Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes

Subject: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From:
Date: 04 Jan 99 - 04:28 PM

Yes, there is a version of the Broom of Cowden Knowes in the DT, but I'm interested in learning another version of this song (or another song with this title). I heard it on a Silly Wizard CD, and can get some of the words, but not all, so I'd appreciate help in checking want I have transcribed and filling in the blanks. Thanks very much!!!

How blythe was I each morn ta see
My lass come o'er yon hill
She ? the barn and run to me
I met her ??????

Chorus: Ah the broom, the bonny bonny broom
The broom of Cowden Knowes
Fain would I be in my ain country
Herdin my faithers yowes

Hard fate that I should banished be
Gan ????? and morn
Because I woo'd the fairest lass
That ever was born

Fareweell ye Cowdens Knowes, fareweell
Farewell all pleasures there
To wander by her side again
‘S all I crave or care

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Susan of DT
Date: 04 Jan 99 - 07:55 PM

It sure sounds like the version in the DT. There are two and the one that doesn't say ballad version seems to be just what you are asking for.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Bruce O.
Date: 04 Jan 99 - 08:17 PM

The one that doesn't say ballad version in DT is missing half of the verses [in Tea Table Miscellany, I; Orpheus Caledonius, 1725 and II, 1733; Scots Musical Museum,(# 69); and elsewhere]

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Bruce O.
Date: 04 Jan 99 - 09:42 PM

Sorry, that should have been Orpheus Caledonius, I (p. 18), 1733.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE BROOM OF COWDENKNOWS
From: Bruce O.
Date: 04 Jan 99 - 10:14 PM

THE BROOM OF COWDENKNOWS

How blithe each morn was I to see,
The Swain come o'er the hill!
He skipped the burn, and flew to me:
I met him with good will.
         O the broom, the bonny broom
         The broom of Cowdenknows
        I wish I were at hame again,
         To milk my daddy's ews.

I neither wanted ew nor lamb
While his flock near me lay;
He gathered in my sheep at E'en,
And chear'd me a' the day.

He tun'd his pipe and reed sae sweet,
The birds stood list'ning by:
E'en the dull cattle stood and gaz'd,
Charm'd with his melody.

While thus we spent our time by turns,
Betwixt our flocks and play:
I envy'd not the fairest dame,
Tho' ne'er so rich and gay.

Hard fate that I shou'd banished be,
Gang heavily and mourn,
Because I lov'd the kindest swain,
That ever yet was born.

He did oblige me every hour,
Cou'd I but faithfu' be;
He staw my heart: cou'd I refuse,
Whate'er he ask'd of me?

My doggie, and my crooked stick,
May now lie useless by,
My plaidy, broach and little kitt,
That held my wee soup whey.

Adieu, ye Cowdenknows, adieu;
Farewell a' pleasures there;
Ye gods restore to me my swain,
Is a' I crave or care.

Text from Orpheus Caledonius, I, p. 18, 1733

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Susan-Marie
Date: 05 Jan 99 - 08:30 AM

Thanks so much Bruce, and Susan. I didn't find the second version when I searched the DT on "cowden" and "knowes", but I'll go back and try again just to see why I didn't find it the first time.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Bruce O.
Date: 05 Jan 99 - 11:13 AM

Search for file COWDENKN or 'Broom of'

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From:
Date: 05 Jan 99 - 09:00 PM

Archie Fisher does a nice version of this.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE BROOM O THE COWDENKNOWES
From:
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 06:07 AM

I have a beautiful version of it from The Cast, Mairi Campbell and Dave Francis of Scotland. They are a husband and wife team, who sing some marvelous songs. I met them and bought The Colours of Lichen at the Celtic Colours festival in 1997. Anyway, their version of Broom of the Cowden Knowes seems very close to the original posters:

How blithe was I each morn to see
My lass come o'er the hill
She skipped the burn and ran to me
I met her wi' good will

Chorus O the broom! the bonny, bonny broom
       The broom o the Cowdenknowes
       Fain would I be in my ain country
      Herdin' my faither's yowes

We neither wanted yowe nor lamb
While the flock near us lay
She gaithered in the sheep ae nicht
Cheered me a' the day

