JOHN O'DWYER OF THE GLEN [1] (Seán Ó Duibhir a' Ghleanna). AKA and see "Sean O Duibir an Gleanna." Irish, Slow Air (3/4 time). Ireland, County Kerry. D Major or A Mixolydian. Standard. AB (Stanford/Petrie): AAB (O'Neill). O'Neill states: "Versions (of the song) are almost as numerous as the singers of this fine old air," and he says it was very popular in Munster in a variety of forms and titles. According to Flood (1906), the song commemorates the Glen of Aherlow, which hid for a time the brave Anglo-Irish lord James, Earl of Desmond, after his defeat in September, 1600, at the hands of Captain Greame and the Irish. One version of the melody can be found in Bunting's Ancient Irish Airs of 1796 (a collection of 66 airs, mostly collected from performers at the Belfast Harp Festival of 1792). A translation of the lyrics goes:
***
After Aughrim's great disaster
When our foe, in sooth, was master
It was you who first plunged in and swam
The Shannon's boiling flood
And through Sliabh Bloom's dark passes
You led your Gallowglasses
Although the hungry Saxon wolves
Were howling for your blood.
And as we crossed Tipperary
We rived the Clan O Leary
And a creacht we drove before us
As our horseman onward came
With our spears and swords we gored them
As through flood and fire we bore them
Still Seán Ó Duibhir a Ghleanna
You were worsted in the game.
***
Long, long we kept the hillside
Our couch hard by the rillside
The sturdy knotted oaken boughs
Our curtain overhead.
The summer sun we laughed at
The winter snow we scoffed at
And trusted to our long bright swords
To win us daily bread.
Till the Dutchman's troops came round us
In steel and fire they bound us
They blazed the woods and mountains
Tills the very clouds were flame
Yet our sharpened swords cut through them
To their very hearts we hewed them
Still Seán Ó Duibhir a Ghleanna
You were worsted in the game.
***
Here's a health to yours and my king
The sovereign of our liking
And to Sarsfield, underneath whose flag
We'll cast once more a chance
For the morning dawn will wing us
Across the seas and bring us
To take a stand and wield a brand
Amongst the sons of France.
And as we part in sorrow
Still, Sea/n O/ Dibhir, a chara
Our prayer is "God Save Ireland"
And pour blessings on her name.
May her sons be true when needed
May they never fail, as we did
For Sea/n O/ Duibhir a Ghleanna
You were worsted in the game.
***
Sources for notated versions: "From an old Kerry MS" [Stanford/Petrie]; fiddler Michael G. Enright, a native of County Limerick [O'Neill]. O'Neill (1850), 1903/1979; No. 35, pg. 7. Stanford/Petrie (Complete Collection), 1905; No. 736, pg. 184.
SHAD(E)Y GROVE [1]. Old-Time; Breakdown and Song Tune. USA, North Carolina. A Minor. Standard. AA. There are towns called Shady Grove in Virginia or Kentucky, though the title may refer to a place.
***
Shady Grove, my little love, Shady Grove I know
Shady Grove, my little love, bound for the Shady Grove.
***
Cheeks as red as the blooming rose, eyes the deepest brown,
You are the darling of my heart, stay til the sun goes down.
***
Shady Grove, my little love, Shady Grove my darlin/
Shady Grove, my little love, I'm going away to Harlan.
***
Went to see my Shady Grove, she was standing in the door,
Shoes and stockings in her hand, little bare feet on the floor.
***
From Jean Ritchie's Singing Family of the Cumberlands (1955) (condensed):
***
Dad remembered for us the first day he ever heard the fiddle played. He was about nine years old and going to school to old man Nick Gerhart... when Maggard Ritchie came in.
"He'd been off somewheres, courtin in Virginny, and he'd brought a feller home... and they had come to the schoolhouse to visit with Nick. Nick told us not to look up while they talked... But you know that stranger had a fiddle in his hand, and pretty soon he propped it in the cradle of his arm and begun to play that thing. Lordie! It was the prettiest sweepingest music. ... I just couldn't stand to sit still on that log bench and that tune snaking around so.
No sir, that was one tune that didn't stay in one place no time at all. ... I thought I was going plum crazy. You could hear feet a-stomping all over the house, benches a-creaking, young uns a-giggling...
