Track 3: The Flower Of Magherally (3:54)

Lyrics:

One pleasant summer’s morning when the flowers were all blooming
Nature was adorning and the wee birds sweetly tuning
I met my love near Banbridge Town, my charming blue-eyed Sally
She is the queen of the County Down, the flower of Magherally

With admiration I did gaze all on that fair-haired maiden
And Adam ne’er so much was pleased when he first saw Eve in Eden
Her skin was like some lily fair that grows in yonder valley
I am blest when I am nigh the flower of Magherally

Her golden hair in ringlets fell, her boots were Spanish leather
Her bonnet with two ribbons on, her scarlet cap and feather
Like Venus bright she did appear, my darling blue-eyed Sally
She is the one that I love dear, the flower of Magherally

I know the day will surely come when we’ll join hands together
And I’ll bring home my darling girl in spite of wind and weather
Oh let them all say what they will, oh let them rail and rally
I will wed the girl I love, the flower of Magherally

Colleen writes:

The legacy of song collection is one of my favorite parts of traditional music. As a song gets passed from teacher to student, from brother to sister, from recording to listener, a bit of each singer gets transferred with the notes and the lyrics. I am lucky to have lived in a number of places where there have been traditional singers, and Portland is no exception.

At a gathering at a friend’s house just over a year ago, I was lucky to be able to hear the wonderful Nancy Conescu sing her version of The Flower of Magherally and was captivated. It is one of two times I have heard her sing the song and it made such a distinct impression on me that I went home that night and began to cobble together a version of it for myself. She and I have very different interpretations, but I’ll always be grateful to have been in the room on that particular night to collect this song from her.

I love the lyrics of this song, I love the imagery, and I love the hopeful determination therein. I love the twist in the melody that catches the ear in the last line of each verse, and I love the space that Colm’s deft accompaniment allows the song as it develops over the four verses.

Colm writes:

Some of the tracks on Cuan are songs and arrangements we’ve been playing forever. But the recording of this song is a recording of perhaps only the third time we had ever played the song together, and the first time we had ever used this arrangement. We were definitely both enthusiastic about adding this song but when we first made a list of songs, with a notepad and pencil at the Cricket Cafe in Portland, this somehow wasn’t on the list, and hadn’t featured in our shows.

But we had ran through an arrangement once at my apartment, and we liked it. When it came to the day of the recording it didn’t seem quite right for the record. It was a bit too strained, and there was a bit too much going on. So in some downtime in the engineering room, we came up with something a bit more less. Two minutes later we recorded the version you hear here, sometimes we get away with these things. And out of nowhere, we got an unexpected but great track onto Cuan!