Annotation:Low Down in the Broom
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LOW DOWN IN THE BROOM. AKA - "Low in the Broom." AKA and see "Red Red Rose (2)." Scottish, Air and Strathspey. D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. Early printings of the song and tune appear in James Oswald's Caledonian Pocket Companion (vol. 7, p. 6, 1760), and in the 1768 (James) Gillespie Manuscript of Perth. Subsequently it appears in several song collections of the latter 18th and early 19th centuries, including the first volume of Johnson's Scots Musical Museum (1787), Calliope (1788, pp. 345-346), and the second volume of David Sime's Edinburgh Musical Miscellany (1793, pp. 228-229).
My daddy is a canker'd carle
In the 19th century F.F. Graham replaced a strathspey called "Major Graham of Inchbrakie" with "Low Down in the Broom" as the vehicle for Robert Burns's lyric "My love is like a red red rose [1];" it is the song tune familiar today under that title. Late 18th century uilleann piper O'Farrell also lists the tune's provenance as Scotch in his collection.
Source for notated version:
Printed sources: Kerr (Merry Melodies), vol. 2; No. 147, p. 17. O'Farrell (Pocket Companion, vol. I), c. 1805; pp. 78-79. Riley (Flute Melodies, vol. 2), 1817; p. 68.
Recorded sources:
See also listing at:
Jane Keefer's Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [1]
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