dish served in the Royal Navy, consisting offried egg on fried bread and called "chicken on a raft." The chorus is as follows:
Chicken on a raft on a Monday morning, Oh, what a terrible sight to see, The Dabtoes forrard and the dustmen aft, Sittin' there a'pickin' at a chicken on a raft!
"... and when he was out in Gibraltar during the war, he was in the submarine service and he had rather an unfortunate affair with a girl, who two-timed him and her name was Sally and he wrote a song about it called "Sally Free and Easy". -
Roy Williamson, introducing the song on the album "The Corries in Concert" Beginning in 1972, Tawney studied English and History at Lancaster University. After he graduated, he admitted to a master's degree from the Leeds University Institute of Dialect and Folklife Studies. In 1987, Tawney's book Grey Funnel Lines: Traditional Song and Verse of the Royal Navy 1900 to 1970'', was published by Routledge. Tawney's last public performance was at Easter 2004, at the Lancaster Maritime Festival. He died of a bacterial infection at Exeter in 2005 after a long illness.
