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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 12 Jan 10 - 07:25 PM How do you identify what tune someone is using in a story, Philip Bennett? I suppose you could write down the notes, but not too many readers are going to be able to make too much of that. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Penny S. Date: 13 Jan 10 - 04:56 AM I assume you write the words the character sings down, possibly describing the lilt of the tune, and readers notice that it fits Bunessan. But of course, it could be something different. I suppose Philip really needs to know if that sort of tune was around at his date. Unless he is quoting the Gaelic words, in which case a date is important. Penny |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 13 Jan 10 - 05:34 PM Well, The Deer's Cry/St Patrick's Breastplate is supposed to date back at least to the eighth century. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Alan Day Date: 13 Jan 10 - 06:25 PM Lovely version of this on Utube by Henfield Will (Will Fly on this site) Al |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,B.J.K. Date: 27 Feb 10 - 09:11 AM I was under the impression that 'Morning has Broken' were the words of an Alcoholic having woken up in a prison cell, sober (in the morning) for the first time in years. He felt the joy of experiencing a clear head and the sounds of Dawn and was thankful. Re the Music, I wouldn't have a clue. Anyone else share this opinion?? |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Bernard Date: 27 Feb 10 - 05:25 PM What's this? Billy J. Kramer making a comeback?! (GUEST,B.J.K.)! |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Leadfingers Date: 27 Feb 10 - 06:41 PM GUEST,B.J.K. How do you get an Alcoholic in a Police cell in a childrens story book ? Try Reading the thread before you prattle nonsense . |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Jack Campin Date: 27 Feb 10 - 07:16 PM A quick google suggests that B.J.K. didn't make that up. The song HAS been given some sort of association with recovery from alcoholism by some Christians (none of whom seem tohave heard of Farjeon). I think I'll start a counter-rumour that The Old Rugged Cross was really a jingle for Tennent's Lager and alludes to their logo. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,BLTN Date: 10 Apr 10 - 05:49 PM Phillip Bennett: I recently came across Farjeon's lyrics in a novel written at least a decade ago about the early 18th century. In the novel, the song was attributed to an even earlier time. The fact that the lyrics date to only 1931 (or thereabout) was irrelevant to me; the book was fiction. The important thing was the beauty of the moment that was captured and the feeling it conveyed to me, the reader. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,Neil MacCormick Date: 15 Jan 12 - 10:50 PM For another story about the source of "Bunessan" see my Youtube page, http://www.youtube.com/user/ruanich |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Jack Campin Date: 16 Jan 12 - 05:26 AM Neil - that was interesting. Do you know Joan Faithfull (author of the monograph about the granite quarries of Iona and the Ross of Mull), and if so does she know about your great-grandfather? |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST Date: 31 Jan 12 - 10:55 PM Jack, I have not met Joan Faithfull but have a copy of the booklet in which she mentions my great grandfather. I understand she has a cottage at Tormore where my grandfather was born in 1872. I had hoped to visit Iona (where other descendants still live) and environs last November but my senior muscles would not permit the trip. Perhaps this year. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Jack Campin Date: 01 Feb 12 - 07:06 AM Joan lives in Dalkeith, near Edinburgh - she's almost completely blind now and couldn't cope at the Tormore cottage any more. I'll see her on Friday (for the funeral of her brother, the composer Robert Crawford) and I'll mention you to her. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Jack Campin Date: 02 Feb 12 - 06:15 AM Okay, here is what Joan says about MacCormick in her book The Ross of Mull Granite Quarries, 2nd ed, New Iona Press, 2004: Neil MacCormick succeeded William Muir as Tormore quarry manager in 1875 and moved into Fionnphort House with his wife Annabella MacLachlan and their large family, of eventually eleven. Neil had been born in Iona in 1836 and shortly afterwards the family moved across to the Ross of Mull. He worked in the quarries from an early age, acquiring great knowledge and technical skill. It is said that his invention of a brake, applied by a lever, to the steep rail which took trucks from the upper Tormore quarry down to the quay became widely known. A memorable event in his life was a visit to Egypt to advise in a dispute about transport methods, which had arisen between the Government there and a firm of London sculptors who had leased a large porphyry quarry. I have frequently stayed in the quarrymen's cottages at Tormore (which Joan grew up in and still owns). That is probably where MacCormick grew up - Fionnphort House, where he would have written the tune, doesn't exist any more. This ties a few things together. A missing link might have been Marjorie Kennedy-Fraser - she stayed for a while in the cottage at Tormore just below the one I've stayed in. Joan's father William Caldwell Crawford leased and then bought the cottages just after MacCormick died; he was a painter so may well have been told about the place by Kennedy-Fraser's batty painter friend John Duncan (I'll ask Joan about that). Kennedy-Fraser would have known Neil MacCormick. MacCormick would also have been happy to see his tune used for the Temperance movement, so maybe the connection goes back a long way. But he would not have been best pleased to see the Catholics getting hold of it. I think I can dig out a lot more about this. