Annotation:Ealaidh Ghaoil

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EALAIDH GHAOIL (A Melody of Love). AKA - "Air faillirinn illirinn." Scottish, Air (6/8 time). D Dorian. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. Christine Martin notes that pipers call the tune "Not the Swan on the Lake," the translation of the first line of the song. The words to the song were written by Ewan MacLaughlin (1775-1822, Fort William, Scotland), and the melody is attributed to a Mrs. MacKenzie. MacLaughlin (or Maclachlan) was an assistant librarian of King's College and rector of the grammar school at Aberdeen. He translated the greater part of the seven books of Homer's Illiad into heroic verse in Scots Gaelic, and was a primary contributor to a Gaelic-English dictionary. He published a number of Gaelic poems in 1816, among them the love-ballad "Ealaidh Ghaoil."

Source for notated version: fiddler Ian Kennedy (Fort William, Scotland) [Martin].

Printed sources: Martin (Traditional Scottish Fiddling), 2002; p. 64.

Recorded sources:



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