Roisin Elsafty from Carna sings Roisin Dubh, accompanied by Ronan Browne on pipes and Siobhan Armstrong on traditional Irish wire-strung harp. It doesn't get any better than this....
’S nach fada an réim a lig mé léi ó inné go inniu,
’Siúl sléibhte i mo chadhan aonraic, ní raibh aon neach liom,
Loch Éirne, chaith mé de léim í, cé go mba ard a bhí an tsruth,
Ó tá m’anam gléigheal ligthe go léig a’m le mo Róisín Dubh.
’S a Róisín, ná bíodh brón ort ná cás anois,
Tá do dheartháir insan nGearmáin, tá a thriall thar muir,
Tiocfaidh do phardún ón bPápa, is ón Róimh uilig,
’S ó ná spáráil fíon Spáinneach ar mo Róisín Dubh.
’S dhá mbeadh seisreach a’m nach deas a threabhfainn in aghaidh an chnoic,
Dhéanfainn seanmóir ar an altóir mar a hordaíodh dhom,
Thabharfainn póg nó dhó don chailín a lig a hógh liom,
Óra, dhéanfainn cleas deas ar chúl an easa le mo Róisín Dubh
Sean Nos singing
The United Nations sometimes designates intangible treasures of world cultural heritage, like, for example, sutartine singing in Lithuania and the Eternech procession. I don't know what practical effect that has on anything, but it does draw some attention to the traditions in question.
If I could nominate some cultural treasures, the Connacht Irish-language song tradition would be among them, as well as east Galway fiddle and flute music, old-style Musgrai and Uibh Rathach songs in Irish, uillean pipes, all Scottish Gaelic song, Breton dancing and twenty more.
But the Connacht song tradition is a treasure.
Today at the turn of the 21st century, it's associated with Conamara, but most of the songs weren't originally made there at all. In the early 20th century, east Galway and west Mayo were well-known sources of songs. Earlier still, east Mayo, Roscommon and Leitrim were sources. (Many of the songs collected by O Loinsigh for Edward Bunting about 1800 were from east Mayo and Leitrim, and some well-known songs were originally associated with Roscommon.) But as Irish-speaking communities in most of the province were absorbed into the new world of agricultural estates, bullocks and money, song died with language. In Conamara (the heavily-populated coastal areas west of Galway town where even into the early 1960s, many people could not speak English effectively), these songs and the performance of the them retained its function and remained a meaningful part of life.
Their poetry is distinguished by a lyric passion, a restrained laconic eloquence and devastatingly beautiful and effective imagery. Indeed, in the late Middle Ages, Connacht was known for poetry and music ("Is binn an Connachtach oirfideach, clu na ndamh", according to the proverb. Or in the 'dark side' version: ("Is cainnteach Connachtach, conablach clamhach gan chain."), and what remains of Irish-speaking Connacht still is.
A map of places where most people spoke Irish about the end of the 19th century.
The music is as passionate as flamenco, though maybe not obviously so. No Connacht man or woman is likely to take a rose between the teeth or stamp around like a randy cockerel--never mind Michael Flateley. Passion in these songs is expressed through the use of ornamentation and variation to focus attention on certain points of the performance. Musical and lyrical tension build in each turn of the tune, in each stanza of the words, and through the performance as a whole, to be released in a few notes or even in one; in an image or phrase. This is not something that will grab a person by the throat or bang them over the head. Anyone not paying attention or distracted will miss it altogether. One needs to be quiet enough inside so as to be able to hear the music, to follow it. It would be impossible to really hear a song while eating a burger.
This is an individual art. Each performance, though obviously founded on a deep individual interaction with tradition as received by the singer, is unique in many ways. It is a remaking, a reformulation, expressing a specific time, place and person. Even an individual singer may (or used to) vary their songs in substantial ways, and songs live only in the moment, in performance. Recording--whether filmed or notated--freezes them, creating a text that is maybe a useful, even beautiful, artifact for those times we're not listening to a person, but which is not 'Donal Og', or whatever song is in question.
