FTX-003 SONGS IN IRISH GAELIC

HUDIE DEVANEY, CONAL O DONNELL & OTHERS

A collection of songs in Irish mainly from Donegal recorded by Peter Kennedy, Sean O Boyle & Noel Hamilton. All the songs are introduced & explained in English by Hudie Devaney, Conal O Donnell and Sheila Gallagher from Gweedore. These are the original recordings of songs #25-48 in FOLKSONGS OF BRITAIN AND IRELAND, edited by Peter Kennedy (Cassell/Schirmer 1975 reprinted in paperback by Oak 1985 and distributed by Music Sales). The book, which won the Library Association McColvin Award for the most outstanding reference book of 1975, contains the full texts, translations, music notations and background information on the songs.

1. AN BHANALTRA (The Nursemaid) (25) Kitty Gallagher (3 v/ talk after by Hudie Devaney) rec. Gweedore, Co Donegal 1952 - 2'07"

2. BRID BHAN (Fair Bridget) (26) Conal O Donnell of Ranafast, Co Donegal rec London 1962 - 3'38"

3. BRID OG NI MHAILLE (Bridget O Malley) (27) Hudie Devaney, Ranafast 1953 -2'17"

4. AN CAILIN GAELACH (The Irish Girl) (28) Conal O Donnell (talk bef) - 2'25"

5. CHUAIGH ME 'NA ROSANN (I went to visit the Rosses) (29) Conal O Donnell (talk) followed by William Rodgers & company, Baile Thiar, Torre Island, recorded in a public house by Noel Hamilton in 1967 (vs 1-3 & 14-15) - 2'50"

6. DONALL O MAOLAINE (Donald O Mullen) (30) Conal O Donnell (talk bef) - 4'07"

7. EIRIGH 'S CUIR ORT DO CHUID EADAIGH (Arise and put on your clothes) (33) Conal O Donnell (talk bef) - 3'04"

8. RISE UP MY DARLING (34) Hudie Devaney (talk bef) - 2'57"

9. GARDAI 'N RI (The King's Own Guards) (35) Conal O Donnell (talk) followed by Hudie Devaney - 3'33"

10. IN AIMSIR BHAINT AN FHEIR (At the Cutting of the Hay) (36) Sheila Gallagher rec by Peter Kennedy, Gweedore, 1953 (talk bef) - 1'20"

11. IS IOMAIDH COISEIN FADA (Many's a long Step) (38) Sheila Gallagher (talk before) - 1'26"

12. MA THEID TU 'UN AONAIGH (When you go to the Fair) (39) Hudie Devaney - 2'34"

13. MAIRE CHONNACT & SEAMUS O DONAILL (Connaught Mary & James O Donnell) (40) Conal O Donnell (talk bef) - 3'34"

14. NION A' BHAOILLIGH (O Boyle's Daughter) (41) Hudie Devaney followed by talk by Conal O Donnell - 2'59"

15. AN t-OILEAN UR (The New-found Island) (42) Sheila Gallagher followed by talk from her & Conal O Donnell - 3'48"

16. AN SEANDUINE DOIGHTE (The Burnt-out Old Fellow) (45) Conal O Donnell & Sheila talk & song - 4'43"

17. SEIMIDH EOGHAININ DUIBH (Dark-haired Jimmy Owen) (46) Conal O Donnell (talk bef) - 2'46"

18. THIOS I DTEACH A' TORRAIMH (Down at the Wake-house) (47) Hudie Devaney (talk bef) - 2'19"

19. TIOCFAIDH AN SAMRADH (The Summer will Come) (48) Conal O Donnell (talk bef) - 3'55"

Recorded & edited by Peter Kennedy and first published by Folktrax 1975.

Hudie DEVANEY, aged 39 when recorded 24^th August 1953, was born at Ranafast and was a teacher of Gaelic 1935-48 and has been a clerk in Dublin Civil Service since 1949. He collected folklore 1936-42 and became All-Ireland Champ8ion Traditional singer at the Dublin Oireachtas 1940-45.

