Origins: Follow Me Up to Carlow

Subject: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,kilshannig
Date: 14 Oct 02 - 07:22 PM

Getting kind of confused of all the names and places. I know by now there were "good" guys and " bad" guys. Anybody knows some more background on this song?

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: michaelr
Date: 14 Oct 02 - 07:50 PM

I found this in the liner notes to a recording of the song:

"This song commemorates the victory of Fiach McHugh O'Byrne over the forces of the Crown as led by Lord Grey de Wilton in a battle which took place at Glen Malure, Co. Wicklow in the years 1580."

It's come up in quite a few threads before (put the title into the Lyrics and Knowledge Search box at top right) but no lyrics seem to have been posted. Has anyone got them?

Also in a previous thread, someone asserted that this is a recent song. If so, who wrote it?

Cheers,
Michael

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Oct 02 - 08:10 PM

Recent in terms of Irish history, and a long time after the events decribed. It was written in the 19th century by Patrick Joseph McCall, who also wrote other songs such as Kelly, the Boy from Killane.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: michaelr
Date: 14 Oct 02 - 08:26 PM

McGrath, could you post the text, please?

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Oct 02 - 08:31 PM

This site has the lyrics, and some interesting background information

But we've got the lyrics in the Digital Tradition on this site already, here.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: michaelr
Date: 14 Oct 02 - 08:46 PM

Silly me, didn't see the lyrics for the threads...

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 14 Oct 02 - 08:46 PM

As McGrath says, the lyric (I don't know how accurate) in the DT, but the midi file is corrupt and won't play. The tune is the first two parts of Sweets of May; a 6/8 set dance, not a march as sometimes stated, and was posted in this previous thread: TUNE ADD: Follow Me Up To Carlow. So far as I know, the song has never been found in tradition, but was rescued from oblivion by Christy Moore in the 1960s.

Does anybody know if the text was originally set to Sweets of May when it was written (presumably at the turn of the 19th/20th centuries)? Quite a lot of websites out there optimistically state things like melody dates from pre-1500's; but that's normal ignorance; there seems to be no available evidence that it's much older than the lyric.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Jon Bartlett
Date: 15 Oct 02 - 01:03 AM

McGrath, could you kindly give me a source for the authorship of "Kelly". The words of that song are superb, compared to these dreadful (unsingable, unpoetic, fake medieval) ones! I suppose it's quite possible that one author is responsible for both, but... The tune is a good one, though.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: MartinRyan
Date: 15 Oct 02 - 03:44 AM

McCall also wrote "Boolavogue".

Regards

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: MartinRyan
Date: 15 Oct 02 - 03:48 AM

Jon

I agree "Follow Me..." uses a very different language to McCall's other well-known songs, alright - but he did write it!

Patrick Galvin's book "Irish SOngs of Resistance" says of "Follow..":
It is said that this air was first performed by the pipers of Feach McHugh as he m arched to attack Carlow after his victory over Lord Deputy Grey at Glenmalure (1580)

I would take that with large amounts of salt.

Regards

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Ard Mhacha
Date: 15 Oct 02 - 05:23 AM

The midi-file played ok for me, and the words are the same as Christy Moores on the Planxty LP. And Christy`s version is much much better. Ard Mhaca

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Martin Ryan
Date: 15 Oct 02 - 05:33 AM

Any Dublin Soccer fans may like to guess who featured in a parody based on this called Follow me up to Tolka!

Regards

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 15 Oct 02 - 05:48 AM

Round here it tends to get heard as (and even sung as) "Follow me down to Harlow".

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: MudWeasel
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 02:07 AM

From what I've heard (no idea at all how accurate this is), MacHugh led a pitifully small band of Irish against a superior English force, saw what he had gotten himself into, and turned tail. Or so the English thought.It was all a clever ruse on the part of the Irish. The English gave chase up into the hills, through a narrow mountain pass where MacHugh had the rest of his force waiting to ambush and wipe them out.

Again, I'm a guitarist, not a historian. I don't vouch for the accuracy of this story.