In a way, the whole corpus of songs that is known in a community is one thing, a single work of art. Songs exist in relation to one another; not only in verses which may float between songs or be adapted into new contexts, but also in music. Some commentators complain that today, songs are on the way to becoming pre-packaged lifeless objects, obtained 'ornamentation included'; that they are merely repeated rather than recreated. Such commentators state that the songs are becoming something for the stage and for competitions. I wouldn't know--I'm a terrible musician--but if true, it would be like freezing a rose; the flower looks good, but it's finished. It can only stay frozen and preserved, or die.
This isn't a totally new thing. Terminal stages of the sean nos tradition in some other Irish areas demonstrated this breakdown, and some collectors in the 1940s and 1950s (Seamus Ennis in southeastern Conamara, and the person who collected songs in Arainn that were released on a Folkways record) found that for particular singers, well-known published song texts had superseded local texts.
Partly this was just respect for books. Partly it's based on the assumption that there exists an original text of a song that's more correct--'better'--than any others. To argue that there is not is not thus to claim that no first performance of a specific song occurred--it clearly did. But a song was adapted from models that already existed in the local tradition, and once performed, it entered the tradition and began to interact with other songs, and to change.
Before this runs down into total incoherence, the songs:
Dónal Óg
Maire Ni Eanai from Carna sings Donal Og (Young Donal), a song well-known in Connacht and Munster. The video is from the TG4 Sean Nos Archive, and originally appeared in a TV program Fonnadoiri na hAirde (Singers from Ard). (Ard is an area in Carna parish.)
Well, I spent a half-hour trying to get the video to come here, but failed. Here is another version, instead.
http://old.tg4.ie/en/programmes/archive/maire-ni-eanai/donal-og.html
My love’s hair is the color of the blackberries,the color of blackthorn fruit on a fine sunny day,
the color of blackest bilberry that’s on the mountain,
black hair and a shining white body.
My heart is as black as the blackthorn fruit,
black as the track of shoes on white hall floors,
and there’s a great melancholy behind my laugh.
Oh Dónal Óg, you’d be better off with me
I’d milk the cow for you and I’d churn the butter,
and if you were in danger, I’d strike a blow for you.
Late last night the dog was speaking about you,
that you’re a lonely wanderer through the wood,
and may you have no mate forever until you take me!
You promised something to me, but you lied to me,
I whistled and I called out twelve times for you,
but there was nothing there for me but the lambs bleating.
You promised me something that wasn’t easy to do;
twelve market towns,
and a fine white palace beside the sea.
Your love was only like a drift of bright snow,
like a sandbar in the middle of the sea,
like a wind running over the top of the gardens,
like the torrent of a stream after a rainy day.
My mother told me not to speak to you,
it's a poor time she chose to give me a warning--
like a wall around a garden after it's been plundered.
I denounce love--alas for she who gave it
he left my heart black in the center of chest,
and I can’t see him in the village or any place at all.
Below is another song, associated originally with Leitrim, sung here by Connacht singers.
An Droighnean Donn
If you go to the link above, you will be able to hear Traolach O Conghaile sing a well-known Connacht song, An Draighnean Donn (The Blackthorn Tree). This comes from the TG4 Sean Nos archive too, and dates to 2014. The archive says the singer is from Mayo, and he pronounces some words in a Mayo/north Conamara way, but I don't know any thing else about him, except that he now lives in south Conamara and is a great singer
(The version translated is not the version he sings, but that's available, in the original, on the Archive site.) I translate from Nua-Dhuanaire I.
Its a foolish man who’d be scrambling up a wall that’s high,
when there’s a low wall beside it, on which he could put his hand;
though the rowan tree is tall, its crop it is sour,
while blackberries and strawberries grow on a low little branch.
I send you two hundred farewells, my thousand love,
Bright swan by the waves’ edge,
I love a black haired man!
I would that he knew the tale of my trouble;
I pray he’s well!