1. AN BHANALTRA - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #25 Hudie Devaney - Cf COSTELLO 1919 p33 - O SULLIVAN 1960 p17 -- Kitty GALLAGHER rec by Brian George, Gweedore Co Donegal 1947: BBC 12053/ SAYDISC CD SDL 411 1995 "Traditional Songs of Ireland" - Hudie DEVANEY rec by Peter Kennedy & Sean O Boyle, Ranafast, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19969

An unusual mixture of lullaby, love song and drinking song, this has a lively air more commonly associated with another Donegal song Fuigfidh Mise An Baile Seo. The words 'A's nach deas an fear i mbaile me' occur in the Con,aught version of Bean an tseanduine (COSTELLO: 1919, P. 33) which has other similarities in the words. A version of the first verse also occurs in An Leanb Aimhreidh (O'SULLIVAN: 196o, p. I7). He was a rakish kind of a fellow: here, there and everywhere. And he had a lover in every town and every place. In the last verse, he says, there never was a better seed than barley sold in the land. It's cut and dried and whisky made of it. He praises the whisky in the song, what whisky could do: make the old crippled women jump around through the house when they get a sup of it - HUDIE DEVANEY.

2. BRID BHAN - O MUIRGHEASA: CEAD DE CHEOLTA ULADH (100 Ulster Songs) 1915 #59 pp111 & 266 full note on song - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #26 O Donnell -- Sheila GALLAGHER, rec by Peter Kennedy, Middledore, Gweedore, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 20142/ FOLKTRAX 272 (story of song) - Anne DONEGAN rec by PK, Teelin, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19358

The tune of this song, one of the finest airs to be found in Donegal, has not appeared in any collections, but the words were given in O 'MUIRGHEASA 1915. She was from Teelin, a small townland beside the sea] in south Donegal, and she got married to a man 'in the mountain', as they would say in that part of the country. He came from Meenawanne, between Carrick and Ardara. She went to live at Meenawanne, and it was a heartbreak for her to leave Teclin and start a new life. She composed so many verses, and he composed so many verses, but she had the last word in the last verse. As far as I know from the old people, she came back to her own place in the end. They don't like to hear this song where she went to live, but the Teelin people very much enjoy it - CONAL O'DONNELL.

3. BRID OG NI MHAILLE - The Shamrock Feb 1872 - HARDEBECK 1939 Govnmt Publ Dublin #M-103 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #27 O Donnell - Tune used for THE BLACKBIRD OF AVONDALE -- Hudie DEVANEY rec by Peter Kennedy, Ranafast, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19970 with talk bef/ SAYDISC CD SDL 411 1995 "Traditional Songs of Ireland" - Conal O'DONNELL rec by Peter Kennedy London 1962: FOLKTRAX 003 - O BOYLE Family: CEOLTA GAEL OSS-2 1971 - Mary O'HARA (voc/ harp): DECCA GES-1095 1973

Conal O'Donnell tells that a friend of his, Owen O'Donnell, happened to be a Gaelic teacher in County Mayo and took a fancy to this song, and brought it back to Donegal where it has become very popular. It is the oft-repeated story of the young man who has lost his love to another. He bemoans her marriage, and laments his own forthcoming one. This girl left him in his pain. 1 would say that he took it very bad when he didn't succeed in getting her. He tells about the change that took place in himself - CONAL O'DONNELL.

There's one verse in this song where he says: 'There is nothing more beautiful than the moon over the sea or the white blossom, and my love is like that with her golden tresses and her honey-mouth that has never deceived anybody' - HUDIE DEVANEY.

NOTE: Meenawanne = Min a'Bainne. 'Min' means a piece of flat ground on the mountainside that was good for grazing milk-cows. 'Chib' in Verse 3, line 4, is the sour grass which grows on the mountains. The old people could tell from the teeth of the cattle when they had been grazing on it for too long.

