Annotation:O'Sullivan More's March (1)

Back to O'Sullivan More's March (1)

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O'SULLIVAN MOR(E'S MARCH) [1]. AKA and see "Highlander's March (The)," "The Rebel's March," "Rock and a Wee Pickle Tow," "Captain Collins" (Pa.), "One-Horned Cow (2) (The)," "The Retreat," "Pretender's March (The)," "Green Goose Fair (1)," "Glengariff," "Gogaí ó gog," "Painseach/Pairneach/Páinneach na nUbh [1]" (Basket of Eggs (The)), "Montrose's March," "Scottish March," "Bob Ridley" (Pa.), "The Bell Cow [1]" (Pa.), "The Belling Tune" (Pa.), "Fifer's March" (Pa.). Irish, March (3/4 and 6/8 time). A Major (Roche): G Major (Tubridy). Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB (Tubridy): AABBCCDDEEFF'GG' (Roche). The tune, note the Chieftains, is nowadays played more often as a jig, but is said to have been the march of the Kerry-based O'Sullivan Clan. However, Scottish antecedants are to be found in James Oswald's "Highlander's March (The)" and, nearly a century earlier, in England in Playford's "Montrose's March." O'Neill (1922) notes: "The above is an involved variant of a much simpler jig tune of identical name printed in Lynch's Melodies of Ireland (1845); and in O'Neill's Dance Music of Ireland (1907) (for which see "O'Sullivan's March (2)"). The strain is ancient. Following is a quatrain of a folk song sung to it in the editor's boyhood days:

There was an old woman tossed up in a blanket
Seventeen times as high as the moon;
What she was doing there I cannot imagine
But in her hand she carried a broom.

All of which is reminiscent of the days of witchcraft."

Tubridy's 6/8 version corresponds to the last parts of the Roche printing. A recording of "O'Sullivan's March" by Matt Molloy was used as theme for the 1995 film Rob Roy, starring Liam Neeson. See note for "Páinneach na nUbh (1)" for more on the tune-family.

Source for notated version: the Rice-Walsh manuscript, a collection of music from the repertoire of Jeremiah Breen, a blind fiddler from North Kerry [O'Neill].

Printed sources: Roche (Collection of Traditional Irish Music, vol. 2), 1912; No. 315, p. 51. O'Neill (Waifs and Strays of Gaelic Melody), 1922; No. 78. Tubridy (Irish Traditional Music, vol. 1), 1999; p. 6. Walsh (Session Tunes, vol. 2).

Recorded sources: Claddagh CC24, "The Chieftains 7" (1977). Columbia 35612, "The Chieftains" (1977). Columbia Legacy CK 48693, "The Best of the Chieftains" (1986).

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