Aren’t I just like a nut on the branch
I’ll reward you, southern wind,
Aren’t I like a curragh swept from wave to wave?
But the Connacht song tradition is a treasure.
Today at the turn of the 21st century, it's associated with Conamara, but most of the songs weren't originally made there at all. In the early 20th century, east Galway and west Mayo were well-known sources of songs. Earlier still, east Mayo, Roscommon and Leitrim were sources. (Many of the songs collected by O Loinsigh for Edward Bunting about 1800 were from east Mayo and Leitrim, and some well-known songs were originally associated with Roscommon.) But as Irish-speaking communities in most of the province were absorbed into the new world of agricultural estates, bullocks and money, song died with language. In Conamara (the heavily-populated coastal areas west of Galway town where even into the early 1960s, many people could not speak English effectively), these songs and the performance of the them retained its function and remained a meaningful part of life.
Their poetry is distinguished by a lyric passion, a restrained laconic eloquence and devastatingly beautiful and effective imagery. Indeed, in the late Middle Ages, Connacht was known for poetry and music ("Is binn an Connachtach oirfideach, clu na ndamh", according to the proverb. Or in the 'dark side' version: ("Is cainnteach Connachtach, conablach clamhach gan chain."), and what remains of Irish-speaking Connacht still is.
A map of places where most people spoke Irish about the end of the 19th century.
The music is as passionate as flamenco, though maybe not obviously so. No Connacht man or woman is likely to take a rose between the teeth or stamp around like a randy cockerel--never mind Michael Flateley. Passion in these songs is expressed through the use of ornamentation and variation to focus attention on certain points of the performance. Musical and lyrical tension build in each turn of the tune, in each stanza of the words, and through the performance as a whole, to be released in a few notes or even in one; in an image or phrase. This is not something that will grab a person by the throat or bang them over the head. Anyone not paying attention or distracted will miss it altogether. One needs to be quiet enough inside so as to be able to hear the music, to follow it. It would be impossible to really hear a song while eating a burger.
This is an individual art. Each performance, though obviously founded on a deep individual interaction with tradition as received by the singer, is unique in many ways. It is a remaking, a reformulation, expressing a specific time, place and person. Even an individual singer may (or used to) vary their songs in substantial ways, and songs live only in the moment, in performance. Recording--whether filmed or notated--freezes them, creating a text that is maybe a useful, even beautiful, artifact for those times we're not listening to a person, but which is not 'Donal Og', or whatever song is in question.
In a way, the whole corpus of songs that is known in a community is one thing, a single work of art. Songs exist in relation to one another; not only in verses which may float between songs or be adapted into new contexts, but also in music. Some commentators complain that today, songs are on the way to becoming pre-packaged lifeless objects, obtained 'ornamentation included'; that they are merely repeated rather than recreated. Such commentators state that the songs are becoming something for the stage and for competitions. I wouldn't know--I'm a terrible musician--but if true, it would be like freezing a rose; the flower looks good, but it's finished. It can only stay frozen and preserved, or die.
This isn't a totally new thing. Terminal stages of the sean nos tradition in some other Irish areas demonstrated this breakdown, and some collectors in the 1940s and 1950s (Seamus Ennis in southeastern Conamara, and the person who collected songs in Arainn that were released on a Folkways record) found that for particular singers, well-known published song texts had superseded local texts.
Partly this was just respect for books. Partly it's based on the assumption that there exists an original text of a song that's more correct--'better'--than any others. To argue that there is not is not thus to claim that no first performance of a specific song occurred--it clearly did. But a song was adapted from models that already existed in the local tradition, and once performed, it entered the tradition and began to interact with other songs, and to change.
Before this runs down into total incoherence, the songs:
Dónal Óg
Maire Ni Eanai from Carna sings Donal Og (Young Donal), a song well-known in Connacht and Munster. The video is from the TG4 Sean Nos Archive, and originally appeared in a TV program Fonnadoiri na hAirde (Singers from Ard). (Ard is an area in Carna parish.)
