ABOUT THESE ACCOMPANIMENTS

As in the other volumes, the accompaniments in this third volume of Travels With My Harp are suitable for piano and for pedal or lever harp but they were specifically written or adapted for the latter. Since making my first singing radio broadcast in Ireland at the age of sixteen, I accompanied myself on the Irish harp. Over the years my repertoire expanded to include songs from other parts of the world. This volume offers a sprinkling of my favourite songs - songs I have performed many times in concert, on radio and on television, recorded on LP, CD and DVD- video.

It has been said that the Irish harp is the dosest of all instruments to the human voice and I only ever used the harp as an accompanying instrument. The harp’s role for the self-accompanist is to enhance the singing without drawing undue attention to itself. All along, my aim had been to keep my harp accompaniments simple without being dull, interesting without being fussy or drawing attention away from the actual song. I memorised my harp accompaniments and never wrote them down. Now at last I’m committing them to paper.

Over many years I performed my songs on stage and in my television shows. As any professional singer will tell you, one’s interpretation of songs evolves over time and likewise the accompaniments. My recordings of the songs in this book were made at different times, sometimes part of live performances, and what is on the various recordings may not always in every detail accord exactly with what appears on paper here. I’ve avoided over-burdening the user with too many directions. Singing and the interpretation of songs is a personal matter, best left to the individual singer to work out on his or her own. My own interpretation can be heard on my recordings or, as in the case of some volumes, on the separate accompanying DVDs. I’m including a sprinkling of contemporary songs in each volume but most are traditional and are now available on a new (double CD) compilation entitled Mary OHara — 40 Traditional Songs.

Of the hundreds of songs I have recorded, fewer than a third are with harp accompaniment only. Most are with harp, piano and flute — my regular concert line-up — and many with orchestra. For this book, I’ve selected a cross section of the songs I sang with the harp only.

To help you understand some of these songs more fully, knowiedge of the songs backgrounds or my own connection with them may be helpful.

Bring Me a Shawl from Galway. I first heard this song In the late 70s being performed beautifully by the Irish tenor Charles Kennedy. There is a freedom and freshness about it that never staled however many times I performed it

The Unicorn. A friend of mine, the late English poet Peter Levi, wrote the words for me in the early 8Os. All I had to do was to name a subject: a snail, or a clown, or the unicorn, and he invariably came up with a winner, which I then set to music.

An Peata Circe or The Pet Hen. Singing this song in Gaelic is great fun. A compliment I cherish is the reaction of a nine year old when her grandmother played the recording to her remarking “Listen to Mary imitating a hen”, to which the child replied “Mary is not imitating a hen. She is the hen.” My husband and I have tried our hand at a translation.

O Hear Me Lord. While I was still at Stanbrook, this was sent to me by the Irish composer Michael Bowles, with an accompanying note: “One Michael Hodgetts of Birmingham wrote a metric version of Psalm 101 while we were in England. We were never satisfied with the verses, he no more than I. I was looking for my copy the other day and could not find it, so I made up the first verse, as herewith; sent it, with the tune, to an acquaintance at Melleray. The second verse was drafted by a monk of Melleray’ and, after a little more exchange of suggestions, we settled for this. And now they intend to put it into Lauds during Lent, next year.” After trying it out, I took to it at once.

Ae Fond Kiss. Scotland’s Robert Burns (1759-1796) used a traditional melody to clothe his heart-rending thoughts in this much-loved song.

Believe Me if All Those Endearing Young Charms. When I was growing up in Ireland in the 50s, Moore’s Melodies was in the very blood of every man, woman and child and this song was part of our inherited culture. What is little known, however, is that Thomas Moore (1779-1852) wrote this song for his beautiful young wife who had contracted smallpox, leaving her disfigured and heading for an early grave.

She Didn’t Dance. This is a dandling song sung when one is bouncing the baby upon one’s knee.

Down By the Sally Gardens. Yeat’s poem is set in the sally gardens in my home-town of Sligo in the west of Ireland. Almost every little village in Ireland had a sally garden because the rods were needed to make baskets.

Thrice Toss These Oaken Ashes. In my late teens I discovered the Elizabethan composers through Alfred Deller’s recordings. A painter friend of mine, Michael Morrow, played the lute and taught me several songs. Another friend, John Beckett, one day sat himself down at our piano and taught me this song. It was many years later after being widowed, entered Stanbrook Abbey and left, that I decided to include songs from this era in my concerts.

The Scent of the Roses, also known as Farewell But Whenever. This is another of Moore’s Melodies, which everyone in Ireland in the 40s and 50s could sing. When in 1979 I was asked to write my autobiography I gave it the title ‘The Scent of the Roses’, a phrase taken from the last lines of this song. Joan Baez told me that my recording of it was for a long time her ‘most favourite’ song.

I have now been retired from singing for some years and I have hung up my harp for good but I hope these harp accompaniments of mine will give you some pleasure and that you’ll find them useful in your work.

A word about accidentals and enharmonics:

All Irish harps are tuned to either Eb or Ab. I choose to tune mine to the key of Ab major (4 flats) and all my instructions regarding the accompaniments stem from that. In the key of Ab major (a key I was comfortable with, having a high voice), all the levers (blades) are in the neutral position and thus the tone of the harp is at its best — when a lever is engaged, the tone of the string is slightly affected. I have indicated how to get accidentals in a way that I see to be easiest for the player of the Irish and similar lever harps. Incidentally, the next much favoured key for me was Eb. To get from the key of Ab to Eb, simply engage the D lever.