-MudWeasel

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 08:23 AM

I've been told that this song was set to an already existing air known as Follow me DOWN.. or CARRY me DOWN... and that traditional musicians tend to use DOWN. Johnny O'Leary had it as Follow me down to Carlow.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 09:06 AM

I've always heard it as "down". It sings easier too, with the more open vowel.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Brakn
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 09:10 AM

I was playing near Doncaster earlier this year and a woman asked me to sing "Follow Me UP To Carlow" which I did. She told me, to my surprise, that she was Patrick Joseph McCall's great granddaughter.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Big Mick
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 10:56 AM

We do a fairly hard driving version of this, using "The Swallowtail" between the verses, at the lead break and (with a key change) to end the song. It is on our new CD. I have always loved the song.

It is true that O'Byrne suckered the troops into pursuing him up that draw. It is also true that the troops were very inexperienced, having been pressed into service quickly and rushed to Ireland due to the rising. Someone verify, but I believe I read somewhere that they were Hessian mercenary troops

Mick

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: IanC
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 11:25 AM

Mick

This appears to be fairly accurate.

:-)

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: IanC
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 11:32 AM

Just to highlight the appropriate section:

Sir Francis Cosby and Captain Green with their hired Gaelic troops from Connacht formed the advance's spearhead. They were followed by the Berwick regiment under Colonel George Moore. Officers such as Sir Peter Carew, Captain Audley, Captain Furres, Captain Bernard Fitzwilliam and Audley's lieutenant were among the vanguard. Sir Henry Bagenal and Sir William Stanley protected the rearguard with their companies of shot.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Big Mick
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 11:49 AM

Yes, Ian, and thank you for that link. I must be mixing memories of other incidents. But you leave a few things out. The document says in several places that the troops were very inexperienced, as was Grey, but that they had some veteran Captains whose experience left them very uneasy about entering the horseshoe valley. It goes on to say that the "hired" Irish troops deserted the English troop and joined with the rebels as soon as the first shots were fired.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: IanC
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 12:03 PM

Mick

Quite right, but I didn't want to quote the whole lot ... put the link in for that.

;-)

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Big Tim
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 12:16 PM

McCall (1861-1919) also wrote "Grainnu Mhaol" (Grace O'Malley), 6 verses and chorus, air 'Mo Theaglach', "Sailing in the Lowlands Low" (not the trad. folk song of same name), 6 verses, traditional air, "Ballad of Redmond O'Hanlon", "Henry Joy McCracken" ('Twas on the Belfast Mountains)- the latter according to John Moulden recently on Mudcat, tho no source quoted.

Anyone know of any other songs by him?

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Big Mick
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 12:37 PM

Tim, do you know of any good recordings of "Grainnu Mhaol". I have been struggling with a good arrangement on this one and would love to hear others versions.

All the best,

the other Big Fella

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 12:57 PM

If you're reading, kilshannig, I imagine you get the picture now. Ask the right question, and it's a case of "light the blue touch paper and stand back".

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Kilshannig
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 01:17 PM

I'm reading, McGrath of Harlow. the good thing is I know more about the song. The bad thing is ... more dates, more names, more places...will it ever stop? Anyway, you all made me more curious. The Swallowtail?Grainnu Mhaol?'Mo Theaglach'? Follow me DOWN ...?
And the key question: How much can a Dutch guy like myself handle so much international information about an Irish song?
Mudcatters...thanx!

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Big Tim
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 03:22 PM

Can't help you Mick, I don't actually know the song, I just have the words as in "Irish Ballads and Songs of the Sea" by James N. Healy, Mercier Press, 1967. A biog of GOM "Granuaile: the Life and Times of Grace O'Malley c.1530-1603" by Anne Chambers was published by Wolfhound Press (+Irish American Book Company), 1998. It gives the words of 9 poems and songs on GOM tho not McCall's.