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,Neil MacCormick Date: 06 Feb 12 - 11:00 PM Jack, thank you for the fascinating information. Somewhere along my way through the Net, I came across suggestions that the tune, named by MacBean as Bunessan, was to be found in Captain Simon Fraser's Collection. But the source melody was not identified. I will try and retrace my research to find a precise reference. I will also seek family help in obtaining the evidence presented to the Church of Scotland. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,Neil MacCormick Date: 22 Jun 12 - 11:54 PM Jack, have been indisposed for a wee while. (And at my age, assume I will continue in some version of that mode!). But did not want to leave our discussion of Bunessan stranded in the Bull Hole. I have yet to see the papers presented to The Church of Scotland claiming attribution of Bunessan to my great grandfather. But I recently came across a copy of a paragraph in The Oban Times of some years ago, observing the death of my father's cousin, Annabel MacCormick. Mention is made of her grandfather, Neil MacCormick (of Tormore), having 'notated' the melody for "Child in the Manger." You are the musicologist and will have an expert understanding of the transition to notation of music from the oral tradition. Neil Tormore was born in 1836. Mary MacDonald died in 1872. Lachlan MacBean first published his Songs and Hymns of the Scottish Highlands in 1888. (The editions of the latter I saw online do not name the melody as Bunessan which MacBean is said to have done.) I have yet to recover the link to Captain Simon Fraser's Collection. Ah well. Perhaps I can now let Bunessan rest - for a while! All the best. Neil |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,Neil MacCormick Date: 12 Aug 13 - 09:47 AM Jack, greetings once more. Briefly stirring Bunessan out of its sleep. Am on your side of the Atlantic for a few months. Following earlier comment, found a copy of Simon Fraser book http://imslp.org/wiki/The_Airs_and_Melodies_peculiar_to_the_Highlands_of_Scotland_and_the_Isles_%28Fraser,_Simon%29 Fast run through looking only at 3/4 time pieces revealed nothing resembling Bunessan melody. So Bunessan, go back to sleep! Who has time in our over-informed age to read yet more crap, but have blog out at http://musicmusicandwords.wordpress.com/ All the best. Neil |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST Date: 12 Aug 13 - 10:10 AM too many researchers claim tunes are celtic or pagan incantations, even the meaningless "Fol de Rol" type chorus. There's just no way we can tell without uncovering a stoneage record collection. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,ollaimh Date: 12 Aug 13 - 10:42 AM it is safe to assume that jack campin doesn't read any gaelic or gaidhlig. there are in fact a number of religious songs in both dialects from what gaels call ancient times. they use the word as the French use ancient, as in l'ancien regime. I suspect campin doesn't read French either so for the benefit of the monolingual (and mono syllabic) these old religious songs are found in several sources. the most famous is the seventh century "wexford carol" which has medieval irish words and music. there are many others where the words and tune have separated but a few with both. ancient regime means before the revolution, so in the gaelteacht that would be before the ascendancy of the English military and churches. in English translation these religious songs are often called hymns, sometimes carols. they have separate gaelic designations which few here would understand. I get tired of how the English here on mudcat are experts in everything they don't understand. so is morning has broken older than 1888 when collected. I think the tune is much older, but i'll have to do some research on it. there are several good on line sources on old gaelic tunes for those with the energy to look around. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: Rumncoke Date: 12 Aug 13 - 12:04 PM There is a blackbird which sings at the very first crack of dawn at the back of our house. To be awake just before the day and happen to hear the bird start to sing - breathtakingly beautiful. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 12 Aug 13 - 07:27 PM Whatever's the case with the tune, Eleanor Farjeon wrote the words and they were first printed in 1931, when she was about 50. Wrote a lot other stuff that's pretty good as well, verse and prose Here's a page to links to some of her verse. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: kendall Date: 13 Aug 13 - 04:35 PM One of my favorite songs. |
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Subject: RE: Origin: Morning Has Broken From: GUEST,Neil MacCormick Guest Date: 18 Aug 13 - 07:53 AM Sorry - further note. For better or worse I have just uploaded my Bunessan Fantasy to my blog. http://musicmusicandwords.wordpress.com/ For the many who don't care for dissonance, skip the middle bits. It was originally on YouTube a few years back. But I withdrew from that system on grounds of "principle." |
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