"Finally I let out a yell and lept off'n that bench and commenced to dance and clog around.... some of the other boys jumped up too.... .... after a while they left, and the teacher tried to settle us, back to our books, but I couldn't even see the print. I kept seeing that old fiddle bow race around on "Shady Grove." We around there had always sung that tune middling fast, hopped around to it a little bit, but that fiddle had tuck out with that'n like the Devil was after her. ... I kept laughing and wiggling in my seat, and saying the words to "Shady Grove" instead of my lesson.
Cheeks as red as a bloomin rose,
Eyes of the deepest brown,
You are the darlin of my heart,
Stay till the Sun goes down.
Shady Grove, my little love,
Shady Grove I know,
Shady Grove, my little love,
Bound for the Shady Grove.
(more verses).
***
These verses have also been heard:
***
Shady Grove, my little love, Shady Grove my darling
Shady Grove, my little love, I'm going back to Harlan
(or)
Shady Grove, my little love, Shady Grove I know
Shady Grove, my little love, I'm bound for Shady Grove
***
When I was a little boy, I wanted a Barlow knife
Now I want little Shady Grove to say she'll be my wife
***
Cut a banjo from a gourd, string it up with twine
The only song that I can play is "Wish that gal was mine"
***
Apples in the summer time, peaches in the fall
If I can't have the girl I love, I don't want none at all
***
I've got a big fine horse, and corn to feed him on
All I need's little Shady Grove to feed him when I'm gone
***
Johnson (The Kitchen Musician: Occasional Collection of Old-Timey Fiddle Tunes for Hammer Dulcimer, Fiddle, etc.), No. 2, 1982/1988; pg. 4. Rounder 0113, Trapezoid - "Three Forks of Cheat" (1979. Learned from Kilby Snow). Tradition TLP 1007, Mrs. Edd Presnell - "Instrumental Music of the Southern Appalachians" (1956).
T:Shady Grove
S:Jean Ritchie's 'Singing Family of the Cumberlands'
Q:45
L:1/4
M:2/4
N:"Very lively"
K:Em
E/E/ E/E/4E/4|F/E/ D|E/E/4E/4 F/A/|\
B3/2 B/|d3/4d/4 B/B/|A/(F/4E/4)D|\
E/F/4F/4 A/F/|E2||E/E/E|\
F/E/4E/4D|E3/4E/4 F/A/|B2|d3/4d/4B|\
A/F/4E/4D|E/F/4F/4 A/F/|E2|]
SNOWBIRD ON THE ASHBANK [1]. AKA and see "Snowbird," "Georgia Snowbird." Old-Time, Breakdown. USA: West Virginia, Virginia, western North Carolina, Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona. G Major/Mixolydian. Standard. AABB (Brody, Phillips). Arizona fiddler Kenner C. Kartchner said: "A jumping bow in the second change is popular as it emulates a misguided snowbird flitting in an ash bank, thinking it's snow" (Shumway). The title appears in a list of traditional Ozark Mountain fiddle tunes compiled by musicologist/folklorist Vance Randolph, published in 1954. It was listed as one of the standard tunes in a square dance fiddler's repertoire by A.B. Moore in his History of Alabama, 1934 (Cauthen, 1990). In the repertoire of fiddler Osey Helton, western North Carolina. There are several tunes with the title "Snowbird" or "Snowbird on the Ashbank;" the Oscar Wright/Fuzzy Mountain version is similar to "Paddy on the Turnpike." Sources for notated verisons: Fuzzy Mountain String Band (Durham, N.C.) [Brody]; John Hartford [Phillips]. Brody (Fiddler's Fakebook), 1983; pg. 261. Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes), 1994; pg. 225. Arhoolie 5018, Uncle John Patterson (Ga.). Rounder 0035, Fuzzy Mountain String Band- "Summer Oaks and Porch" (1973. Learned from Oscar Wright, Princeton, W.Va.). Rounder 0089, Oscar and Eugene Wright- "Old-Time Fiddle and Guitar Music from West Virginia" (learned from "One-Eyed Jim Bell, from over in Virginia, over on John's Creek.").