4. AN CAILIN GAELACH - O BAOIGHILL 1944 p8 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #28 from O Donnell - O BOYLE 1976 p54 with notes (3v) -- Hudie Davaney rec by Peter Kennedy, Co Donegal 24/5/53: BBC 19970

My brother was in Tory Island collecting old stories and folklore and he came across John Tom [Dougan] and he got this one down on the 'Ediphone' recording machine and I learned it off that - CONAL O'DONNELL.

He'd love to be out on the side of the hill with an Irish colleen. One morning, as he was going to the fields to collect his cattle home, he saw this beautiful girl sitting on the lane-way, and he spoke to her and asked for a kiss, and she said, as it's given in song [in English]: 'Pray sir, let me be' - HUDIE DEVANEY.

Seamus Ennis said that the song is also known from its first line as Mallaigh Shleibhe. 'Gaelach' means 'Irish', but 'Gaolach' (same pronunciation) is 'friendly' (cf. 'gaol' meaning 'kinship' and, in Scots Gaelic, 'love'). In this song there is a reference to nuts, which, in the lingua franca of love songs, would refer to the virgiity otherwise of the girl. The song also owes its great popularity to the implication that the young man is rebuffed by English-speaking girl and would much prefer an Irish-speaking girl in the same situation.

5. CHUAIGH ME 'NA ROSANN - AN GAODHAL 1888 Irisleabhar na Gaedhilge 1894/1902 tune supplied but different - O MUIRGHEASA 1915 p247 notes about Peter Walsh p231 - FAINNE AN LAE 1923 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #29 Rodgers -- Conal O DONNELL rec Peter Kennedy London 1962 - William RODGERS rec by Noel Hamilton, Baile Thiar (Torre Island) 1967

I hear that they're giving the old bar in Arranmore the title of this song. That it's going to be christened to attract the tourist. And that's where this song was composed. It was Peadar Breatnach, the poet from Finntown, who wrote the song over a hundred years ago, and he went in there to get a drink. All the poets had a drink and it seems that this girl who was in the bar comes in to the whole of this song. He pretends that he is in the bar talking to her, taking a liking to her, in love with her, having a chat with her, and he has her in love with him, and he has her making a bargain with him as well as doing it himself - CONAL O'DONNELL.

The song was composed by Peadar Breatnach (or Peter Walsh), a tailor from Ballinamore, Glenfinn, in Central Donegal. It describes his exploits on one of the islands in the Rosses, probably Arranmore, the only big island, and how the girl he met did not approve of all his 'pastimes'.

6. DOMHNALL O MAOLAINE - A Donegal version, on the same theme, as the Munster song EAMONN MAGAINE (Eamonn Magaine) publ in HARDEBECK: FUINN FIADHA FUINIDH #M-32 (Govmt publ, 1937 Dublin) - O SULLIVAN 1960 p166 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #30 from Conal O Donnell -- Conal O Donnell rec Peter Kennedy & Sean O oyle, Glenties, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 20151

The way Maire John told me the story you would swear that you could see Donall coming along and meeting this girl and the promises that were made. Afterwards, it seems, her father found out she was going to have a child and then they met again and she told her story. She told her story and he had another story ready about another girl that he liked - CONAL O'DONNELL.

This song, generally known in Munster as Eamonn Magaine, would seem to be about 250 years old. Many versions of the words with only slight variations have been printed, mostly in periodicals which are now out of print. The tunes printed elsewhere, in HARDEBECK: I937 and O'SULLIVAN: 1960 are different from the one here.

7. EIRIGH 'S CUIR ORT DO CHUID EADAIGH (Arise and put on your clothes) - O MUIRGHEASA 1915 p104 "Buaidheadh an phosta" - O BAOIGHILL 1944 p28 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #33 O Donnell -- Hudie DEVANEY rec by Peter Kennedy, Ranafast Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19971 - Conal O DONNELL rec by PK, London 1962

Because of a dream he has had, the singer exhorts his lover to rise and hurry off with him to get married. As seems so frequently the case in Donegal folksong, there is a reference to the Erne, which seems always to have been the lover's idea of Utopia. There was a man in this town long ago and he didn't get the girl he wanted. Later on in life he got married to an elderly woman. This night, when he was lying in his bed, the one he was in love with in his young days came to him in his dream, and told him to get up and that she'd cut his hair from him and dress him up, that the two of them would go off to the bishop and get married, and he'd leave the old one and come along with her - HUDIE DEVANEY.