I did John Moulden a disservice on my previous post: he named the "Henry Joy McCracken" source as the "Shan Van Vocht" magazine, tho he didn't know the issue number. The mag only ran from Jan 1896 to Apr 1899, so shouldn't be too hard to find. If John doesn't come back, I'll try to remember to check it in the Linen Hall Library next time I'm in Belfaast!

All the best to you too,BT.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Oct 02 - 03:31 PM

The tune of "Follow me up/down to Carlow" is Donald Dow's "Bonnie Annie", c 1775.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 17 Oct 02 - 02:08 AM

That's interesting! Was that a jig rhythm and is the notation on-line?the .

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 17 Oct 02 - 01:34 PM

Dow wrote Bonnie Annie as a reel. Notation quoted from The Athole Collection (1884) can be seen at The Fiddler's Companion. It's recognisably ancestral to the tune used for Carlow, but the latter has undergone considerable modification over the years.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: belfast
Date: 21 Oct 02 - 09:56 AM

Malcolm Douglas suggests that the song was rescued from oblivion by Christy Moore. This is not my memory. I had heard the song long before I ever heard of Christy. And some of us even knew the Dominic Behan song using the same air, "Barry's Column".

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 21 Oct 02 - 10:20 AM

My impression was formed from Christy's own comments, but I guess I should know better than to take him too literally. I'd still put the song's spread outside Ireland over the last thirty years down to him in large, though.

Back to the tune, for a moment; does anyone know if McCall specified it, and under what name he referred to it?

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: belfast
Date: 21 Oct 02 - 10:56 AM

I wouldn't for a minute that Christy was too big a claim for himself. I assume that he hadn't heard it sung anywhere and came across it some book or other. (Is it, for example, in Paddy Galvin's Irish Songs of Resistance?) And I've no doubt that Christy's singing of the song popularised it immensely. There's many a song that nobody in Ireland would ever have heard of had it not been for Christy Moore.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Big Tim
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 11:01 AM

Who was MacCahir Oge?

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,mick
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 11:37 AM

McCall published a collection of traditional music with somebody called Darley . It was reprinted sometime in the 1980s. One of the tunes in it was Follow me Down to Carlow .

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Big Tim
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 01:21 PM

As far as I can trace, the song was first published in McCall's "Songs of Erinn", first ed in 1899, originally titled "Marching Song of Fiach MacHugh". I've tracked down everyone named in the song except MacCahir Oge!

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Little Robyn
Date: 04 Mar 04 - 01:52 PM

Didn't McCall also write the words for My Lagan Love - also known as Love is Lord of all???
We learnt Carlow from the Johnsons, back in the 60s. Maybe they learnt it from Christy?
Robyn

Subject: Lyr Add: FOLLOW ME UP TO CARLOW
From:
Date: 09 Apr 04 - 11:50 PM

"FOLLOW ME UP TO CARLOW "

Lift MacCahir ogue your face
Brooding o'er the old disgrace
That black FitzWilliam stormed your place,
Drove you to the Fern!
Grey said victory was sure
Soon the Firebrand he'd secure;
Until he met at Glenmalure
Feagh MacHugh O'Byrne.

Chorus:
Curse and swear Lord Kildare!
Feagh will do what Feagh will dare
Now FitzWilliam, have a care
Fallen is your star, low
Up with halbert out with sword!
On we'll go for by the Lord!
Feagh MacHugh has given the word,
Follow me up to Carlow!

See the swords of Glen Imayle,
Flashing o'er the English Pale
See all the children of the Gael,
Beneath O'Byrne's banners
Rooster of the fighting stock,
Would you let a Saxon cock
Crow out upon an Irish rock,
Fly up and teach him manners.

Chorus:
Curse and swear Lord Kildare!
Feagh will do what Feagh will dare
Now FitzWilliam, have a care
Fallen is your star, low
Up with halbert out with sword!
On we'll go for by the Lord!
Feagh MacHugh has given the word,
Follow me up to Carlow!

From Tassagart to Clonmore,
There flows a stream of Saxon gore
Och, great is Rory Oge O'More,
At sending the loons to Hades.
White is sick and Lane is fled,
Now for black FitzWilliam's head
We'll send it over, dripping red,
To Queen Liza and the ladies.

