Star of the County Down – Fiddle Tune a Day – Day 242

Star of the County Down is a beautiful old Celtic Tune. I would call it a waltz because it’s a 3/4 tune, but I’m guessing it’s really an Air. It doesn’t really feel like a dance tune to me.

But, what do I know. It’s a pretty song, and while I haven’t really ever performed it before, I have listened to it many times.

I have heard renditions of Star of the County Down in Straight time – (4/4), but I like it better in 3/4, so that’s how I’m going to play it for you today. This tune goes out in honor of L.G., friend of Mike Koenig who passed away recently.

Star of the County Down according to Fiddler’s Companion

STAR OF THE COUNTY DOWN. AKA and see “I Love Nell,” “Mary from Blackwater Side,” “My Love Nell,” “Paddy’s Return [2],” “When a Man’s in Love,” “When first I left old Ireland.” Irish; March (4/4 time), Air or Waltz (3/4 time). A Minor (most versions): E Minor (Silberberg). Standard tuning. AB (Barnes, Matthiesen, Silberberg): AAB (Brody, Johnson, Phillips). A star, in Irish vernacular, is a beautiful woman. John Loesberg (1980) says the air originally was set to the sheet ballad “My Love Nell,” but first appears under the “Star of the County Down” title in Hughes’ Irish Country Songs, with words written by Cathal Mac Garvey {1866-1927}. However, this popular air seems to have been attached to numerous songs over the years. For example, P.W. Joyce (1909) prints a version of the air under the title “Mary from Blackwater Side” (No. 187), while George Petrie (Stanford/Petrie, 1905) collected it several times: as an untitled air from favorite source sculptor Patrick MacDowell (No. 196), “When first I left old Ireland” (No. 863), and “Paddy’s Return” (No. 867). This tune is identified by Cazden (et al, 1982) as belonging to the protean and huge ‘Lazarus’ family of tunes, which includes, among numerous others in the Gaelic/British tradition, the Scottish “Gilderoy,” Cazden’s own Catskill Mountain collected “Banks of the Sweet Dundee,” and Chappell’s English “We Be Poor, Frozen Out Gardeners” as well as literally hundreds of other airs. Jerome Colburn points out that an American shape-note variant of the “Star” family appears in the tenor of the hymn “Help Me to Sing” (attributed to B.F. White) from The Sacred Harp (1859). The tune is also used for two poaching ballads (one from Scotland, one from Ireland, “Van Dieman’s Land”), remembers Sean Laffey, and the forebitter /capstan shanty “Banks of Newfoundland.” Rock singer Van Morrison performed a march-time version of the song with the Chieftains on a 1994 recording. County Down takes its name from Downpatrick, where St. Patrick is said to have been buried (Down is a variation of the Celtic word Dun, meaning a fortified place).

Star of the County Down according to Wikipedia

“Star of the County Down” is an old Irish ballad set near Banbridge in County Down, in Northern Ireland. The words are by Cathal McGarvey (1866–1927) from Ramelton, County Donegal.^[1] The tune, a pentatonic melody, is similar to that of several other works, including the almost identical English tune “Kingsfold”, well known from several popular hymns, such as “Led By the Spirit”. The folk tune was the basis for Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Five Variants of Dives and Lazarus.

The melody was also used in an old Irish folk song called “My Love Nell”.^[2] The lyrics of “My Love Nell” tell the story of young man who courts a girl but loses her when she emigrates to America.^[3] The only real similarity with “Star of the County Down” is that Nell too comes from County Down. This may have inspired McGarvey to place the heroine of his new song in Down as well.^{[citation needed]} McGarvey was from Donegal.

“The Star of the County Down” uses a tight rhyme scheme. Each stanza is a double quatrain, and the first and third lines of each quatrain have an internal rhyme on the second and fourth feet: [aa]b[cc]b. The refrain is a single quatrain with the same rhyming pattern.

The song is sung from the point of view of a young man who chances to meet a charming lady by the name of Rose (or Rosie) McCann, referred to as the “star of the County Down”. From a brief encounter the writer’s infatuation grows until, by the end of the ballad, he imagines wedding the girl.

Star of the County Down Lyrics

Near Banbridge town, in the County Down
One morning in July
Down a bóithrín green came a sweet cailín
And she smiled as she passed me by.
Oh she looked so sweet from her two bare feet
To the sheen of her nut brown hair
Such a coaxing elf, sure I shook myself
To be sure I was really there.

Chorus:
And from Bantry Bay up to Derry Quay
And from Galway to Dublin town
No maid I’ve seen like the brown cailín
That I met in the County Down.

As she onward sped I shook my head
And I gazed with a feeling rare
And I said, says I, to a passerby
“Who’s the maid with the nut-brown hair?”
He smiled at me, and with pride says he,
“That’s the gem of Ireland’s crown.
She’s young Rosie McCann from the banks of the Bann
She’s the star of the County Down.”

Chorus

I’ve travelled a bit, but never was hit
Since my roving career began
But fair and square I surrendered there
To the charms of young Rose McCann.
I’d a heart to let and no tenant yet
Did I meet with in shawl or gown
But in she went and I asked no rent
From the star of the County Down.

Chorus

At the crossroads fair I’ll be surely there
And I’ll dress in my Sunday clothes
And I’ll try sheep’s eyes, and deludhering lies
On the heart of the nut-brown rose.
No pipe I’ll smoke, no horse I’ll yoke
Though with rust my plow turns brown
Till a smiling bride by my own fireside
Sits the star of the County Down.

Chorus

Versions

• The Pogues recorded a version on their 1989 album Peace and Love.
• Orthodox Celts recorded a version on their 1997 album The Celts Strike Again, as well as on their 1995 live album Muzičke paralele.
• Michael Card recorded a version on his 1998 album Starkindler.
• Loreena McKennitt recorded a version on her 2010 album The Wind That Shakes the Barley. She also used the melody of “The Star of the County Down” for the carol “The Seven Rejoices of Mary,” released on her 2008 album A Midwinter Night’s Dream.
• A popular adaptation (keeping the music, but changing the lyrics) is “The Fighting 69th”, which is about the famed Irish Brigade of the American Civil War.
• A version played by The Chieftains featuring Van Morrison on vocals can be found in the DVD The Chieftains Live over Ireland – Water from the Well (2000).
• Ehud Banai has produced a Hebrew version entitled “HaKochav Shel Mahoz Gush Dan”
• Lyriel recorded a version on their 2012 album Leverage.
• The Irish Rovers recorded a version on their 1996 album The Irish Rovers’ Gems that included a substantially different third verse.