8. EIRIGH SUAS A STOIRIN - (Rise up, my darling) - has the first line, "Rise up my darling" sung in English - A blind fiddler proposes to a young girl without property and promises a life of ease. "If I have lost the sight of my eyes, I haven't lost the agility of my fingers" - See Mrs Costello's Connaught Coll, AMHRAIN MHUIGHE SEOLA (Talbot Press, Dublin) where a similar air is used for a similar song: BRIGHID BHEASAIGH (Bridget Vesey) - O BAOIGHILL 1944 p30 Ranafast (in Dorian mode) - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #34 from Hudie Devaney -- Kitty GALLAGHER rec by Alan Lomax, Dunloe, Co Donegal Jan 1951 - Hudie DEVANEY rec by Peter Kennedy Ranafast, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19071 titled "Rise up, my darling" - Sheila GALLAGHER rec by Peter Kennedy, Middledore, Co Donegal 1953: FOLKTRAX 272

English was the new thing at one time, and somebody would possibly learn a little phrase of it, and then they thought it would put special flavour into the song, so they made use of it.

He's on his own and he's coming to look for this woman's daughter, and he hopes he won't he refused, but he doesn't get her. He's all the time looking back to the time when he first went to look for her. Well this is one of Maire John's. It describes how marriages were in the Gaelic-speaking places or the poor parts of Ireland. Marriages in them days was more or less a bargain. A man didn't move out to look for a wife until he was a good age and then he came along and he had somebody with him to more or less co@ the father and mother to agree by giving him the daughter. In this song this man came along and he says, 'Pise up my darling, that's if you're in bed', and then he mentions about having a bottle of whisky and that they would have a dram and he hoped that she wouldn't refuse him by giving the daughter. There we can see the whole thing bargained up, which was a true story in them days. Then we can see the girl in a lonely place. Perhaps in the depths of the mountain and her crying her eyes out. There she's dropping tears and everything and she there in the glens, her very lonely and nobody to come on a Sunday evening, not even to cheer her up or anything like that then she looks and she hews the birds so happy and her so lonely. I think it's a very sad song and it's a very true song. I still can see the picture of this girl being led away into marriage and then her heart breaking and may be not in love with that man at all but just by the way her father and mother coaxed her into it. I've witnessed some of these things myself in my young days and I've heard so many stories about them. And I'd say this song is very true - CONAL O'DONALL.

9. GARDAI 'N RI - O BAOIGHILL 1944 p8 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #35 from O Donnell - O BOYLE 1976 p54 with notes (3v) -- Hudie Davaney rec by Peter Kennedy, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19970.

There was no such thing, you know, before my father's time, as there is now, when they're meeting girls at dances. The old people had great command on the young people and they wouldn't let them from their doorsteps, as they are now' It became a very common thing for them to meet their coming wife at the fairs and wakes. The only ceilidhing in the houses would be at marriages. In cases where a man used to let the years get a grip of him, somebody would mention to him, 'There's a girl in such a place that no-one bothers his head with her, and I think she'd make a match for you.' A team of men would be picked out, then and there, a few bottles of whisky would be bought and shibeen poteen, and they would set out on their journey. And maybe they would describe themselves as the 'King's Own Guard', you know, just to put a polish on it. (They weren't quite so slow in those days as we might think they were!) It sounds like a few, just egging on this man that's going to be left on the shelf and telling him about a girl on the mountain top. 'And wouldn't it be a grand thing if we just marched up there to the top of the mountain and put our case?' They'd let everybody go to bed, and then they'd march up to the house and rap at the door. The man of the house would answer and the woman of the house would be whimpering to get the daughter up out of her bed. Well then, the men would set about praising the man of the house, telling him about all the fine land he had, about all the money that he has, and how good a match he could make for his daughter. And so it was that the father and mother would have the last word, and not the daughter at all. That was very common in this part of the country. After the men had given the man's side of it all, the father wouldn't let his daughter go without giving her something, maybe three or four bullocks, if they were up in a mountainy place, or else some sheep or money - CONAL O'DONNELL.

