Annotation:Paddy Will You Now?

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PADDY WILL YOU NOW? AKA and see "Tow Row Row." Irish, March (2/4 time). G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. O’Neill (1922) says: “The above setting differs not materially from that in Clinton's 200 Irish Melodies for Flute, Dublin 1840. Under the same name a much simpler version appears in Haverty's 300 Irish Airs, New York 1858, having but the exceptional number of 13 bars altogether. To the editor this strain was known in boyhood days as ‘Tow Row Row’ both names being taken from the first line of the song Tow Row Row, Paddy, will you now, which song by the way cannot be found in any Irish collection at present available. ‘Ta na la’ or ‘It is day’ one of three tunes of that name in Stanford-Petrie Collection is obviously the same strain. The arrangement however is quite different; the melody and chorus together consisting of but 17 bars. To add to the diversity, we find that the arrangement of ‘Paddy will you now’ to which is set Gavan Duffy's poem ‘Watch and Wait’ in Ballads and Songs by the Writers of The Nation Dublin, 1845, is limited to 14 bars.” The song, which can also be found in lullaby versions, begins:

Tow, row, row! Paddy, will you now?
Take me now, while I'm in humor;
And that's just--now!

A version in Charles Villiers Stanford's Complete Collection of Petrie's Irish Music (1905) prints a version under the title "Ta na la" (It is day).

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: O’Neill (Waifs and Strays of Gaelic Melody), 1922; No. 51.

Recorded sources:

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