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Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green

05 Mar 05 - 10:51 AM (#1427329)
Subject: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: Brakn

Does anyone know if there is a recording of this poem put to music. Read about it here.


07 Mar 05 - 05:34 PM (#1429202)
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: Brakn

refresh


07 Mar 05 - 05:58 PM (#1429222)
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: MartinRyan

Brakn

As of about three years ago, there was nothing of that name in the Irish Traditional Music Archive - which has most recordings.

Regards


17 Apr 05 - 07:46 AM (#1463424)
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: Brakn

fresh


22 Jul 05 - 12:23 PM (#1525406)
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: Brakn

Found it. Same as the Green Fields Around Ferbane. Johnny McEvoy recorded it.


23 Jul 05 - 07:16 AM (#1526124)
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: MartinRyan

Ha! Funnilly enough, I knew of the Ferbane song - but had forgotten the Lusmagh reference. Good corncrake country!

Regards


10 Mar 07 - 03:51 PM (#1992848)
Subject: green field round ferbane
From: GUEST,Kwiff

Hi js seen ye say sumthing bout green field round ferbane.does ne one know where i can get the lyrics?


10 Mar 07 - 06:41 PM (#1992993)
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: Brakn

You'll find them here if you scroll down the page.


08 Jan 22 - 01:01 PM (#4131556)
Subject: Lyr add: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: Felipa

THE LUSMAGH FIELDS SO GREEN by Edward Dolan (1908)

In London town I do lie down upon my bed to sleep.
When I think of home and how I must roam across the waters deep,
I can't sleep a wink when 'ere I think of home and my cailin,
Ah will I ever more see you astor, or the Lusmagh fields so green.

In my youthful sport I did resort to dear old Foolagh lane,
And it runs in my head the old car shed, I will never see again.
For a long while I'll be an exile until God's will has been
For me to roam back to my home in the Lusmagh fields so green.

In Cruchan Street where I used to meet with the lads so bright and gay,
Where we did conspire to our hearts' desire and always got our way,
Twas through the village I used to pillage while I was that age sixteen,
How I did delight to roam at night through the Lusmagh fields so green.

Where I used to lie when I was a boy just at the Deerpark stile
In Cruchan Wood where I oft times stood with the lads to talk awhile.
Going to 'the sports' I passed Clufan fort where the ghost used to be seen,
But I don't believe that a ghost could live in those Lusmagh fields so green.

In a few days more I'll leave the shore of this great British town
And I'll take my leave with a farewell wave as the Thames I do sail down.
Through Biscay bay I'll sail away and I'll view many a scene,
But I'll see none there that can compare with the Lusmagh fields so green.

Through Gibraltar Strait and Mediterranean great, the Suez and the Red Sea,
Going through Port Said and Arabia's Head, shure it's all like a dream to me,
When I'm far apart, it will break my heart to see all those miles between,
The Deerpark Hill and the ruins of the mill and the Lusmagh fields so green.

On Fremantle's earth not far from Perth I do expect to land,
Where the tiger-snake, it often takes a life on the desert sand,
If it be my lot on that foreign spot, to lie and never be seen
But when I die may my soul fly, to the Lusmagh fields so green.

source http://www.mcnichollfamilytree.co.uk/paulmcn/myweb/lusmagh.htm

"This poem was written by Edward Dolan (my grandfather's brother) in 1908 and he posted it home while en route to Australia, via Liverpool and London, with the instructions that his cousin Stephen Coughlan should write music for it, which he did. It has become the Lusmagh Parish anthem.

                Edward Dolan left for Australia with his uncle Dan (who had come home from Melbourne) after a farewell party. Edward and Dan Dolan are pictured on the Dolan family photograph in the 'Photo Album' which was taken outside the family home in Lusmagh, Co.Offaly, prior to them leaving for Australia."