10. IN AIMSIR BHAINT AN FHEIR - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #36 Gallagher -- Sheila GALLAGHER, rec by Peter Kennedy & SB Gweedore Donegal: 1953: FOLKTRAX 271

He was going to Scotland but he would rather be home to cut the hay. He wanted the girls to say their prayers for him, so he could be home at the hay-cutting time - SHEILA GALLAGHER.

The tune used for this song is that of a dance tune, a hornpipe called The Cuckoo's Nest. A song version in English, recorded in Ireland, is The Magpie's Nest (No.182), which is sung like this one, with a liling dance rhythm to the chorus. The same tune is also used in Ireland in a slower and more lyrical manner for songs such as An Splealadoir.

11. IS IOMAIDH COISCEIM FADA - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #38 -- Sheila GALLAGHER rec by Peter Kennedy, Middledore, Gweedore, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 20144

Paddy went on the boat, and she met this girl coming off the boat, and she asked the girl, 'Was Paddy on the boat?' She said, 'Yes, Paddy's on the boat and you'll never see him more' - SHEILA GALLAGHER.

This would seem to be a fragment of a longer song, so far untraced; and because Sheila Gallagher seemed to mix some of her lines this text has been slightly edited to make sense of it. The song was sung in a style consisting of a series of jerky statements, giving the story of the girl's realisation of her loss, in an atmosphere that seems to bring to life the feeling of her problem-in which direction she should take another step. It was quite clear from Sheila Gallagher's performance that this was an important characteristic of the song and not just the hesitation of a singer of over ninety years of age.

12. MA THEID TU 'UN AONAIGH - O'MUIRGHEASA 1915 p88ff Monaghan & Edinburgh ms - An Lochrann 1908 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #39 O Donnell - O CONNOR Ms "Songs of the North of Ireland" 1994 p243 -- Hudie DEVANEY rec by Peter Kennedy & Sean O Boyle, Ranafast, CoDonegal 1953: BBC 19969/ SAYDISC CD SDL-411 1995 "Traditional Songs of Ireland"- Conal O DONNELL (from Ranafast) rec by Peter Kennedy, London 1962

This love song is a conversation between a boy and a girl in which he is telling her that she must marry for love and not for riches. Hudie Devancy told of an old lady who quoted the last verse of this song on her deathbed. These were the last words that she said before she passed away. Hudie Devaney gave a translation of the last verse into English: True-love, is it possible that you sleep at night?/ Can you not see the spears that are piercing through my heart?/ There's something worrying me and the pain is terrible/ And I am suffering listening to the birds in the wood going to rest.

The song seems to be native of Ulster, other versions having been collected in County Monaghm as well as in Donegal. The song has probably remained popular because its subject concerns the all-important matter of money. In marriage in Donegal, suitors were refused or accepted according to whether or not they would bring much wealth into the marriage. I've heard this from Maire John and the old people. It would happen that there would be a mm left in the house all alone and somebody would come along and give him a bit of advice: 'It's about time you done something, you're going to be left alone, there's nobody going to be looking after You. Why not go over to such and such a place, to Nlickey's daughter or 13artiey's daughter and she's getting old as well.' And he'd agree and the next thing a night would he arranged unknown to the girl and her father and mother and they would wait until everybody was in bed in case somebody would be ecilidhing in another house as they went there. It was mostly at daybreak or around two or three in the morning. They wouid walk in and tell their business. The mother would go up and shake the daughter out of bed and she'd come down and for her parents' sake she'd agree, but not in her heart. It was the case of the father bargaining something with the man that come asking for the daughter: 'I'll give you a few cows or so much money. Then a few days after that they would get married and in them days it was mostly at night that they got married about seven or eight o'clock at night. They were a kind of a shy crowd, you know! Especially as there were more maids than bachelors - CONAL O'DONNELL.