Well, I spent a half-hour trying to get the video to come here, but failed. Here is another version, instead.
http://old.tg4.ie/en/programmes/archive/maire-ni-eanai/donal-og.html
Maire Ni hEanai doesn't sing all the verses of the version I've translated below, which is very complete. The text of the Irish original is in Nua-Dhuanaire, Cuid I, edited by Padraig de Brun, Breandan O Buachalla and Tomas O Concheannain, and published by Institiud Ardleinn Bhaile Atha Cliath (Dublin Institute for Higher Studies), in 1975. That is a great anthology of modern (circa 1500 - 1900) Irish poetry and songs. There are also volumes II and III, just as good.
My love’s hair is the color of the blackberries,the color of blackthorn fruit on a fine sunny day,
the color of blackest bilberry that’s on the mountain,
black hair and a shining white body.
My heart is as black as the blackthorn fruit,
black as the track of shoes on white hall floors,
and there’s a great melancholy behind my laugh.
Oh Dónal Óg, you’d be better off with me
I’d milk the cow for you and I’d churn the butter,
and if you were in danger, I’d strike a blow for you.
Late last night the dog was speaking about you,
that you’re a lonely wanderer through the wood,
and may you have no mate forever until you take me!
You promised something to me, but you lied to me,
I whistled and I called out twelve times for you,
but there was nothing there for me but the lambs bleating.
You promised me something that wasn’t easy to do;
twelve market towns,
and a fine white palace beside the sea.
Your love was only like a drift of bright snow,
like a sandbar in the middle of the sea,
like a wind running over the top of the gardens,
like the torrent of a stream after a rainy day.
My mother told me not to speak to you,
it's a poor time she chose to give me a warning--
like a wall around a garden after it's been plundered.
I denounce love--alas for she who gave it
he left my heart black in the center of chest,
and I can’t see him in the village or any place at all.
Below is another song, associated originally with Leitrim, sung here by Connacht singers.
An Droighnean Donn
If you go to the link above, you will be able to hear Traolach O Conghaile sing a well-known Connacht song, An Draighnean Donn (The Blackthorn Tree). This comes from the TG4 Sean Nos archive too, and dates to 2014. The archive says the singer is from Mayo, and he pronounces some words in a Mayo/north Conamara way, but I don't know any thing else about him, except that he now lives in south Conamara and is a great singer
(The version translated is not the version he sings, but that's available, in the original, on the Archive site.) I translate from Nua-Dhuanaire I.
Shilfeadh aomfhear gur dil do fein me nuair a luionn do'm mionn
a's go dteann dha dtrian sios diom nuair a smaoinim ar do chomhra liom;
sneachta siobhtha a's e a shiorchur faoi Shliabh Ui Fhloinn
a's go bhfuil mo ghra-sa mar bhlath na n-airni ar an droighheann donn.
Shil me fein nach ag ceasacht spre orm a rachadh gra mo chroi,
a's nach bhfuigfeadh se ina dhiadh me mar gheall ar mhaoin;
fa-raor gear nach bhfuilim fein a's an fear a chraigh mo chroi
a ngleanntan sleibhe i bhfad o einneach a's an an drucht 'na lui,
Ta feirin le me cheadshearc i mo phoca thios
a's fearaibh Eireann, ni leigheasfaidis mo bhron, fa-raor.
nuair a smaoinimse ar a chursai a's ar a chul brea donn,
bim ag gearghol os iseal a's og osnail go trom.....
Every man thinks that it's him I’m in love with, when he begins to swear oaths,
a's go dteann dha dtrian sios diom nuair a smaoinim ar do chomhra liom;
sneachta siobhtha a's e a shiorchur faoi Shliabh Ui Fhloinn
a's go bhfuil mo ghra-sa mar bhlath na n-airni ar an droighheann donn.
