Night visiting song - modern?

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 09:45 PM

Well, I have to say that cold sheets can be a turnoff, but that's another story.



Did we ever identify the song in the first message of this thread?

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Artful Codger
Date: 30 Jun 07 - 08:42 PM

Why were the bed sheets warmed? Maybe he wasn't her first visitor that night. ;-}

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 07:59 PM

Why were the bed sheets warmed in the summer time?

Well, in a song from the British Isles, it's hardly surprising. It can be pretty chilly this time of year - for example, tonight.

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: harpmolly
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 02:49 AM

LOL! You're way ahead of me as usual, Declan. ;)

What a great song. Although I sang it for a friend of mine once, thinking she'd find it quite romantic, and at the end she rolled her eyes and said, "Yeah, 'he saddled up and away did ride'...Typical!" ;)

I really enjoy John McCusker's melody. It's actually the first melody I taught myself to play on the mountain dulcimer.

Cheers,

Molly

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Jim Lad
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 02:48 AM

Why were the bed sheets warmed in the summer time?
Just a question.

I'm going

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 02:37 AM

Thanks, Declan - now I know why it all sounded so familiar. The song posted above is certainly a different song, but they follow a very similar pattern.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Declan
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 02:19 AM

Joe,

The words Kate sings are pretty much the ones posted in this message. You may recognise the poster!

Kate sings it to a different air from the usual one, composed by John McCusker.

"The night visiting song" is well known in Ireland, mainly through a version sung by Luke Kelly. There are probably other Irish versions collected from the tradition.

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 01:40 AM

Molly, what's the title of the Kate Rusby song? Can you post the lyrics?
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: harpmolly
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 11:19 PM

Ooooohh, I love it! A little different from the version I've heard sung by Kate Rusby and Solas...I'd love to see/hear the melody.

M

Subject: RE: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 03:39 PM

refresh

Subject: Night visiting song - modern?
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 08:25 AM

On one of my old folk club recordings from 1968 is the start of a night visiting song which I don't recognise from anywhere else. I indexed it as "Modern night-visiting song", which it quite possibly is, though if so it's deliberately written using an older style of language.

Listening to it today I thought it might be a good one to revive, depending how the story runs, but then found to my disappointment that I had stopped recording after a few verses, so I don't know how it ends, though the mournful tune suggests probably a sad ending.

So – is anyone familiar with a song that starts thus:

My good companions, fare thee well,
Tonight the wine glass is not for me
For I must go to my true love's house
To spend one hour in her sweet company

And as the moon rose in the sky
It found him at his true love's door
"One night, one night with you sweet girl
Then I'll return to my dear native shore".

She's taken his hand and she's let him in
And to her bedroom they went straightway,
Where the bed was warmed and the sheets turned down.
And soon locked in her arms her true love lay.

And all through that short summer's night
Fast in her arms he lay entwined.
And he felt her kisses upon his lips
. . . . .
?

I don't know how to use ABC notation but can provide a PDF of the dots if necessary.