The song is also known as Da mBeadh Lan Na Pairce Bain Agam.

13. MAIRE CHONNACHT AGUS SEAMUS 0 DONAILL - MAIRE: Rana na Feirste nd (words only) - HAMILTON 1973 p9 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 -- Conal O DONNELL (of Ranafast, Co Donegal) rec by Peter Kennedy, London 1962

This song is local to the Ranafast area of west Donegal and concerns the problem caused by a lot of timber that came drifting into the area, floating in from the Atlantic. It was composed as a conversation between a Ranafast O'Donnell and a woman who came to Ranafist from County Galway or Mayo and became known locally as Mary Connaught. She sings the first pair of verses, he sings the middle pair, and Mary has the last word in verses 5 and 6. When the timber came ashore, the priest more or less took the timber from the people that had got it ashore in order to make use of it for roofing the chapel. As far as I could hear, they said that Mary of Connaught was too much for him in the song. She had the last word. The tune of this song is the air of a well-known Connaught song Cuaichin Ghleann Neifin (O'TUAMA 1955), and is also used for Chaith Me Seacht Seachtaini I Mainistir Na Buille, recorded by Maire Ni Scolai for GAEL-LINN. I've heard the old people in Ranafast talking about her. That she lived in Kencasslagh where the chapel has been built. So she came from Connaught in them early days. People moved until they got some place after the Battle of Kindale they were on the move. And that's how they came into these poor parts. It's not that there were land there around Keneasslagh or parts of the Rosses but it was rocky and niountainy and there was nothing there but cliffs but in any case they made land. As the man said they made land out of the rocks and they quarried these stones and boulders and everything so it seems Mary Connaught took up her residence in Kencasslagh. So there was a priest there - and he fancied where she was living - for to build a chapel there - so, she didn't agree with the priest - and there were an argument - and a-quarelling all like this between herself and the priest - but they say she was gifted in the tongue - she was an able person - and could hold her own with them - whether it be clergy or lay people - or whoever they would be. That's how she came into it - being gifted in composing songs - and verses - and everything like that. So in them days anyhow there were hardly any such thing as anybody being the owner of where they lived they just took up residence there - and the priest more or less fancied this spot - and not that he commandeered it or anything - but he tried to come to an agreement with her - but she wouldn't agree by having the chapel there. She more or less called it her own homeplace - in any case the priest took advantage of the place - and he built the chapel - and they say that she had potatoes growing there where the graveyard is now - and they say that the potatoes grew up after him making the chapel - and she was able to dig up the potatoes in the graveyard that she had planted before they started building - CONAL O'DONNELL

14. NION A' BHAOILLIGH - O BAOIGHILL 1944 p46 Ranafast - DE NORAIDH 1965 p37 Munster - Cf 1st v of COSTELLO 1919 p4 "Mo Mhuirnin Bhan" Connaught - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #41 O Donnell -- Hudie DEVANEY rec by Peter Kennedy, Ranafast, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19968 - Conal O DONNELL of Ranafast, rec by PK, London

The beginning of February this wake was in Mullaghmore ('mullagh' means 'height' and 'more' is 'big'). He describes the house where it was, and how he happened to be there, how this girl was in, and that he took a fancy to her (this word 'fancy' as used in Gaelic). They weren't in sorrow all the time at these wakes, you know. They had plenty of fun on their own. The old people that was in the house, if it was an old person that was dead, especially. You used to have to enjoy yourselves and they had all sorts of tricks. It's dying out now, the keening over the dead. Anyway this young man happened to be at the wake and he took a fancy to this girl. lie describes everything about her, her hair, her neck, her figure, her charms, her speech. She has him carried away in such a way that he'll never forget her. But in the end he doesn't get her, but he doesn't forget her good looks. The song gives the whole story there, as you might see a townland from the top of a mountain - CONAL O'DONNELL

This is typical of love songs still to be found all over the Gaeltacht. The first verse is widely distributed, yet the song itself would seem to belong to Donegal, as much by its title as by anything else, since O'Boyle is more common as a name in Donegal than in other parts of the Gaeltacht. The place-names do not help us much in determining the origin, for both Mullaghinore and Ballintemple are common in many parts of Ireland. Liaigh na bhfiann was the magic all-healing well at Tara.