Hard fate that I should banished be
Gang wearily and mourn
Because I lo'ed the fairest lass
That ever yet was born

Adieu, ye Cowdenknowes, adieu
Fairweel a' pleasures there
To wander by her side again
Is a' I hope or care

 

Hope that is the one you want. The Gaelic song, Buain na Rainich/Tha Mi Tinn fits the same tune wonderfully.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Susan-Marie
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 08:11 AM

Thanks George, and I'll make a note about a song called Buain na Rainich/Tha Mi Tinn fitting the same tune in case I ever get proficient singing in Gaelic.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: John M
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 08:13 AM

The Black Fanily also does it, much like The Cast version but with a few different lyric's. I understand this is a very old tune. Anyone know it's history?

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Bruce O.
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 04:11 PM

The English broadside ballad of the "The lovely Northern Lasse" (Broom of Cowdenknows) was entered in the Stationers' Register in January of 1632. (ZN2610 in the Broadside Ballad Index on my website.) Its tune was used for several other broadside ballads. The tune is in the 'Dancing Master' from the first edition, 1651 to the 14th, 1709. (Tune B045 on my website). [See C. M. Simpson, 'The British Broadside Ballad and Its Music', #45, 1966, for more particulars.]

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From:
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 07:06 PM

According to the notes in the Cast's recording:

This song and tune were already old when, in the early 1700s, Allan Ramsay included it in The Gentle Shepherd and guaranteed its popularity. A few years after its appearance there, it became a fad among trained fiddlers to try and add second sections on to old traditional tunes. Thre's a story that the celebrated Italian composer Geminiani, then living in Dublin, had a go and gave it up in frustration after blotting several quires of paper.

 

The song Buain na Rainich is also known to be ancient. However, the chorus anmd the first verse are the only ones remembered along with the tunes. Broom o' the Cowden Knowes is one of three tunes which can be used with it. I have 6 verses, and it is confirmed that Kenneth MacLeod wrote them, probably at the end of the last century, or the beginning of the 20th. For the lyrics

Buain Na Rainich

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From:
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 07:08 PM

Actually, that was "It was confirmed that Kenneth MacLeod wrote the last FIVE of the six verses I have."

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: dulcimer
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 08:20 PM

According to F. Richie on Thistle and Shamrock the tune was written by the favorite suitor (lover) of Mary of Scots. I couldn't confirm it, but if true it would put in sometime in the middle of the 1500's.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Mary Ann
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 08:24 PM

John Allan Cameron (Canadian) has recorded this too; words pretty much as above.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Mary Ann
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 08:24 PM

John Allan Cameron (Canadian) has recorded this too; words pretty much as above.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Susan-Marie
Date: 07 Jan 99 - 08:51 AM

Can anyone provide a translation (even just roughly) of Buain na Rainich?

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Wolfgang Hell
Date: 07 Jan 99 - 10:49 AM

there's a place with Silly Wizard lyrics .

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Bruce O.
Date: 07 Jan 99 - 12:04 PM

The Scots song I gave above from 'Orpheus Caledonius' is in Allan Ramsay's 'Tea Table Miscellany', 1723/4 labeled 'new words by different hands'. It is not among the 21 songs in his 'The Gentle Shepherd', nor was the tune used for any of the songs there.

The claim that the tune was by a lover of Mary Queen of Scots is probably a corrupt resurrection of David Rizzio, her secretary and an Italian musician, as composer of several old Scots tunes. (These attributions were in Oswald's 'Caledonian Pocket Companion'.) In no instance are any of these attributions now credited.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From:
Date: 07 Jan 99 - 10:21 PM

Bruce, if you want to contact Dave Francis about the information on "Gentle Shepherd" in his notes from the Colours of Lichen, his e-mail address is [e-mail].

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Bruce O.
Date: 08 Jan 99 - 12:36 AM

The Gentle Shepherd

The opening lines of songs, and the tunes to which they were sung, in Allan Ramsay's 'The Gentle Shepherd', from reprint by A. Millar, London, 1763.

[My previous count was one too low. In the text there is an unnumbered song between #15 and #16.]

