Colorado Celtic Harp Society

This blog is no longer kept up to date.  The new address for CCHS is:

coloradocelticharpsociety.org.

Please contact Deb Kolacny for further information

 Deb Kolacny 

PO Box 2066 

Englewood, CO 80150-2066

    debrak.cchs@gmail.com  

Retreat 20 coming soon!

 

Love those retreats!   

The time has come to prepare for the 2025 CCHS Harp Retreat.  Some of the major preparations are already underway, So please mark your calendar.  The retreat will be held once again at the Franciscan Retreat Center in Colorado Springs.  The dates are  in June:  TBD

Innisheer

Inisheer

  

Innisheer means East Island. It is the 

smallest and most eastern of the three Aran Islands in Galway Bay, Ireland. 

The song, Innisheer, is a beautiful, 

lyrical slow air and is one of the most popular tunes played 

by traditional Irish musicians.  But…the tune is not traditional or very ancient.  

It was composed by accordion player 

Thomas Walsh from Dublin in the ‘70’s.   He said he composed 'Inisheer' after spending the best holiday of his life on the island.   To quote him, “There was no electricity on the island at that time, which was new to a Dub like me. 

I found the people and the island had something special which I never experienced before. I went for three days and came home three weeks later, due to a lack of money. I composed 'Inisheer' the next day while I was walking in the Phoenix Park dreaming of what I had left behind, and the peace and tranquility it gave me.”

The Salley Gardens

"The Sally Gardens" is a poem published in 1889 by Irish poet, William Butler Yeats.  (13 June 1865 – 28 January 1939). Yeats indicated in a note that the poem was "an attempt to reconstruct an old song from three lines imperfectly remembered by an old peasant woman in the village of  Ballisodare, Sligo, who often sang them to herself." The composer John Ireland set the words to an original melody.  See video below under Harp Demo.

The Salley Gardens

(Salley in Irish means Willow.)

Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white
feet.
She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish, with her would not
agree.
In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white
hand.
She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.

The Water is Wide

This song became popular in America after Pete Seeger introduced it in 1958.  It tells the story of false love.  The song has been claimed not only by Americans, but by the English, Scottish, and Irish as well.  The modern lyrics were consolidated from several versions, and then the song was named The Water is Wide by Cecil Sharp in 1906.  Watch the YouTube video in"Harp Demo" on the lower right of the screen!

  The words are as follows:

The water is wide, I can-not cross o'er.

And neither have I wings to fly.

give me a boat that can carry two,

And both shall row, my love and I.

A ship there is and she sails the seas.

She's laden deep, as deep can be;

But not as deep as the love I'm in

And I know not if I sink or swim.

I leaned my back up against an oak

Thinking it were a trusty tree

but first it bended and then it broke

Thus did my love prove false to me.

O love is sweet and love is kind

The sweetest flow'r when first it's new

but love grows old and waxes cold

And fades away like the morning dew.

CCHS Retreat 2017

Every Year the Colorado Celtic Harp Society hold a retreat for its members. The last few years it has been held at the Franciscan Retreat Center in Colorado Springs.  This year's retreat was May 19, 20, and 21 - right after the big spring snow.  Like last year, we included an event called "On the Town" during which each participant performs a selection for the whole group.  The harpist in this selection is Rebecca Markel.   One of the acts was videotaped as you can see by clicking on the link "On The Town" in the lower right under "Harp Demo."

The Water Kelpie  Click on link lower right "Harp Demo" to watch youtube video of the Harplanders performing the song.

A water kelpie is, as everyone knows, a supernatural water horse from Celtic folklore that is believed to haunt the rivers and lochs of Scotland and Ireland. In J.K. Rowling's book Fantastic Beasts and Where to find Them, Kelpies are described as shape-shifters native to the British Isles whose favorite form is a horse with bulrushes for a mane.  Rowling also mentions that the Loch Ness monster is a gigantic kelpie whose favorite form is a sea serpent.

The Kelpies

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Kelpies in Falkirk.

The Kelpies are 30-metre-high horse-head sculptures, standing next to a new extension to the Forth and Clyde Canal, and near River Carron, in The Helix, a new parkland project built to connect 16 communities in the Falkirk Council Area, Scotland.

