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Songs for the homesick

05 Sep 00 - 12:14 PM (#291447)
Subject: Songs for the homesick
From: rabbitrunning

The thread on American Patriotic songs over here has named a lot of the songs that Americans might enjoy hearing when they're abroad, but now I'm all curious. For those of you from other places, what songs remind you, or your compatriots, of home?

For Americans, what songs remind you of your home city or state?

I'll start off with "Colorado Born" a bit of cheese that we learned in school in Denver in the late 60's, but that still flits through the back of the old braincells every so often when Boston is getting to me.

COLORADO BORN
I'm Colorado born
And Colorado bread
and when I die I'll be
Colorado dead!

So it's Rah Rah Colorado!
Rah Rah Colorado
Rah Rah that dear old state of mine!

Oh, I've travelled east
and I've travelled west
but Colorado is
Still the best!

chorus

CD

05 Sep 00 - 03:48 PM (#291539)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Amergin

Here is one about my home town....I Wish I Was Back Home

05 Sep 00 - 08:47 PM (#291751)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Liz the Squeak

Linden Lea, by William Barnes. It should be in the digitrad, but I've posted it in dialect here before. His statue stands outside the church I spent my happiest years singing in, and he lived not 5 miles from my home. One of the true gentlemen, and a Son of Dorset.

LTS

05 Sep 00 - 10:39 PM (#291818)
Subject: Lyr Add: DAWN ON THE HILLS OF IRELAND
From: Jimmy C

There are many Irish songs that remind me of my home but this recitation written by John Locke really tugs the heart strings no matter what province you may come from.

"DAWN ON THE HILLS OF IRELAND"

TH'Anam and Dia! but there it is
The dawn on the hills of Ireland,
God's angels lifting the nights black veil
From the sweet smiling face of my sireland
O, Ireland, isn't it grand you look,
like a bride in her rich adorning
And with all of the pent up love in my heart
I give you, the Top o' the mornin"

This one brief hour pays lavishly back
For many a year of mourning
I'd almost venture another flight
There's so much joy returning
Watching out for the hallowed shore
All other attractions scorning
O, Ireland - can't you hear me shout
I bid you the Top o' the Mornin

Ho - Ho - Upon Cliodhna's shelving strand
The surges are grandly beating
And Kerry is pushing her headlands out
To give us the kindly greeting
In to the shore the sea birds fly
On pinions that know no drooping
And out from the cliffs, with welcomes charged
A million of waves come trooping

Oh, kindly generous Irish land
So real and fair and loving!
No wonder the wandering Celt should think
And dream of you in his roving
The alien home may have gems and gold
Dark shadows may never have gleamed it
But the heart will sigh for the absent land
Where the love-light first illumed it

And dosen't old Cobh look grand out there
Watching the wild waves motion
Leaning her back up against the hills
and the tips of her toes in the ocean
I wonder I don't hear Shandon's bells -
Ah maybe their chimings over
For it's many a year since I began

For thirty summers Asthore Machree
The hills I now feast my eyes on
Were never seen, save when they rose
On memory's dim horizon
Even so, it was grand and fair they seemed
In a vision spread before me
But dreams are dreams
And my eyes would ope
To see Texas's skies still o'er me

And often upon the Texan plains
When the day and the chase were over
My thoughts would fly o'er the watery wave
And around the coastline hover
And a prayer would rise that some future day
All danger and doubting scorning
I might help to win for my native land
The light of Young Liberty's morning

Now fuller and clearer the coast line shows
Was ever a scene so splendid
I feel the breath of the Munster breeze
Thank God, that my exile has ended
Old scenes, old songs, old friends again,
The vale and the cot I was born in
O Ireland! up from my heart of hearts
I bid you " The Top o' the Mornin"

05 Sep 00 - 10:40 PM (#291820)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Mbo

"Home", as sung by Joe Diffie & Sean Keane.

05 Sep 00 - 10:44 PM (#291822)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Jimmy C

Sorry - I missed this last line of verse # 5

"The life of a western rover"

05 Sep 00 - 11:09 PM (#291842)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: rabbitrunning

Ah, Jimmy, that one's enough to make _me_ homesick for Ireland and I've never been there!