Shil me fein nach ag ceasacht spre orm a rachadh gra mo chroi,
a's nach bhfuigfeadh se ina dhiadh me mar gheall ar mhaoin;
fa-raor gear nach bhfuilim fein a's an fear a chraigh mo chroi
a ngleanntan sleibhe i bhfad o einneach a's an an drucht 'na lui,
Ta feirin le me cheadshearc i mo phoca thios
a's fearaibh Eireann, ni leigheasfaidis mo bhron, fa-raor.
nuair a smaoinimse ar a chursai a's ar a chul brea donn,
bim ag gearghol os iseal a's og osnail go trom.....
Every man thinks that it's him I’m in love with, when he begins to swear oaths,
and two-thirds of them drop away from me, when I remember your words;
the snow blows in drifts in the endless storm on Sliabh Ui Fhloinn;
my love’s hair is the color of the sloes that grow on the blackthorn tree
I never thought that my dearest love would haggle over my dowry
or that he would desert me afterwards, over a matter of wealth;
its my desperate despair that I’m not with the man who so troubled my heart in a little mountain glen far away from them all, with the dew coming down.
I have a present from my first love down in my pocket
and all the men of Ireland couldn’t cure my sorrow, alas;
when I remember your ways and your lovely brown hair,
I spend a while weeping softly and a while sighing heavily.
I wish I had a present on the fair day from my handsome lad,
and sweet conversation after, with the flower of the men:
it's my desperate despair that we’re not there with a priest in front of us,
to join our lives together, before he leaves and goes away.
No matter what they think of it, I’ll praise my dearest love;
no matter what they think of it, I’ll sit down by his side;
no matter what they think of it, a thousand arrows through his heart;
and oh shining star before the people, it's you who’s troubled my heart.
Oh dear God, what will I do if you should leave me?
I don’t know the way to your house, your fire or to your hearth.
My mother is frantic, my father’s in the grave,
my people are enraged with me, and my love’s far away.
There's a darkness on my eyes and I didn't sleep a wink,
my love’s hair is the color of the sloes that grow on the blackthorn tree
I never thought that my dearest love would haggle over my dowry
or that he would desert me afterwards, over a matter of wealth;
its my desperate despair that I’m not with the man who so troubled my heart in a little mountain glen far away from them all, with the dew coming down.
I have a present from my first love down in my pocket
and all the men of Ireland couldn’t cure my sorrow, alas;
when I remember your ways and your lovely brown hair,
I spend a while weeping softly and a while sighing heavily.
I wish I had a present on the fair day from my handsome lad,
and sweet conversation after, with the flower of the men:
it's my desperate despair that we’re not there with a priest in front of us,
to join our lives together, before he leaves and goes away.
No matter what they think of it, I’ll praise my dearest love;
no matter what they think of it, I’ll sit down by his side;
no matter what they think of it, a thousand arrows through his heart;
and oh shining star before the people, it's you who’s troubled my heart.
Oh dear God, what will I do if you should leave me?
I don’t know the way to your house, your fire or to your hearth.
My mother is frantic, my father’s in the grave,
my people are enraged with me, and my love’s far away.
There's a darkness on my eyes and I didn't sleep a wink,
thinking about you, my first love, though the night is long.
The way that you denied me in front of the world,
and oh, fragrant branch, why would you bear false witness to me?
and oh, fragrant branch, why would you bear false witness to me?
Its a foolish man who’d be scrambling up a wall that’s high,
when there’s a low wall beside it, on which he could put his hand;
though the rowan tree is tall, its crop it is sour,
while blackberries and strawberries grow on a low little branch.
I send you two hundred farewells, my thousand love,
the gossipers have poisoned your mind against me.
I have no little boat to send after your ship
the sea’s rolling high in front of me and I don’t know how to swim.
Take my blessing to that village there west among the trees,
towards the village to which I’m wandering, both early and late;
there’s many a wet muddy road and a twisting path
stretching between me and the village where my sweetheart dwells.
Here is Traolach singing another song:
I have no little boat to send after your ship
the sea’s rolling high in front of me and I don’t know how to swim.
