A strange tale for St. Paddy's day.

[tavernier]

I am 67 years old.

When I was four, my father wanted to teach me how to play the violin. After weeks of basic stuff, posture, bowing, scales, etc., I latched on to a tune that I played over and over. He asked who had taught it to me and I said I had made it up. It was unfamiliar to him and I guess he thought I had really made it up. Keep in mind, there were no musicians in our little hick town and dad taught me only basic tunes.

As the years went by I got pretty good at the instrument and in high school I was the concert mistress in our orchestra. But from time to time I would play the song that I "made up". It was always my favorite.

Years later as an adult I went to Chicago on St. Paddy's day and heard them playing... MY SONG! I asked the group how they knew that song (still under the impression that I had written or made it up).

They told me that the song was called The Minstrel Boy, and was very, very old.

I was shocked to the core! This was the song I had always known, a part of me from my earliest days.

Here's the thing. I'm not Irish. No one from birth has ever played that song for me. No one around me would ever have known or played that song. No Irish, no radio, no TV.

But here's the strangest part: I've always had dreams about Ireland, and both of my husbands were Irish. And when I visited last year, I recognized a small village we passed through on the bus. I could have gotten off and walked comfortably through the hills.

I've traveled around the world and never had this connection. Not to mention... I wrote the song!!! I believe it to this day!

😄

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

🍀🍀🍀

[TuxedoKat]

1. Great story!

Now I have to go find your song on youtube and listen to it! Happy St. Patrick's Day!

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. That's pretty weird.

I've always loved "The Minstrel Boy," though for years I didn't know the name of the tune or even the words - I didn't even know it had words. My parents had a recording of an orchestral version of it and I listened to it over and over when I was a little bitty kid, maybe 4 or 5, and it always made me cry because it was so beautiful. Maybe the tune is magic or haunted or something.

[orleans]

3. who wrote the melody??

"This haunting melody is called "The Moreen" and was used by Thomas Moore (1779-1852) for his song "The Minstrel Boy". "

so who composed "the moreen" ??? and what irish village did they live in???
that is what you need to find out next.

[tavernier]

5. Thanks...

Lovely.

[Petrushka]

15. Thank you for that information. It piqued my curiosity enough for me to do a little searching.

See response #14 below.

[tavernier]

4. Thy songs were made for the pure and free

They will never sound in slavery.

----

Yes, the words are electric. But I can only "claim" the tune. 😉

It is the one great mystery in my life.

[Enthusiast]

6. tavernier, that is an excellent tale indeed.

I wonder if you would mind if I sent it to friends and family. It is certainly worth sharing.

[tavernier]

8. I share this story

with total understanding that ppl will laugh and make fun of it, and perhaps they should. I probably would myself. 😄 Maybe I heard the tune somewhere as a baby?? But really, that's unlikely, considering my early childhood.

Feel free to share... I'm not collecting royalties. 😉

[Mojorabbit]

13. I dreamed of old Roman baths my whole life

I was in Barnes and Nobles one day and saw a book on old roman baths I opened it to browse and there was the one in my dreams in that book. I called hubby over full of excitement to show him my :communal bath: LOL
I also had dreams of a long bridge in great detail for most of my childhood and it ended up to my surprise being the old 7mile bridge to the Keys. I have no idea how it happens.

[tavernier]

20. Perhaps you should visit Bath in the UK.

I was there some years ago and was surprised (and a bit disturbed) at how accessible the ancient structures are to tourists. We were allowed to touch the statues of Roman soldiers that surrounded the baths, and could even walk down into the water if we liked. Perhaps historians and preservationists have now changed that dubious policy in light of the damage that has been done to the relics in Egypt by millions of curious hands. Anyway, a visit might spark an additional memory?

And interesting that you bring up 7 mile bridge. I live in the Keys and work as a home health nurse. I cross that bridge almost weekly! I know much of its history, having lived here for half a lifetime. There are some good books regarding the building of the railroad (including the bridge), with photos.

[RebelOne]

27. I have been on the 7-Mile Bridge many times.

I grew up in Miami and would go down to Key West frequently on weekends. I remember the first time I rode on the old bridge. I was on the back of a motorcycle. Now that was a scary ride.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. I understand what you are saying

and I am of Irish descent.

I now live in a place that is deeply familiar to me, that feels like "home", that I seem to "understand" on a visceral level, even tho I was born and raised on the other side of the country.
When I was 5-6-7...I would draw trees that were the opposite of the tall evergreens all around me.
I would draw shorter trees with thick branching trunks and rounded tops.
the trees I drew were the oaks that grow all over here, but I had never seen one as a kid.

Down here in South, I feel the incredibly grounded, and have the strongest sense I have been here before.
and I feel terrifically lucky that I can live in a place that fits so totally.

[tavernier]

9. Very few of us ever capture that.

I'm so glad that you were able to return to the home you loved!