06 Sep 00 - 01:25 AM (#291907)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Jimmy C

Now you know how it affects me ?.

Glad you enjoyed it.

06 Sep 00 - 06:00 AM (#291968)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: sian, west wales

Coming from southern Ontario, I go glassy-eyed over songs about the Great Lakes. I remember that I was stopped dead in my tracks the first time I heard Stan Rogers' White Squall. OK, I know it's tragic, but it really captures the temper of the Lakes, and the vessels that sail on them, and the people.

In Wales, there's a special word for that homesicky longing feeling - hiraeth. One of those words that never translates completely into English. Maybe other languages have something similar. There's a well-known folk song about it ...

Dwedwch, fawrion o wybodaeth
O ba beth y gwnaethpwyd hiraeth
A pha ddefnydd a roed ynddo
Na ddarfyddo wrth ei wisgo?

Derfydd aur a derfydd arian,
Derfydd melfed, derfydd sidan
Derfydd pob dilledyn helaeth
Eto, er hyn, ni dderfydd hiraeth.

Hiraeth mawr a hiraeth creulon,
Hiraeth sydd yn torri 'nghalon.
Pan fwyf dryma'r nos yn cysgu
Fe ddaw hiraeth ac fe'm deffry.

Hiraeth, hiraeth, cilia, cilia
Paid a+ phywso mor drwm arna',
Nesa dipyn at yr erchwyn,
Gad i mi gael cysgu gronyn.

Very roughly translated: (oh... using 'perish' in the sense of disintegration)

Tell, o great ones of knowledge, what is hiraeth made of, and what materials are used so that it doesn't perish with its wearing?

Gold perishes, silver perishes, velvet perishes, silk perishes; all garments perish and yet hiraeth does not.

Great hiraeth, cruel hiraeth, hiraeth which breaks my heart. When I am in my deepest sleep, hiraeth will come and awaken me.

Hiraeth, hiraeth, leave me, leave me. Do not weight so heavily on me. Go off to my bedside and allow me sleep. ******

Oh, lord. That's so Welsh (Celt?). Shoot me now.

Falling on the floor,
grovelling in the depths of exile
give up hope, all ye who enter here

sian

06 Sep 00 - 06:25 AM (#291976)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: The Shambles

Stoneground

I see that limestone, look, in your eye
I know you can't help it but still you try
Is it a place you're seeking or a state of mind?
I can take you there, but what would you find

Roaring, pummelling thoughts aside
It plunges deeper, deeper than a knife
Uplifting, in forlorn moments
It ignores the natural forces of life

Stoneground…Where I want to be...On Stoneground
My roots down… Surrounded by the sea…On Stoneground
I'm home!……….I'm home!

Its twisted ways, torturous to the mind
Chosen paths, must be ignored
Like a jealous child, it holds the heart
Return to the nest, in innocence

Debilitating needs, thunder on
Ceaselessly pushing towards it's goal
Taken along, there is no rest
Oh! Let me be where I belong

Stoneground…Where I want to be...On Stoneground
My roots down…Surrounded by the sea…On Stoneground
I'm home!……….I'm home!

Katrina Gall and Roger Gall. (Started in 1986 and finished after returning home to Portland Dorset in)1996.

06 Sep 00 - 07:36 AM (#291991)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: JulieF

Just the tune Dark Island will get me all sentimentally Scottish as will a Bagpipe lament played very well, preferably outside.

Julie

06 Sep 00 - 12:10 PM (#292117)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Mbo

What about "O Tha Mise Fro Gruaman" by Mary Jane Lamond? It's a song about a homesick Scot living in Cape Breton Island. There's also "Dean Cadalan Samhach", written by a homesick Scot living in North Carolina (incidentally, about 45 minutes away from my parent's house.)

--M

06 Sep 00 - 01:48 PM (#292216)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Benjamin

Way Back Home sung by Jr. Walker and the Allstars.
All though that's about the south and I live in the Northwest!