Take my blessing to that village there west among the trees,
towards the village to which I’m wandering, both early and late;
there’s many a wet muddy road and a twisting path
stretching between me and the village where my sweetheart dwells.
Here is Traolach singing another song:
Below is my translation of a well-known song collected by Douglas Hyde in the late 19th century in Roscommon. The original text is from Nua-Dhuanaire, Cuid III, ed. by O Concheannain, Tomas; Institiud Ardleinn Bhaile Atha Cliath, 1978.
Mo bhrón ar an bhFairrge
I wish sorrow to the sea, for she is so wide,
Below, Darach O Cathain sings Oro 'Se do Bheatha Abhaile. Any occasion is better for a bit of Darach O Cathain, a singer from the Conamara islands whose family moved to the Meath "Gaeltacht colony" when he was young. He went to work in England as a young man, like most, and would be completely forgotten today (except to his family of course), only that Sean O Riada brought him to attention. There was one record.
And now for something completely different....
Two Breton musicians play for a dance. The tune is for a lariden-gavotten from the villages between the towns of Pontivy and Baud. The bombarde is a shawn that takes a lot of wind to make any sort of noise on. (I know; I tried once, and failed). The traditional Breton bagpipe is shrill, but the sound of the two instruments together carries for miles--good for the traditional outdoor dances..
The next poem was spoken by a woman hoping that her true love would return from sea before she was forced to marry against her will. It’s from a collection of songs written down from county Mayo Irish immigrants to the U.S. in the early twentieth century, and published in the journal Bealoideas; specifically Amhrain o Iorrus, ed. Micheal O Gallchobhair, Number.10, I think. At any rate, the collection runs from page 210 to 284, and I will note the correct particulars when I locate that stray piece of paper.
and there she is flowing between my love and I.
I was left in this village, lamenting and sorrowing,
with no hope of ever crossing over those waves.
It's my sorrow that I and my dearest love are not
in the province of Leinster or in the County Clare.
My grief that I and my dearest love are not on board
of a ship traveling off to America!
It was a bed of rushes that was under me last night,
I tossed it out when the day’s heat had come;
my own love came up to my side,
shoulder to shoulder and mouth to mouth.
Below, Darach O Cathain sings Oro 'Se do Bheatha Abhaile. Any occasion is better for a bit of Darach O Cathain, a singer from the Conamara islands whose family moved to the Meath "Gaeltacht colony" when he was young. He went to work in England as a young man, like most, and would be completely forgotten today (except to his family of course), only that Sean O Riada brought him to attention. There was one record.
And now for something completely different....
Two Breton musicians play for a dance. The tune is for a lariden-gavotten from the villages between the towns of Pontivy and Baud. The bombarde is a shawn that takes a lot of wind to make any sort of noise on. (I know; I tried once, and failed). The traditional Breton bagpipe is shrill, but the sound of the two instruments together carries for miles--good for the traditional outdoor dances..
The next poem was spoken by a woman hoping that her true love would return from sea before she was forced to marry against her will. It’s from a collection of songs written down from county Mayo Irish immigrants to the U.S. in the early twentieth century, and published in the journal Bealoideas; specifically Amhrain o Iorrus, ed. Micheal O Gallchobhair, Number.10, I think. At any rate, the collection runs from page 210 to 284, and I will note the correct particulars when I locate that stray piece of paper.
He arrived just in time, according to the story.
Eala Gheal ar Bhruach na Tuinne
Bright swan by the waves’ edge,
I love a black haired man!
I would that he knew the tale of my trouble;
I pray he’s well!
Aren’t I just like a nut on the branch
without any other nuts around me?
You’d only need a gentle breeze to come
to tremble it and to knock that nut down.
I’ll reward you, southern wind,
if only you’ll shift around to the north,
hoping that the man who’s out at sea
will sail into the bay tonight.
Aren’t I like a curragh swept from wave to wave?
Aren’t I like a ship whose sails have been broken?
Aren’t I like an apple tree that’s lost its blossom?
But I’m still here, despite all of them against me.
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