 The sculptures were designed by sculptor Andy Scott and were completed in October 2013.

 The sculptures form a gateway at the eastern entrance to the Forth and Clyde canal, and the new canal extension built as part of The Helix land transformation project. The Kelpies are a monument to horse powered heritage across Scotland.

The sculptures opened to the public in April 2014. As part of the project, they will have their own visitor centre, and sit beside a newly developed canal turning pool and extension. This canal extension reconnects the Forth and Clyde Canal with the River Forth, and improves navigation between the East and West of Scotland.

Ye Banks and Braes of Bonnie Doon. 

Please click the link lower right 
under "Harp Demo"to hear the song.

The melody was written by James Miller, a clerk in Edinburgh around 1783. 

One day he was challenged by a music editor named Stephen Clark to write a Scottish air by using only the black keys of the harpsichord (which is like a piano). 

Taking the challenge, James Miller, composed a melody and called it "The Caledonian Hunt's Delight."   Clarke was really pleased with the tune and he told Robert Burns about it.  

Burns then supplied some beautiful words, and the song became known as Ye Banks and Braes of Bonnie Doon .  Burns lived 37 years: 1759 - 1796. 

The "Bonnie Doon" is a river that flows from Loch Doon to the Firth of Clyde in Ayrshire, Scotland, past Burns' home town of Alloway.

Ye banks and braes o' Bonnie Doon,
How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair?
How can ye chant, ye little birds,
And I'm sae weary, fu' o' care!

Ye'll break my heart, ye warbling birds,
That wanton through the flow'ring thorn
Ye mind me o' departed joys,
Departed, never to return.

Oft I have rov’d by bonnie doon,
To see the rose and woodbine twine;
And every bird sang of its love,
And fondly sae did I o' mine.

Wi' lightsome heart I put a rose,
Full sweet upon the thorny tree.
But my false lover stole my rose,
And ah, he left the thorn wi' me.

Glossary bonnie: pretty braes: hills fu': full hae: have ilka: each oft: often sae: so wantons: disrespectful

Searching for Lambs
This English folk song was collected by Cecil Sharp in his One Hundred English Folk Songs (1916). Though the words may vary from version to version, the theme is always the same—the shepherdess is searching for her lambs on a May 
morning and the young man is searching for her love.

Searching for Lambs / As I went out one May morning

Unknown

As I went out one May morning,
One May morning betime,
I met a maid from home had strayed,
Just as the sun did shine

What makes you rise so soon, my dear,
Your journey to pursue?
Your pretty little feet they tread so sweet,
Strike off the morning dew.

I'm going to feed my Father's flock,
His young and tender lambs,
That over hills and over dales
Lie waiting for their dams.

O stay! O stay! you handsome maid,
And rest a moment here,
For there is none but you alone
That I do love so dear.

How gloriously the sun doth shine,
How pleasant is the air;
I'd rather rest on a true love's breast
Than any other where.

For I am thine and thou art rnine;
No man shall uncomfort thee.
We'll join our hands in wedded bands
And a-married we will be.

These lyrics may or may not be copyrighted!

A.L. Lloyd suggests in Folk Song in England that this tune is the kind that owes its form to the mingling of the art of the peasantry and the art of the townsfolk. 

It was a great favourite of Cecil Sharp and in Somerset he collected five versions between 1904 and 1909. He included it in a number of publications, some with piano accompaniment. As such it was one of his chosen ‘English folk songs’ which became popular as a drawing-room song: It also appears in Novello's Schools Series which was compiled by Sharp and Baring-Gould in 1906, and in fact, Bob learned it at school when he was 12 or 13 from a master who was interested in folk songs.

Lisa Lynne and Aryeh Frankfurter will lead two very valuable workshops on March 26.  See Calendar (on right)!

Aryeh Frankfurter - Norwegian& Swedish Tunes for Celtic Harp (Intermediate/Advanced):

"Nordic music is gaining in popularity and many lovely Nordic tunes are making their way into the Irish/Celtic session and band repertoire. 

