Annotation:Nora O'Neill (1)
Back to Nora O'Neill (1)
NORA O'NEILL [1]. AKA - "Norah O'Neille." American, Air (3/4 time). G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. A song [Roud Number: V1931] that has been set to various airs that has been attributed to American popular songwriter William Shakespeare Hays (1837-1907, Louisville, Kentucky), fist published about 1866. Despite its apparent American origins the lyric appears (without tune or tune direction) in Patrick John Kennedy's Universal Irish Song Book (1898, p. 161), the Irish Emerald Songster (Dublin, n.d.) and similar Irish song collections. It begins:
Oh! I'm lonely to-night, love, without you,
And my love I can never conceal;
For they say there's a charm, love, about you,
My Darling, Sweet Norah O'Neale.
Like the beam of the star when 'tis shining,
Is the glance which your eye can't conceal,
And your voice is so soft and beguiling
That I love you, sweet Nora O'Neale.
One version was recorded in 1929 by Irish tenor John McCormack (1884-1945).
Source for notated version:
Printed sources: Roche (Collection of Traditional Irish Music, vol. 1), 1912; No. 19, p. 12.
Recorded sources:
See also listing at:
Hear John McCormack's 1929 recording on youtube.com [1]