Annotation:Cailín Deas Crúidte na mBó

Tune properties and standard notation

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CAILÍN DEAS CRÚIDTE NA mBÓ. Irish, Air (9/8). E Minor. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. There are several different airs that act as vehicles for this favorite song. The title appears in a list of tunes in his repertoire brought by Philip Goodman, the last professional and traditional piper in Farney, Louth, to the Feis Ceoil in Belfast in 1898 (Breathnach, 1997). "Cailín Deas Crúidte na mBó" is the burden, in Irish, of a wooing song that is primarily in English. It begins:

It was on a fine summer's morning,
When the birds sweetly tuned on each bough;
I heard a fair maid sing most charming
As she sat a-milking her cow;
Her voice, it was chanting melodious,
She left me scarce able to go;
My heart it is soothed in solace,
My Cailín deas crúite na mbó.

It has, in some areas and times in Ireland, been considered a fell song, with the tale being told of a priest who was summoned to perform the last rites to a dying man. On foot, he hurried on his mission but halted when he heard a young woman singing "Cailín Deas Crúidte na mBó." So beautiful was her singing that he was captivated, and spellbound, waited until she had finished, and by the time he arrived at his destination, the man had expired. It is said that the devil was responsible, acting mischief to prevent a last confession for a soul.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Roche Collection, 1982; vol. 3, p. 12, No. 43.

Recorded sources: Tara Records 2002, Christy Moore - "The Iron Behind the Velvet" (1978. Learned from the late Uilleann piper Leo Rowsome).

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Tune properties and standard notation