Annotation:Mol na Tiarna
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MOL NA TIARNA (The Landlord's Beautiful Daughter). AKA - "Moll and Tiarna," "Moll na Tiar na." AKA and see "Ceol na dTéad." Irish, Reel. Ireland, County Donegal. C Major. Standard tuning. ABB'C. A popular reel in County Donegal. Francie Dearg O'Byrne, the fiddler who popularized this tune, told the following story about it and a companion tune. It seems that Mol na Tiarna, the Landlord's Beautiful Daughter, was brought up by a servant named Maire na Sop (Maire of the wisp), and that this servant had a great talent for lilting which she passed on to the girl. In good time Mol became enamoured of a young man of whom her father disapproved and so they had to tryst in secret. Mol enlisted the help of Maire, who was so attached to the girl that she could refuse her nothing, to help keep tabs on her father who had promised to kill the young man if he found them together. The two women arranged a signal in which, if the coast were clear Maire would lilt Mol's favorite reel, and if there was danger Maire would lilt her own favorite reel. This worked well for some time until once, when Maire was distracted, the landlord noticed his daughter missing, and suspecting some sort of affair between his daughter and the boy, he grabbed his gun and set off. Maire finally noticed the landlord gone and ran toward the trysting place with all haste, whistling the warning tune. The boy was able to make an escape, and the women able to explain their presence at the place enough to mollify the father. The story ends happily, for the father eventually lost his dislike of the young man and the two were soon thereafter married. The story of two tunes got around and have since been called by the names of the two lilters.
Source for notated version: fiddlers Francie and Mickey Byrne (County Donegal) [Feldman & O'Doherty].
Printed sources: Feldman & O'Doherty (The Northern Fiddler), 1979; p. 165 (Note: the titles are transposed in the book with a companion tune, "Máire na Sop").
Recorded sources: Cló Iar-Chonnacht Records, Francie & Mickey Byrne - "Ceol na dTéad." Green Linnet SIF-104, Altan - "The Celts Rise Again" (1990). Green Linnet SIF-1095, Altan - "Horse with a Heart" (1989. Learned from the late Francie Byrne from Kilcar, Co. Donegal).
See also listing at:
Alan Ng's Irishtune.info [1]