The Connaughtman's Rambles: A Song History

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"The Connaughtman's Rambles" is an Irish double jig in two parts, usually set in D major with a second strain that turns to B minor.[1][2] Its title points west to Connaught, one of Ireland's old provinces, which took its name from an ancient people called the Connachta.[1] Nineteenth-century manuscripts show it travelling under several names: Henry Hudson entered a version as "Hag in the Hay" in a manuscript of about 1841, James Goodman wrote one down as "The Lads of the Town" in the mid-nineteenth century, and Stephen Grier copied it as "Connaught Man's Rambles" in a manuscript of about 1883.[1]

Color photochrom of a lake among wooded shores beneath a cone-shaped mountain

[Ballinahinch. County Galway, Ireland], photochrom, between ca. 1890 and ca. 1900. A view in Connemara, in the old province of Connacht; it has no connection to the tune.

The Traditional Tune Archive lists early printings in Levey's First Collection of the Dance Music of Ireland (1858) and P.M. Haverty's One Hundred Irish Airs (1859), and the jig later appeared in Francis O'Neill's Music of Ireland (1903, No. 1003) and in volume one of the Roche Collection (1912, No. 110).[1] O'Neill also captured it on a wax cylinder from Chicago Irish musicians between 1902 and 1904, the oldest known sound recording of the tune; irishtune.info names the player as the piper Patsy Touhey.[1][2] Later recordings indexed by irishtune.info include those of the accordionist John J. Kimmel (1918), the fiddlers Néillidh Boyle (1937) and Mickey Doherty (1949) and the piper Seamus Ennis, among 48 recordings it lists from about 1904 to 2018.[2]

The jig has gathered a long list of other names, among them "The Duck from Drummuck," "Mickey the Moulder" and "Gathering Dillisk."[1][2] The Traditional Tune Archive describes it as one of the most lasting and widely loved Irish tunes, noting that it is often played for English rapper sword dancing and is a contra dance standard.[1] Mark Gilston includes it, under the title "Connaugghtman's Rambles," in Irish Tunes For Dulcimer, Volume 1, the first book of his two-volume sheet-music collection of Irish melodies.[3]

Our book that contains the song "The Connaughtman's Rambles"

Sources

  1. The Traditional Tune Archive: "Connaughtman's Rambles (1) (The)".
  2. irishtune.info: "Connaughtman's Rambles".
  3. Mark Gilston: "Irish Tunes For Dulcimer, Volume 1".
  4. Image: [Ballinahinch. County Galway, Ireland], photochrom, between ca. 1890 and ca. 1900. Library of Congress.

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