In this workshop, I encourage you to climb on the Nordic bandwagon - a wonderful refreshing and inspiring landscape of music. The music has some unusual and even exotic flavors relative to Celtic and Irish Music; yet it is close enough to be accessible to both the player and listener. 

You will learn some lovely Nordic tunes that work well on the Celtic harp - from brooding “Bridal Marches,” joyful Polskas, and driving Marches!  Nordic music is beautiful, rich and evocative. I will briefly discuss what differentiates Nordic trad tunes- harmonically and rhythmically from their Celtic cousins. I teach the tunes both by ear and use sheet music (melody only). We cover as many tunes as the class can comfortably handle in the time allotted.

Lisa Lynne – Playing by Ear and Composing:  

We will learn how you can free yourself from the written page, and understand chord progressions and keys that will always work for improvisation. 

We will learn how to read and write a simple chord chart, transpose a tune on the spot, learn a song by ear, communicate with other musicians and take a solo in any key. 

We will learn one or two of my compositions as I share how each was created.

To learn more about Aryeh and Lisa go to TwoWorldsOne.com

Fanny Power 
(Click on the performance - lower right under Harp Demo)

Fanny Power was likely composed before 1728 by Turlough O'Carolan in praise of the daughter and heiress of David Power, County Galway. According to Lady Morgan, Carolan called her "the Swan of the Shore," because her father's residence was situated on the edge of Lough Riadh. Frances changed her name to Mrs. Trench on March 13th, 1732, on her marriage to Richard Trench, and was the mother of Lady Clancarty, surviving to the year 1793. The melody was published in 1745 and 1779 as "Mrs. Trench."

FANNY POWER

words: W.B. Yeats

music: Turlough O'Carolan

Verse I (music part A)

When all but dreaming was Fanny Power

A light came streaming from out her bower

A heavy thought at her door delayed

A heavy hand on the latch was layed

Verse II (music part A)

Now who dare venture at this dark hour

Unbid to enter my maiden bower

"Oh, Fanny, open the door to me

And your true lover you'll surely see"

Verse III (music part B)

"My own true lover so tall and brave

He lives in next isle o'er the angry wave"

"Your true love's body lies on the pier,

"His faithful spirit is with you here."

Verse IV (music part B)

"Oh, his look was cheerful and his voice was gay,

Your face is fearful and your speech is gray

And sad and tearful your eye of blue

Ah, but Patrick, Patrick, alas tis you"

Verse V (music part A)

The dawn was breaking, she heard below

The two cocks shaking their wings to crow

"Oh, hush you! hush you! both red and gray

Or will you hurry my love away?"

Verse VI (music part B)

"Oh, hush your crowin', both gray and red

Or he will be goin' to join the dead

And cease you calling his ghost to the mold

And I'll come crowning your wings with gold"

Verse VII (music part A)

When all but dreaming was Fanny Power

A light came streaming beneath her bower

And on the morrow when they awoke

They knew that sorrow, her heart had broke.

(play music part B)

Turlough O'Carolan was born in Ireland at Newtown in the County Meath, in the year 1670.  In his twenty-second year he became blind as a result of Scarlet Fever, and having displayed much proficiency on the harp, determined to pursue the avocation of harper. Accordingly, in 1693 we find him travelling "on a good horse, with a servant, well mounted also, to carry his harp and wait on him"--all provided for him through the generosity of Madame MacDermot, of Alderford House, County Roscommon.

  Drive the Cold Winter Away   is a song from England with a lot of verses.  Most of them were written before 1625.  During a cold winter night, folks would sit around a fire and keep busy by making up verses and singing them. The lyrics tell about the many different ways to get your mind off the cold winter days and nights.  

There is a great arrangement of this wonderful piece in The Harper's Accomplice: English Country Dances and Waltzes from the 17th and 18 Centuries - for all harps and recorders by Ellen Tepper.

It is neat to explain the history and recite a few of the humerous verses before playing!

Listen to the music! Click on the link under Harp Demo on right.

Drive The Cold Winter Away 

The First Part

1. All hail to the days that merit more praise
Than all the rest of the year,
And welcome the nights that double delights
As well for the poor as the peer!
Good fortune attend each merry man's friend,
That doth but the best that he may;
Forgetting old wrongs, with carols and songs,
To drive the cold winter away.

