Annotation:O Let me in this ae Night

Back to O Let me in this ae Night

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O LET ME IN THIS AE (ONE) NIGHT. Scottish, Air (4/4 time). G Minor. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB. "Old," says Gow (1806). The song was originally published by Herd in 1776, and were thought in later decades to be too risque for publication. The lyric was reworked by Robert Burns ("...another purification by Burns of a vile old ditty") for the Scots Musical Museum, vol. IV (1795). However, Herd's and Burns' versions begin the same:

O lassie are ye sleepin yet,
Or are ye waukin, I wad wit,
For loove has bound me hand and fitt,
And I wad fain be in jo.

Chorus:
O let me in this ae night,
This ae, ae, ae night;
O let me in this ae night,
And I'll no come back again, jo.

Burns's lyric also appears under the title "Oh lassie art thou sleeping yet?" See note for "Oh lassie art thou sleeping yet" for more. The tune, however, is a minor-mode adaptation of "Will ye lend me your Loom Lass", found in James Oswald's Caledonian Pocket Companion.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Carlin (Gow Collection), 1986; No. 552. Gow (Complete Repository), Part 3, 1806; p. 14. Johnson (Scots Musical Museum, vol. 4), 1792; pp. 320-321. Wilson (Companion to the Ball Room), 1816; p. 43.

Recorded sources:

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