Chorus:
Curse and swear Lord Kildare!
Feagh will do what Feagh will dare
Now FitzWilliam, have a care
Fallen is your star, low
Up with halbert out with sword!
On we'll go for by the Lord!
Feagh MacHugh has given the word,
Follow me up to Carlow!

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: MartinRyan
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 07:50 AM

"Lagan Love" was by Joseph Campbell?

Regards

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: artbrooks
Date: 11 May 05 - 12:40 PM

How is Feigh/Fiach/Feach pronounced?

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Allen
Date: 11 May 05 - 01:53 PM

Christy at least says it Feekh (or a hard ch, like in loch).

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: MartinRyan
Date: 11 May 05 - 02:40 PM

Two quick syllables: fee-uck

Regards

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: Reiver 2
Date: 11 May 05 - 03:49 PM

That's a question I was going to ask. I've seen the various spellings and have heard several pronounciations. I'd like to know which are the correct ones. With the Reivers, we sang this song, but never publicly as we weren't sure of the pronounciation. As I recall we learned the song from a Planxty recording.

I've figured out the identities of most of the people and places, but "ma cahir Og" or "McCahir Og" still eludes me. Nor have I definitely located "the Fern" or "Ferns" (I've heard it both ways). Any info. on these would be appreciated.

As to whether it was originally Up to Carlow or Down to Carlow, the recordings I've got each list it as "Up." However, "Down to Carlow" seems more appropriate. Feach's main territory and the battle site of Glen Malure were in the mountains, if I'm not mistaken, while Carlow is on the Barrow River, so it would seem logical that O'Byrne would have been exhorting his men to follow him DOWN to Carlow.

Great Song! I'm glad for the information about the author -- the 7' tall Kelly from Killane also makes a great song.

Reiver 2

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Allen
Date: 11 May 05 - 04:37 PM

Thanks for the correction. He says it so fast you'd swear was Feekh.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: mandoleer
Date: 11 May 05 - 04:58 PM

On a total irrelevancy, my late mother acquired a totally black cat (even eyes and whiskers black) and named him FitzWilliam because of this song. She was rather more into heavy metal music, but she did like Planxty.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Allen
Date: 12 May 05 - 03:30 AM

Judging by old photos of the band, Donal certainly looked as if he were in a metal band.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Tír Chonaill
Date: 12 May 05 - 06:53 AM

Info on the Byrne Clan There is a relationship mentioned to the McCahir's

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST
Date: 12 May 05 - 07:00 AM

From the above link...

Later, in 1543, the senior O'Byrne leaders petitioned the government to shire their territory. St Ledger, three years later, praised the effectiveness of the sheriff of O'Byrnes' Country. A force under Dowlyn McCahir Roe O'Byrne and another Callogh McBran served in Scotland during Henry VIII's 1544-1545 Scottish campaign. Callogh McBran was captain of the Irish kerne. This force quickly earned a reputation among the Scots for ferocity. For his services Callogh McBran was rewarded with the sum of £13 6s 8d in September 1545, before his repatriation. Their service in Scotland had much to do with Earl James's leadership of the Irish contingent. Further signs of their goodwill towards the government were evinced in 1546. Dowlyn O'Byrne appeared among a list of lords considered fit to serve Henry VIII in a fresh Scottish campaign. This period, through government campaigns and treaties, saw a decline in the power of Gaelic overlords, which facilitated the rise of the traditionally weaker septs in east Leinster.

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,Tír Chonaill
Date: 12 May 05 - 07:03 AM

'Black' Fitzwilliam

Subject: RE: Origins: Follow me up to Carlow
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 12 May 05 - 08:59 AM

The MIDI file in the DigiTrad doesn't play. When I tried to save it and listen to it in Noteworthy, I got an ominous message saying "There is a serious problem in the something-or-other. It is recommended that you save your work ASAP."

Can somebody fix this?

I want to see if this tune is the same as the "Follow me Down to Carlow" that I sang in high school.