FTX-168 - PUCK FAIR

IRISH TINKER SINGERS -3-

A group of travellers from Southern Ireland, singing around a camp-fire in Belfast in July 1952, resulted in some remarkable recordings of their style from the pretty young tinker girls. By the early hours of the morning, the men were under the spell of the Guinness, leaving the younger girls, some breast-feeding as they sang, tightly grasping the microphone one-by-one, and competing with each other in their display of vocal decorations in the love-songs. The first two albums had songs from the young girls and from Mary CONNORS; on this last of cassette we hear more from Mary, as well as from some of the men: Paddy DORAN and Christy PURCELL from Kerry. Many of their songs are tinker compositions, including the one about the annual PUCK FAIR at Killorglin, Co Kerry

1. PUCK FAIR - Chisty Purcell (talk before with Liam Andrews) - 3'26"

2. DINGLE PUCK GOAT - Christy - 2'09"

3. THE FAIR AT SPANSIL HILL - Christy - 1'33"

4. THE BANDY-LEGGED MULE - Christy - 2'33"

5. THE PRIDE OF INISHMORE - Christy (talk bef with Sean O Boyle) - 4'05"

6. WILLIAM SCANLON - Christy (talk bef) - 4'29"

7. THE LODGING HOUSE AT CARRICK-ON-SUIR - Christy - 3'03"

8. SWEET ATHY - Christy - 2'37"

9. THE TREE IN THE BOG - Christy - 1'18"

10. THE DARK-EYED GYPSIES - Christy - 2'16"

11. THREE JOLLY SPORTSMEN - Paddy Doran - 2'07"

12. SEVEN LITTLE GYPSIES - Paddy - 1'37"

13. DOWN BY BLACKWATERSIDE - Paddy - 2'27"

14. THE BLACK VELVET BAND - Paddy - 1'37"

15. DUNGARVAN - Paddy - 1'59"

16. WHERE ARE YOU GOING, MY PRETTY MAID? - Paddy with chorus - 1'24"

17. YOUNG KATE FROM BALLINAMORE - Paddy 1'42"

18. THE BLIND MAN HE CAN SEE (2) - Mary CONNORS with Paddy Doran in chorus - 2'26"

19. I WISH I WAS IN NEW ROSS - Mary - 2'57"

20. COME ALL YE LOYAL LOVERS - Mary - 4'56"

21. THE LOVELY BANKS OF LEE - Mary - 4'09"

22. PAUL AND NANCY HOGAN - Mary with Paddy Doran in ch - 3'02"

Recorded by Peter Kennedy on Dan O Neil's Loanen, Belfast 1952. Interviewers: Liam Andrews and Sean O Boyle. Edited by Peter Kennedy and first published by Folktrax 1975.

#1. A traveller's composition about the annnual gathering of tinkers at Killorglin in Co Kerry.

#2. Learned in Kerry in the early twenties. See Hughes: Irish Country Songs vol. 4 p.101

#3. On the road to a donkey fair in Co. Clare. Also called THE TINKER'S BAND.

#4. Composed by Christy, a wagon-builder and repairer of tinker caravans or trailers.

#5. was composed by Christy's father, still alive at the age of 103, about a township in Co. Kerry.

#6. Christy says the man who murdered his sister-in-law came from Co. Cork. A broadsheet gives the date of his execution for the murder of Bridget Gayer as the 9th.January 1910. Another version from Michael McDonagh, tinker of Co. Clare is in the Folk Music Journal for 1972.

#7. Tinker composition about Carrick in Co. Waterford.

#8. Athy, which also appears in the song, JOHNNY I HARDLY KNEW YE, is on the river Galey between Listowel and Newcastle in Co. Limerick.

#10. Child #200. Next to BARBARA ALLEN this is the most popular of all the classic ballads. (See another version #12).

#11. A version of THE THREE BUTCHERS (Laws: L4) a ballad common in England and probably learned from English gypsies.

#12. Child #200. See #10.

#13: See another version sung by Mary Doran on FT-166.

#14: Herbert Hughes published a version, THE BLACK RIBBON BAND, in Irish Country Songs vol 4 p52. A version from Bill Cameron, coxswain of the Cornish lifeboat on St Mary's in the Isles of Scilly is on FTX-217 #12.

#15: Tinker composition mentioning Lismore in Co. Waterford.

#16: A version of SEVENTEEN COME SUNDAY, a song popular among travellers.

#17: Probably part of a CRUEL FATHER ballad.

#18: This is a song known as MARROWBONES (LAWS Q2: THE OLD WOMAN OF SLAPSADAM). Sam Henry #174 has THE AUL' MAN AND THE CHURNSTAFF and Herbert Hughes: Irish Country Songs vol 4 p66 TIGAREE TORUM TORUM. See another BLIND MAN HE CAN SEE recording on FTX-167 #20 which is a version of THE CUCKOLD'S SONG or SEVEN DRUNKEN NIGHTS.

#19: a version of THE IRISH GIRL - See FTX-166 #2 I WISH I WAS IN BANAGHER TOWN. Also in Sam Henry Collection #711 THE MANCHESTER ANGEL.

#20: Jimmy McBeath, Scottish traveller, recorded a version on FTX-059.

#22. See NANCY HOGAN'S GANDER on FTX-166 #5.