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The
Kerry Dance
(1878)
Composer:
James L. Molloy (1837-1909)
Arr:
Merv Rowley (2007)
The writer of this song was an Irish barrister
(lawyer) who spent most of his life in London and never
really adopted the legal profession as a career. While
some credit Molloy as author of both the words and music
for Kerry Dance, others have indicated that the
music was borrowed from an earlier Irish tune. More
recent information suggests that most of the melody is
from The Cuckoo, a tune written in 1790 by
Margaret Casson and first published in England. Molloy
modified portions to produce what is considered a
typical Irish fiddle tune. His lyrics are original,
making the composition both happy and nostalgic to the
listener.
♫♫♫
Included in this dulcimer arrangement are two
verses of lyrics, with a repeated chorus. There is
actually a third set of lyrics, sung and played at a
different, slower tempo and in a different key. These
are intended to serve as an added bit of nostalgia,
where the narrator explains that the days (and old
acquaintances) are now things of the distant past, to be
sadly and fondly remembered:
Time
goes on and the happy years are dead,
And
one by one, the merry hearts are fled.
Silent
now is the wild and lonely glen,
Where
the bright glad laugh will echo ne’er again.
Only
dreaming of days gone by, in my heart I hear
Loving
voices of old companions
Stealing
out of the past once more,
And
the sound of the dear old music
Soft
and sweet in the days of yore:
When
the boys began to gather
In
the glen of a summer night
And
the Kerry Piper’s tuning
Made
us long with wild delight.
Then
follows a repeat of the music on page two of the PDF
file. Few,
if any arrangements of this music include these lyrics,
although they convey a depth of feeling of the composer
that he wished to convey. It should be mentioned that
the name Kerry Dance is not an invention of
Molloy. Its origin can be traced back to at least 1549
to a form of Celtic dance in Ireland called the
“Rincce Fada” (reenka
faudha), meaning “long dance”. A modern successor to
this dance form, in America, is the Virginia Reel!
Also of interest to readers may be the references to the
“ring of the piper’s tune”. The reference here is
not to the traditional Scottish bagpipes, but to the
characteristic Uilleann (il’in) pipes of
Ireland. The Historical Links below provide references
to these topics for any who may be interested.
♫♫
*Painting
at the top:
"Children
Dancing at the Crossroads"
by
Trevor Fowler (19th Century)
from
The National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin
Download files
Kerry
Dance.PDF
Kerry
Dance.TEF
Kerry
Dance.MID
Historical
Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Lynam_Molloy
http://homepages.apci.net/~drdeyne/dances/vareel.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uilleann_Pipes
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