1: My Peggy is a young thing; Tune- The Wawking of the Faulds
2: Dear Roger if your Jenny geck; Tune- Fy gar rub her o'er with Strae
3: The dorty will repent; Tune- Polwart on the Green
4: O dear Peggy, Love's beguiling; Tune- O dear mother, what shall I do
5: How should I be sad when I a husband have; Tune- How can I be sad on my wedding day
6: I yield, dear lassie, ye hae won; Tune- Nansy's to the greenwood gane
7: Caul be the Rebels Cast; Tune- Cald Kale in Aberdeen
8: The Laird who in Riches and Honour; Tune- Muckin of Geordy's Byer
9: Peggy, now the King's come; Tune- Carle, an the King come
10: Winter was cauld, and my Clothing was thin; Tune- When first my dear Laddie gade to the Green-Hill [Yellow-haired Laddie]
11: By the delicious Warmness of thy Mouth; Tune- To its own tune [Ramsay had published it in his poems, 1721, as a song "Patie and Pegie". Tune is in A. Stuart's 'Music for Allan Ramsay's Collection of Scots Songs'(Tea Table Miscellany), c 1726; Oswald's 'Caledonian Pocket Companion', bk. 6; and song(s) and tune are in 'Scots Musical Museum'. #253, 254.]
12: Hid from himself, now by the Dawn; Tune- The Happy Clown
13: Were I assur'd you'll constant prove; Tune- Leith-Wind
14: Well, I agree, ye're sure of me; Tune- O'er Bogie
15: Now from Rusticity, and Love; Tune- What ye wha I met yestreen
XX: Unnumbered; Ye're welcomer to tak me, than to lat me be; Tune- Jocky said to Jenny, Jenny wilt thou do't?
16: Duty and Part of Reason; Tune- [An the] Kirk wad let me be [Blithsome Bridal/ Silly Old Man]
17: Speak on, speak thus and still my Grief; Tune- Wae's my heart that we should sunder
18: When hope was quite sank in Despair; Tune- Tweed-Side
19: At setting Day and rising Morn; Tune- Bush aboon Traquair
20: The bonny grey-ey'd morn begins to peep; Tune- Bonny gray- ey'd Morn
21: My Patie is a Lover gay; Tune- Corn Riggs are bonny

Early sources of all the tunes above can be found listed in the Scots tune index on my website. www.erols.com/olsonw

Theophilus Ciber changed the order around a bit and substituted other tunes for several songs in his ballad opera version, 'Patie and Peggy: or, The Fair Foundling', 1730. [Source PPG in the ballad opera tune index on my website.]

Subject: Lyr Add: GENTLE SHEPHERD (?)
From:
Date: 08 Jan 99 - 04:24 AM

Here's the chorus and the three verses that I think are popular:

Chorus I am tired, and I am alone,
       Cutting the Bracken, Cutting the bracken
       I am tired, and I am alone,
       Cutting the Bracken forever

1 Behind the knoll, up on the knoll,
  Behind the pretty knoll
  Behind the knoll, up on the knoll,
  All the day alone

4 In the weather, oh that I am TIRED
  Often my heart, wounded by her
  When the others would be singing ditties
 I can only make a croon

6 What must I not be chanting
  What will I make a chant
  And I so far from other people
  I would be able to come to my meeting

The legend is that, the fairy who sings the song, was in love with the young girl whom he met when she came out to cut the bracken. When her family caught her, they kept her locked up in their home. Since she didn't come any more, he became despondent and sang the song. It works quite well as a lullaby, and the sentiment of the song goes that way. However, in Cape Breton at least, they've sped it up, so it's almost a dance piece. So goes the oral tradition. Anyway, the song was collected by Marjorie Kennedy-Fraser, but for some reason, only the chorus and first verse. Her Gaelic collaborator, Kenneth MacLeod, wrote the rest of the song that we have here.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From: Susan-Marie
Date: 08 Jan 99 - 08:00 AM

Thanks very much, George.

Subject: RE: Need Help w/ Cowden Knowes
From:
Date: 08 Jan 99 - 10:05 PM

No problem. I decided to add that to the web-page and did the other three verses too. I changed that of verse 6 a bit too. Still not happy with it. Have a look at the end of the page:

Buain Na Rainich