Annotation:Captain Cook's Death

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CAPTAIN COOK'S DEATH. Scottish, Air (whole time). E Flat Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. "Captain Cook's Death" is attributed to Lucy Johnston of Hilton (later Mrs. Oswald of Auchincruive). It is the air to which Burns's song "Thou lingering star with lessening ray" ("My Mary dear, departed shade") was set, published by James Johnson and Robert Burns in the Scots Musical Museum, vol. 3 (1790). The modern air to which the song is now usually sung, however, is a composition of Scots fiddler-composer John Lowe, called "Mary's Dream." Lowe was a Galloway divinity student and minor poet who died in America in 1798. See notes for "Annotation:Miss Johnston of Hilton's Fancy" and "Annotation:Mrs. Oswald of Auchincruive (1)" for more on the Oswalds.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Johnson (Scots Musical Museum, vol. 3), 1790; No. 279, p. 288.

Recorded sources:

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