Bright Harvest Day

'Tis well I remember the blue skies of Galway
When white clouds were wreathing o’er bonny Loughrea
The soft winds were sighing the brown leaves were sweeping
The corn was waving yellow, that bright harvest day.
But all the beauty that was around me
Could not compare with her, so gay
‘Twas light was the reaping with Mary beside me
The love in her glances, that bright harvest day.

Her brown hair caressing her brow like the primrose,
The smile on her red lips was like the sun’s ray
Her voice was the music of songbirds in springtime
And my heart she did win there, that bright harvest day.
I’ve been enchanted with joys and pleasures
I’ve been enraptured with splendour so gay
But I will remember when all things have faded
My flower of the kind heart, that bright harvest day.


This is a song I was taught along with many traditional unaccompanied songs by Mary McAndrew in Liverpool in the 1970s.
I assumed in was in the traditional repertoire, but since singing it again recently I find nobody knows it and the only trace of it on the internet is the following version sung as a 'parlour ballad' by a tenor: Bright Harvest Day sung by Michael Nash (tenor)

If anyone knows or can find out any more about this song I'd be interested.