15. AN T-OILEAN UR - MUIRGHEASA (Henry Morris: CEAD DE CHEOLTAI ULADH) 1915 #70 pp139 & full note on 293 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #42 Gallagher - O BOYLE IST 1976 p78 (5v) with full Engl transl-- Sheila GALLAGHER rec by Peter Kennedy, Middledore, Co Donegal 1953: FOLKTRAX 003 & 272 - Conal O DONNELL of Ranafast rec by PK, London 1962

When emigration started, especially in the famine time, they went away to what they call The New(found) Island: that's the only way they had of describing the place we now call America. This man was travelling across the New Island. He went through strange places where he met them naked and all such as that, and wild animals and so on. And then it was Heaven to him when he walked into this certain house and made himself known. The old lady in the corner got up and spoke to him in Gaelic and shook him by the hand. She came from Lough Erne in County Fermanagh. I heard the song from Maire John in Ranafast. Maire wouldn't be tired telling you the story of this song. She could pity that man and what he went through and how small was the world and how he then made the second thought that he wasn't going to stay there - CONAL O'DONNELL

The Place-names in the song seem very much corrupted. Enri 0 Muirgheasa remarks on this in Cead de Cheoltaibh Uladh and explains that it is because the song has travelled beyond its native district.

16. AN SEANDUINE DOIGHTE - AN CLAIDHEAMH SOLUIS 26/9/08 - AN t-ULTACH July 1928 - AN AGHAIDH Sept 1936 - O SULLIVAN 1960 p74 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #45 O Donnell - O Neill in his preface to "The Music of Ireland says it is the source of the Scots "The Campbells are Coming" and "Mrs McLeod's Reel", but Sheila Gallagher's is a somewhat different tune, chorus and some words of verses -- Sheila GALLAGHER rec by Peter Kennedy, Middledore, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 20145/ FOLKTRAX 271 - Conal O DONNELL rec by PK, Glenties, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 20151 - O BOYLE Family: CEOLTA GAEL OSS-2 1971 - Micho RUSSELL: FREE REED FRR-004 1976 - Bridgit FITZGERALD rec USA: ELLIPSIS CD-4070 1997 "Celtic Mouth Music"

Probably this song was, in origin, a straightforward complaint by a young wife against her aged husband, but it h" developed into a rather comic and sometimes scurrilous list of the old man's incapacities, and this no doubt accounts for its widespread popularity. There are probably more versions of this song than any other in the Irish language, and it is certainly by far the most popular 'chanson de la mal-mariee' in Irish. The places mentioned in our north-west Donegal version are in the counties of Mayo and Galway, but the song is generally taken to be of Munster origin. The tune that is nearly always used for it is a variant of that which was used for the Scottish The Campbells are Coming.

17. SEIMIDH EOGHAININ DUIBH - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #46 -- Conal O DONNELL of Ranafast, Co Donegal rec by Peter Kennedy, London 1962

When I was small, going through some of the neighbouring houses, where they would be ceilidhing at night, we got an old man or an old woman singing one of these songs. We wouldn't maybe take any notice of the songs, but the old people always went into these songs through a conversation, a conversation that would lead on to them singing the song. Some conversations would arise, for instance, about relations of relations in the townland: marriages, deaths, and so on, like that. There was such and such in a marriage, and so forth. I'll give you an example about a particular person. This mother just had the one boy and naturally enough she thought the world of him, as every mother would do when she had only the one child and him to be a boy. She thought more of him than if she had a full family, and with the result that all the neighbouring women round about got sick listening to her praising her little Jimmy - and if she saw another boy about little Jimmy's height, and him to have a new pair of trousers or wearing something new - O it wasn't fitting that boy at all - it would fit little Jimmy far better. Everything was all right until this neighbouring boy got a pair of trousers, and little Jimmy's mother made out that they were far too big for this boy, and she more or less said they wouldn't fit anybody but her little Jimmy. And he got very annoyed about his new trousers and he told somebody about it, and there happened to be a poet in the neighbourhood and he got to hear about it, and he composed a song rigging out little Jimmy with all the queer things that was ever worn round the neighbourhood from leggings to headgears like old sou'westers. The song was very popular, it was sung by young and old, but it's an old story said by the people that eventually it got to little Jimmy's ears, and, as he grew up, he left the neighbourhood in disgust - CONAL O'DONNELL