2. Let Misery pack, with a whip at his back,
To the deep Tantalian flood;
In Lethe profound let envy be drown'd,
That pines at another man's good;
Let Sorrow's expense be banded from hence,
All payments have greater delay,
We'll spend the long nights in cheerful delights
To drive the cold winter away.

3. 'Tis ill for a mind to anger inclined
To think of small injuries now;
If wrath be to seek do not lend her thy cheek
Nor let her inhabit thy brow.
Cross out of thy books malevolent looks,
Both beauty and youth's decay,
And wholly consort with mirth and with sport
To drive the cold winter away.

4. The court in all state now opens her gate
And gives a free welcome to most;
The city likewise, tho' somewhat precise,
Doth willingly part with her roast:
But yet by report from city and court
The country will e'er gain the day;
More liquor is spent and with better content
To drive the cold winter away.

5. Our good gentry there for costs do not spare,
The yeomanry fast not till Lent;1
The farmers and such think nothing too much,
If they keep but to pay for their rent.
The poorest of all now do merrily call,
When at a fit place they can stay,
For a song or a tale or a cup of good ale
To drive the cold winter away.

6. Thus none will allow of solitude now
But merrily greets the time,
To make it appear of all the whole year
That this is accounted the prime:
December is seen apparel's in green,
And January fresh as May
Comes dancing along with a cup and a song
To drive the cold winter away.

The Second Part

7. This time of the year is spent in good cheer,
And neighbours together do meet
To sit by the fire, with friendly desire,
Each other in love to greet;
Old grudges forgot are put in the pot,
All sorrows aside they lay;
The old and the young doth carol this song
To drive the cold winter away.

8. Sisley and Nanny, more jocund than any,
As blithe as the month of June,
Do carol and sing like birds of the spring,
No nightingale sweeter in tune;
To bring in content, when summer is spend,
In pleasant delight and play,
With mirth and good cheer to end the whole year,
And drive the cold winter away.

9. The shepherd, the swain do highly disdain
To waste out their time in care,
And Clim of the Clough hath plenty enough
If he but a penny can spare
To spend at the night, in joy and delight,
Now after his labour all day;
For better than lands is the help of his hands
To drive the cold winter away.

10. To mask and to mum kind neighbours will come
With wassails of nut-brown ale,
To drink and carouse to all in the house
As merry as bucks in the dale;
Where cake, bread, and cheese is brought for your fees
To make you the longer stay;
At the fire to warm 'twill do you no harm,
To drive the cold winter away.

11. When Christmas's tide come in like a bride
With holly and ivy clad,
Twelve days in the year much mirth and good cheer
In every household is had;
The country guise is then to devise
Some gambols of Christmas play,
Whereat the young men do best that they can
To drive the cold winter away.

12. When white-bearded frost hath threatened his worse,
And fallen from branch and briar,
Then time away calls from husbandry halls
And from the good countryman's fire,
Together to go, to plough and to sow
To get us both food and array,
And thus will content the time we have spend
To drive the cold winter away.

THE GREAT SILKIE

An earthly nourris sits and sings,
And aye she sings, "Ba lilly wean,
Little ken I my bairn's father,
Far less the land that he staps in."

Then ane arose at her bed fit,
And a grumly guest I'm sure was he,
Saying "Here am I, thy bairn's father,
Although I am not comely."

I am a man upon the land,
I am a silkie in the sea,
And when I'm far frae every strand,
My home it is in Sule Skerry."

“It was na weel”, the maiden cried,
“It was na weel, indeed” quo she,
“For the Great Silkie of Sule Skerrie,
To hae come and aught a bairn to me!”

Then he has taken a purse of gold,
And he has laid it on her knee,
Saying, "give to me, my little young son,
And take thee up thy nouriss fee.

It shall come to pass on a summer's day,
When the sun shines hot on every stone,
That I shall take my little young son,
And teach him for to swim the foam.

