I found an excellent article on the history of the song "Silence or Tears" (as it is most commonly titled) in Bluegrass Today. The short version is that back in the 1950s two young bluegrass players came up with it: Tom Gray wrote a tune and Jerry Stuart adapted Byron's poem to fit it.

It's been played by dozens of bluegrass groups at a pace ranging from brisk to blistering, most famously the Country Gentlemen. The Sangsters slowed it down a lot! Martin Wyndham-Read uses the same tune but altered it somewhat and omitted the refrain.