06 Sep 00 - 01:52 PM (#292219)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: SINSULL

Simon and Garfunkel's "The Boxer". Makes we want to fill up my home with strays. No one should be that unhappy.

06 Sep 00 - 04:27 PM (#292341)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: MMario

Old Cape Cod - which oddly enough I usually only hear just before I take my annual vacation "home" to the cape...

06 Sep 00 - 06:04 PM (#292415)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)

Rolling Home to Dear New England
The Rolling Hills of the Border
...my husband gets dewy-eyed over the parody, "Da Rollin' Mills of New Joisey"

06 Sep 00 - 11:28 PM (#292578)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: bseed(charleskratz)

How about songs about homesickness--Bob Gibson's "Abilene," Bobby Bare's "Detroit City," Kristofferson's "Just the Other Side of Nowhere," and Curley Putnam's(?) "Green, Green Grass of Home," homesickness especially aggrivated by impending execution.

--seed

06 Sep 00 - 11:49 PM (#292593)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Thomas the Rhymer

When I was a little boy I heard my dad sing "The Innocent Hare" a lot! It still sends me back to our family farm in in the foothills.

The song that I love to remeniss with now-a-days is "Piney Wood Hills" by Buffy St. Marie. It is just my cup-o-tea!

07 Sep 00 - 12:01 AM (#292599)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Margaret V

In a strange way, James McMurtry's song "I'm Not From Here (I Just Live Here)" is about homesickness. It captures the feeling of deracination and the loss of sense of place that characterizes so much of modern life, and manages to do so while still being humorous. Margaret

07 Sep 00 - 12:43 AM (#292611)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Hedy West (inactive)

  • "Hobo's Lullabye",
  • "I'm Goin' Back to Georgia",
  • "Blue Ridge Mtn. Blues",
  • "500 Miles"
  • "Reuben's Train"
  • "Some of These Days, & It Won't Be Long",
  • "I Have a Father in My Native Land",
  • "Deserter's Song",
  • "Waiting for the Train",
  • "Seven Long Years",
  • "Bonnie Blue Eyes",
  • "In the Pines",
  • "My Home's across the Smokey Mountains"...
No telling how long a list would go... Hedy

07 Sep 00 - 02:47 PM (#292965)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Dorrie

Cheesy but true-Our town-iris dement/kate rusby has actually made me cry but then again hasn't everything made me cry dorrie xxx

07 Sep 00 - 03:38 PM (#292995)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: Mbo

Oh Dorrie, it's not cheesy at all! It's really a beautiful song. There's been many a time I had to let a tear go when listening to it. Now for really cheesy (at least to you folks, no doubt) is Glen Campbell's "Country Boy". When we moved from North Carolina to California in '86, I used to be so homesick for NC...that song always made me so sad (I was only 7 after all.) Funny how time changes you... now I wish I was in California and not NC.

--M

07 Sep 00 - 08:56 PM (#293205)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: GUEST,Guest: D.W.

There is the home sickness that begins the moment one turns away from a long loved home. Listen to Eric Bogle's "Leaving Home" expecially Jeanie Redpath's rendition of it. I have listened to it over and over these last two weeks and every time I hear it the tears fall and my throat tightens. How does one learn to sing a song that won't lete you sing for the weeping?

07 Sep 00 - 10:46 PM (#293249)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: rabbitrunning

Mbo, I know what you mean about missing a second home when you're back where you thought you always wanted to be. When I visit Denver now, I find myself thinking of Boston. But "Charlie on the MTA" doesn't make me homesick. I'll have to think about what song means "Boston" to me.

There are songs I can't sing without crying if I'm alone, but I can sing in front of an audience. "Mama, Hey Mama" from the play 1776 is one.

07 Sep 00 - 10:56 PM (#293254)
Subject: RE: Songs for the homesick
From: catspaw49

There is something about Iris DeMent's "Our Town" its true. They useed it as the final song on the last episode of "Northern Exposure" and it tied that sries up very nicely......an excellent final episode.

I like Si Kahn's "Blue Ridge Mountain Refugees"...It tells a sad but true tale of many mountain people forced to the cities to survive. Really hits me.

Spaw