08 Jan 22 - 01:10 PM (#4131557)
Subject: Lyr add: The Green Fields of Ferbane
From: Felipa

THE GREEN FIELDS OF FERBANE John Doyle (Roud 17891)

(sung by Big John Maguire, Recorded by Keith Summers and Willie Clerkin in the Ulster Bar, Belturbet, Co Cavan, 3.8.80)

I curse the day that I sailed away
From my dear little Isle so green.
On a foreign strand where I now stand
And a deep sea rolls between.
My thoughts they fly to when I was a boy,
E'er my worldly cares began,
My vision shows where the Brosna flows
Round the green fields of Ferbane.

Now my heart does sink when I stop and think
Of the times that are no more.
When I used to stray from my way from school
Round the green fields of Kilmore.
My only quest was a wild bird's nest,
And that oak tree lordly stands.
I spent those hours in the leafy bowers
Round the green fields of Ferbane.

Now that good old town with its roofs of brown,
I spent many's the happy night.
When I rambled away with my comrades gay
'Til the morning dawned full bright.
Those lads I see, with their smiles of glee,
As the years they backward span;
There are three or four I'll see no more
Round the green fields of Ferbane.

Now the lust for gold it soon grows cold,
When the heart gets sad within.
Old memories prey, sure, I rue the day
It's errant that I've been.
I'll turn my face from this awful place
As quickly as I can,
And I'll sail for home never more to roam
From the green fields of Ferbane.

http://www.mustrad.org.uk/articles/hardyson.htm
"This song's orignal title is The Green Fields Round Ferbane and it's a song from Co Offaly, hence the River Brosna reference, written by one John Doyle.

"Joanie McDermott of ITMA supplied us with a copy of a monograph written by Brendan Ryan, principal teacher at Ferbane National School, concerning John Mary Doyle (1896-1969) who composed The Green Fields Around Ferbane:

   'This poem was probably written in the 1940s. The content and metre are identical to an earlier poem, Lusmagh's Fields So Green. The Lusmagh poem was written in 1926[?or 1908?] by Edward Dolan and deals with a specific emigrant to Australia. We don't know of any factual background to John's work. It is probable that it was the Lusmagh poem that prompted John to pen the now more-famous poem. The air, based on an older melody, was put to it by John himself.'"


08 Jan 22 - 01:35 PM (#4131559)
Subject: RE: Tune Req: Lusmagh's Fields So Green
From: Felipa

Johnny McAvoy singing Lusmagh's Fields So Green
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEf-4sopmEk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=303xuW4TDyo
same recording (I think) with lyrics on screen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwMQt7iD310

sung, in much the same style, by Noel Cassidy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9kpLHiN9vI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ssxgyp3PXkc Mary Beth Carty (I prefer her simpler accompaniament; she doesn't sound so "country and Irish".

Mary Beth's notes:
My auntie Caroline Carty of Glasgow, Scotland, told me about this song when she came to visit. The song mentions her grandmother. So I endeavoured to learn it! More details :

“The words were written by Edward Dolan from Lusmagh in 1908 when he was en route to Australia. He posted it to his cousin from London. The tune is an old Irish melody. Lusmagh is a small parish of farmland in Co. Offaly. With the large families, many of the younger sons left for Australia or America. The girlfriend or coleen he was leaving behind was my grandmother Rose Anne Kelly, he was meant to send for her, but he was never heard of again by anyone, not her, not family, and it remained a mystery. My grandmother must have waited a while, marrying in 1917 Michael Sullivan, my grandfather, and my mum was born in 1918, the first of 9 children.

A few years ago when my mum’s youngest brother was still alive we visited him on the farm. We were in the “singing pub” in Banagher talking to locals, had the song sung for us and then were introduced to a descendant and he had fresh news for us. One of the Dolan family was out in Australia doing family research and found a gravestone inscribed with Edward Dolan, an Irishman, who died in 1908 or so, very soon after he arrived. I hope as it said in his words that his soul did fly to the Lusmagh fields of green.”

======================
Dermot O'Brien singing "Green Fields Round Ferbane" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqfvnScVM1w

P.J. Murrihy singing "Green Fields Round Ferbane"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TggS2Z88sv4

John Loughrey https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx5-4nDq220

I searched the ITMA site but didn't find a more traditional recording of the popular "Green Fields Round/of Ferbane". I don't know if John Maguire's singing can be heard anywhere online.