This is an entirely local song from West Donegal, which is typical of how such amusing and rather malicious satire comes to be made as an internal comment on members of the community. Like all such satires, of course, it goes a bit farther than the truth, and little Jimmy's mother is accused of coveting even women's apparel for young Jimmy. This is another example of a local tune which has become well known through its popularity in Scotland, where it was used for the song Kelvin Grove (see An Seanduine Doighte, No. 45, which uses the tune of The Campbells are Coming). The words of Kelvin Grove were composed in the early 1800's by Thomas Lyle and were probably a reworking of the traditional song The Shearing's Not For You.

18 THIOS I DTEACH A' TORRAIMH - AN tULTACH Aug 1928 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 # 47 Hudie Devaney - Sheila has other verses not sung by Hudie and somewhat different tune - "Bothar Buidhe" mentioned in Sheila's talk is THE YELLOW ROAD publ in Father Murphy: AMHRAIN CHUIGE ULADH (Drumdealgan Press, Dundalk) -- Hudie DEVANEY rec by Peter Kennedy, Ranafast, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 19968 - Sheila GALLAGHER rec by Peter Kennedy, Middledore, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 20146/ FOLKTRAX-272

Down at the wake-house, that's to say a house where some man or woman had died, he happened to see this fair damsel and fell in love with her, and, like all the rest, he didn't manage to get her. He only saw her at the wake and never saw her afterwards. He was a weaver. He said he wanted to have the girl at home so that he could sit at one end of the house, at the loom and weave, and keep singing and telling stories to his lover while she'd be working through the house - HUDIE DEVANEY

19. TIOCFAIDH AN SAMHRADH - One of the most widely distributed Gaelic songs in Ireland with versions found in Connacht and Munster. There is an English version in JOYCE OIFMS p227 "The Summer is come and the grass is green" - also in JOYCE AIM - AN CLAIDHEAMH SOLUIS 1903 - AN tULTACH May 1928 - AN CAMAN 1934 - HARDEBECK 1950 Govnmt Publ Dublin #M-164 - O FREGHIL 1952 Govnmt Publ Dublin #M-177 - HAMILTON 1973 p2 - KENNEDY FSBI 1975 #48 Rodgers -- Conal O DONNELL rec by Peter Kennedy, Glenties, Co Donegal 1953: BBC 20151/ rec by PK, London 1962 - Kitty RODGERS rec by Noel Hamilton, Baile Thiar (Torre Island) 1967: - O BOYLE Family: CEOLTA GAEL OSS-2 1971

It tells you how everything looks: grass growing, the colour of it, the leaves on the trees, everything budding up and shining. 'From my heart out I'll sing this tune - and then he goes back to his very young days: how he would make love to the girls - and everybody wanted to see him coming. He described himself well here: his charms and how he was liked in places. But - at the end - and I think that's the nicest part - the mother appeared and told him he's too late. She went last night with another man. And then he comes back to tell you how everything looked different from the beginning. Now the night is dark and there's a storm at sea. I can still remember the deep voice of the man I heard singing this song - he used to kind of hum it through his nose. He had a great hum to it. I have heard this song spoiled by singers who have never heard it properly sung. They leave out the hum and it's though the leaves have come off the trees - CONAL O'DONNELL

This is one of the best-known and most haunting of sad Irish love-songs to be found in the Gaeltacht areas of Donegal. A number of versions, some with music, have already been published but have long since gone out of print.