Annotation:Wild Geese (3)
Back to Wild Geese (3)
WILD GEESE [3]. Scottish, Air. The song was derived from a poem called "Norland Wind” by Violet Jacob (1863-1946), and was published in Jacob’s Songs of Angus (1915). According to Rampant Scotland [1] "She was born Violet Kennedy-Erskine into an aristocratic family near Montrose, Angus. She is known best for her historical novel Flemington and her poetry. In 1894 she married an Irish officer in the British Army, and accompanied him to India where he was serving. When Arthur died 1936, she returned to live at Kirriemuir, in Angus." The words are also in John Buchan's The Northern Muse (1924, p. 379), and begin:
Oh, tell me what was on yer road, ye roarin' norlan
As ye cam' blawin' frae the land that's niver frae my mind?
My feet they trayvel England, but I'm deein' for the north
My man, I heard the siller tides rin up the Firth o' Forth.
It was set to a tune added by folksinger Jim Reid from Dundee.
Source for notated version:
Printed sources:
Recorded sources: Philo 1110, Jean Redpath - "Fine Song for Singing" (1987).
See also listing at:
See notes on the song at Mainly Norfolk [2]