Vintage Danny Boy Sheet Music 1913

70.00

35cm x 25cm  Limerick

 

Danny Boy” is a ballad, written by English songwriter Frederic Weatherly in 1913, and set to the traditional Irish melody of “Londonderry Air“.

“Danny Boy”
Danny Boy p1 - cover page.jpg

Danny Boy
Song
Published 1913
Genre Folk
Songwriter(s) Frederic Weatherly (lyrics) in 1910
Recording
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Performed by Celtic Aire of the United States Air Force Band

1940 recording by Glenn Miller and His Orchestra on RCA Bluebird, B-10612-B

In 1910, in Bath, Somerset, the English lawyer and lyricist Frederic Weatherly initially wrote the words to “Danny Boy” to a tune other than “Londonderry Air”. After his Irish-born sister-in-law Margaret Enright Weatherly (known as Jess) in the United States sent him a copy of “Londonderry Air” in 1913 (an alternative version of the story has her singing the air to him in 1912 with different lyrics), Weatherly modified the lyrics of “Danny Boy” to fit the rhyme and meter of “Londonderry Air”.

Weatherly gave the song to the vocalist Elsie Griffin, who made it one of the most popular songs of the new century. In 1915, Ernestine Schumann-Heink produced the first recording of “Danny Boy”.

Jane Ross of Limavady is credited with collecting the melody of “Londonderry Air” in the mid-19th century from a musician she encountered.

Lyrics

The 1913 lyrics by Frederick E. Weatherly:

Oh, Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen, and down the mountain side.
The summer’s gone, and all the roses falling,
It’s you, It’s you must go and I must bide.
But come ye back when summer’s in the meadow,
Or when the valley’s hushed and white with snow,
It’s I’ll be there in sunshine or in shadow,—
Oh, Danny boy, Oh Danny boy, I love you so!

But when ye come, and all the flowers are dying,
If I am dead, as dead I well may be,
Ye’ll come and find the place where I am lying,
And kneel and say an Avé there for me.
And I shall hear, though soft you tread above me,
And all my grave will warmer, sweeter be,
For you will bend
and tell me that you love me,
And I shall sleep in peace until you come to me!

Meaning

There are various conjectures about the meaning of “Danny Boy”.Some interpret the song to be a message from a parent to a son going off to war or participating in the Irish uprising (as suggested by the reference to “pipes calling glen to glen”) or emigrating as part of the Irish diaspora.

The 1918 version of the sheet music with Weatherly’s printed signature included alternative lyrics (“Eily Dear”), with the instructions that “when sung by a man, the words in italic should be used; the song then becomes “Eily Dear”, so that “Danny Boy” is only to be sung by a lady”. Nonetheless, it is unclear whether this was Weatherly’s intent.

Usage

  • Percy Grainger‘s Irish Tune from County Derry adapts the Danny Boy/Londonderry Air melody for wind ensemble in 1918.
  • The song is popular for funerals; but the National Catholic Reporter wrote in 2001 that it “cannot be played during Mass.”

Select recordings

“Danny Boy” has been recorded multiple times by a variety of performers. Several versions are listed below in chronological order.

Description

Additional information

Weight 2.5 kg
Dimensions 50 × 60 × 8 cm
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