The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #122008   Message #2670824
Posted By: Phil Edwards
03-Jul-09 - 02:20 PM
Thread Name: Pronunciation of Gaelic/Norn in 'King Orfeo'
Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Gaelic/Norn in 'King Orfeo'
if anyone has access to a copy

I hear and obey!

The reference is to a brief article in JEFDSS 5(2), December 1947, called "Folk Music and Dance in Shetland" by Patrick Shuldham-Shaw. There's not a lot more information there, although it does (perhaps by accident) include two versions of the second chorus line - For yetter kangra norla and For gettar kangra norla.

The text given is:

Will ye come into our Ha'?
Scowan Earl Grey
Yes we'll come into your Ha'
For yetter kangra norla

And we'll come into your ha'
And we'll come in among ye a'

First they played the notes o noy
Then they played the notes o joy

Then they played the good old gabber reel
Which might a made a sick heart heal

Shuldham-Smith writes:

This is all of the ballad that Mr Stickle could remember. For complete versions of the text see The Oxford Book of Ballads and also the Shetland Times. The chorus-lines seem to be a corruption of "Scowan urla grun" (Early green is the wood) and "Whar giorten han grun oarlac" (Where the hart goes yearly)

He doesn't say what language it is, though.