Bright her locks of beauty grow
| TYPE | 3 - Complex Melody |
| TOPIC | Love |
| TUNE STRUCTURE | ab |
| VERSE STRUCTURE | unclear |
| TIME SIGNATURE | C 34 |
| KEY SIGNATURE | ♭♭♭ |
| TONAL CENTRE | E- |
| INCIPIT | GGC'C'C'BE'D'D'C'C'C' |
| TEXT SOURCE | 'Bright her locks of beauty grow: from Miss Brookes's Reliques of Irish poetry' [Dublin? c.1795] British Library H.1601.xx.(64) |
| TUNE SOURCE | as above |
| FIRST LINE | Bright her locks of beauty grow |
| NOTATED INCIPIT | |
| This London-printed song-sheet (c.1795) also includes ‘Lord O’Neill’s March, composed by Mr W.H. Bird' on the reverse of its final page. Its text is taken from the first 3 stanzas of a longer ‘Elegy’ which was translated by Charlotte Brooke in Reliques of Irish Poetry, 1789. (There is only one small variation: the phrase ‘Heavenly blue’ is chosen over Brooke’s ‘smiling blue’ in the third line.) In her note to the song, Brooke claimed that the original Gaelic poem was written by Edmond Ryan, known sometimes as ‘Edmond of the Hill’ the commander of a group of Irish rapparees after the Battle of the Boyne. Brooke’s modern editor, Lesa Ní Mhungaile, notes that the earliest extant manuscript copy of this popular folksong dates from 1787 and that ‘it may have been transcribed from oral recitation for the purpose of inclusion in the Reliques’ (Ní Mhungaile, 2009, p.114). Ó Tuama thought the song was originally a love-song which became intertwined with patriotic themes (Ó Tuama, 1960, pp.61-6); Hardiman believed the song was allegorical, with the loved one as a symbol for Ireland (1831, i, p.358). Ní Mhungaile notes that the song shares an identical metre with the songs ‘Coillte glasa an Triúcha’, ‘Bean dubh an ghleanna’ and ‘Mór ná beag’ and that stanzas from each of these were often interwoven (p.115). Ní Mhungaile also writes of how Brooke’s translation omits more sexually suggestive elements of the original. | |
 p.1 Bright her locks.jpg)
 p.2 Bright her locks.jpg)
BRIGHT HER LOCKS OF BEAUTY GREWFrom Miss Brookes’s Reliques of IRISH Poetry. Composed by Mr W.H. BIRD.Bright her locks of Beauty grew,curling fair and sweetly flowing,And her Eyes of Heav’nly Blue,Oh! how soft how Heav’nly glowing,Oh! how soft, Oh! how soft how Heav’nly glowing.Ah poor plunderd heart, of painwhen wilt thou have an end to mourningThis long Year I look in vainTo see my only hope returningThis long Year I look in vain, To see my only hope returning:Oh would thy promise faithful prove,And to my fond fond Bosom give thee,To my fond Bosom Bosom give thee,Lightly then my steps wou’d move,Joyful shou’d, Joyful shou’d my Arms receive thee.