And thou shalt marry a proud gunner,
And a very proud gunner I'm sure he'll be,
And the very first shot that e're he shoots,
he'll kill both my young son and me."

An interpolated 5th stanza has also been heard:

'Twas weel eno' the night we met,
When I'd be oot and on my way,
Ye held me close, ye held me tight,
 "Just ane mair time ere the break o' day!"

The Great Selkie o' Suleskerry - or Grey Selkie of Suleskerry, as it is also known - is one of Orkney's best-known and most haunting ballads.

It was first written down in 1938 by one Dr Otto Andersson, who had heard the song sung on the island of Flotta.

It recounts the tale of a young Orcadian maiden who falls in love with an elusive selkie-man. She has a child by him but, shortly after, the selkie-man disappears, leaving her alone with her baby son.

Some years later the maiden comes across a grey seal by the shore. The seal says to her:

"I'm a man upon the land, I'm a selkie in the sea; and when I'm far frae every stand, my dwelling is in Suleskerry."

She realises the creature before her is none other than her selkie lover, but he once again vanishes beneath the waves, only to return again seven years later. After giving his son a golden chain, the boy leaves his mother and goes with father to the sea.

The woman marries and some time later, when her husband is out hunting, he shoots two seals - one old and grey, the other younger. Around the neck of the young seal was a gold chain, which the hunter takes home to give his wife.

Upon receiving the gift she realises her son is dead.

Some of the verses of the ballad are still remembered in the islands but the tune was very nearly lost. As with all folk ballads there are various versions.

Eleven harpers help Edward Bunting save music of Ireland. 

Who was Edward Bunting?

The  1792 Belfast festival honoring Ireland’s national heritage was organized to augment the celebrations surrounding the 3rd anniversary of the fall of the Bastille (July 14, 1789). The venue of the contest was in The Assembly Room, of the now unoccupied and until recently, Northern Bank building on Waring Street in Belfast (which was opened as a market house in 1769). The festival was held 11-14th July 1792.

Henry Joy, an uncle of Henry Joy McCracken, and Dr James McDonnell, invited harpers from across Ireland to come to Belfast and play their music. Edward Bunting, a young organist of 18, was appointed to note down the tunes.

The festival attracted ten Irish harpers and one Welshman. The harpers ranged in age from a venerable ninety-seven to a youthful fifteen.  Six of them – in true Irish tradition – were blind. Prizes of ten, eight and six guineas were awarded to Fanning, O'Neill and Rose Mooney respectively. Charles Fanning winner of the first prize played An Chuilfhionn, better known to us as the Coolin. This tune was composed by Thomas Connellan, an Irish Harper born in 1640 at Cloonmahon Co Sligo and died in Edinburgh around 1700.  (Carolan was born in 1670 and died in 1738.)

The names of the harpers are: 

James Duncan

Charles Byrne

Dan Black

_____ Williams

Paddy Quinn

Arthur O'Neill

Rose Mooney

Hugh Higgins

Denis Hemson

Charles Fanning 
William Carr

(More about these  harpers in future posts)  

From Wikipedia: 

Bunting was born in County Armagh, Ireland. At the age of seven he was sent to study music at Drogheda and at eleven he was apprenticed to William Ware, organist at St. Anne's church in Belfast and lived with the family of Henry Joy McCracken. At nineteen he was engaged to transcribe music from oral-tradition harpists at the Belfast Harp Festival in 1792. As Bunting was a classically trained musician, he did not understand the unique characteristics of Irish music, such as modes, and when transcribing tunes he 'corrected' them according to Classical music rules. One proof of this is that some tunes published by him were in keys that could not have been played by the harpists. His notes on the harpists, how they played and the terminology they used is however invaluable, and also many tunes would have been lost if he had not collected them. 

Bunting went on a number of collecting tours between 1792 and 1807, and was the first to transcribe music 'in the field' as played by the musicians. He realised the importance of the Irish words to the songs and Patrick Lynch was employed to collect these. Bunting, who lived in Belfast with the McCrackens until his marriage in 1819, moved to Dublin where he held the post of organist at St. George's Church. He died in Dublin on 21 December 1843 and is buried at the Cemetery of Mount Jerome, Dublin.