Hi Q, I don't know but that we may be just circling the same subject from opposite directions. Valentine Vousden claims to have written both the lyrics and the melody for "The Irish Jaunting Car". While I have seen references to the tune as "an old Irish folk melody", etc., those are all 20th and 21st century writers (to whom the 1854 composed melody may be fairly characterized as an "old Hibernian melody.") But at the time Macarthy employed it, in 1861, I believe the evidence available indicates it was a fairly newly composed tune (within the previous decade) by Vousden. Not to open a whole new thread, but the tune was also employed by Septimus Winner for his comic late war song, "He's Gone to The Arms of Abraham" and it turns up for the late 19th (or perhaps early 20th century sea song,) "The Harp Without A Crown." Does anyone know any others? Fag an Bealac (Gallant Sons of Erin)
|