[icymist]

10. The Minstrel Boy is a common song played during the Civil War.

Here is a depiction of that song being played to Union soldiers at a Catholic Mass in the film Gettysburg:

[tavernier]

11. I can see that,

as many soldiers of that war were of Irish/Scottish/ English ancestory. The arrangement is nice; probably much nicer Hollywood style than it would have been during the latter Civil War years when even shoes and boots, let alone instruments, were scarce.

Thanks for sharing the vid!

[No Vested Interest]

16. Some Irish immigrant men were met at the docks in NYC and herded off

to fight in the Civil War. Americans who were being drafted had only to pay a substitute to get out of serving.

[Vadem]

12. I have a similar story about my now, 90 year old mother...

My mother is so talented at the piano; she could hear a piece on the radio and sit down at the piano and play it; full melody and chords; she plays "by ear" or "by sound" as they say.

She played this piece for years that she thought that she had written, like you.

A friend came over and Mom played the piece that she thought that she had written and the friend said I know that piece. Mom said no, I wrote it; well, the friend brought the music and played it for Mom--Drigo's Seranade; Mom still says that she wrote a part of it (but she didn't, it is in the music, but we let her believe that she wrote that part).

We love her dearly and she is so talented! So, I'm sure Drigo could care less!

LOL

[tavernier]

19. My musical talent is limited.

Nothing like your mother! What an amazing lady.

I sometimes wonder if ppl like us shouldn't spend a little time and effort with a reputable hypnotist? Of course that wouldn't really prove anything, either, unless it brought back a solid memory of hearing our songs in early childhood.

[Petrushka]

14. A little more history on the melody --->

The Minstrel Boy is played to the melody of The Moreen ("Moreen" or Moirin, diminutive of Morin, a girl's name).

The Moreen is a later version of an older melody called The Green Woods of Truigha which was printed in Edward Bunting's General Collection of the Ancient Music of Ireland in 1796.

It is said that The Green Woods of Truigha is undoubtedly one of the oldest airs of Ireland and is known by many different names in various parts of the country. (If I'm not mistaken, it was one of the airs played on the harps of ancient Ireland.)

In any case, if you'd like to see the music annotation (from John Mulholland's Ancient Irish Airs (1810)), it can be found at the following link: http://tunearch.org/wiki/Green_Woods_of_Truigha_%28The%29

. . . And . . . here is The Green Wood of Truigha as played on a harp by Maria Daniels :

P.S.
I found your story fascinating!


Edited to add:

P.P.S.
It's amusing, I think, to find that Thomas Moore "...pillaged Bunting for the tunes of many of his Irish Melodies"---see page 106 at the link below:

http://books.google.com/books?id=wD93mJ5LX9oC&pg=PA106&lpg=PA106&dq=the+green+woods+of+truigha+Edward+Bunting+1796&source=bl&ots=Qv1_8R_I3p&sig=lMLXJVHcBn7deVq2N6lzQnePhmg&hl=en&sa=X&ei=F5kmU_2sPKGIyAGqk4CABg&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=the%20green%20woods%20of%20truigha%20Edward%20Bunting%201796&f=false

[orleans]

17. nice research. (i didn't have the time or patience) n/t

[tavernier]

18. Wow; thank you!

Last edited Mon Mar 17, 2014, 07:20 AM - Edit history (1)

I certainly will take a look and spend a little more time myself in the research.

On edit: The Last Rose of Summer is, to me, very similar to the song played on the harp (as also mentioned in your second research piece). Not so much to the Minstrel Boy, except in the third stanza, where I can hear the familiar tune.

Interesting history lesson.

[Petrushka]

21. Here's the same melody in "Eamonn a' Chnuich" and "Ned of the Hill" --->

[Sheldon Cooper]

22. Collective unconsciousness?

[CBGLuthier]

23. I am surprised no one has brought up Bridey Murphy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridey_Murphy

In 1952, Colorado businessman and amateur hypnotist Morey Bernstein put housewife Virginia Tighe of Pueblo, Colorado, in a trance that sparked off startling revelations about Tighe's alleged past life as a 19th-century Irishwoman and her rebirth in the United States 59 years later. Bernstein used a technique called hypnotic regression, during which the subject is gradually taken back to childhood. He then attempted to take Virginia one step further, before birth, and was astonished to find he was listening to Bridey Murphy.








The experts who examined the case of Virginia Tighe came to the conclusion that the best way to arrive at the truth was to check back not to Ireland but to her own childhood and her relationship with her parents. Morey Bernstein's book stated that Virginia Tighe (whom he called Ruth Simmons in the book) was brought up by a Norwegian uncle and his German-Scottish-Irish wife. However, it did not state that her actual parents were both part Irish and that she had lived with them until the age of three. It also did not mention that an Irish immigrant named Bridie Murphy Corkell (1892–1957) lived across the street from Tighe's childhood home in Chicago, Illinois. Scientists are satisfied that everything Virginia Tighe said can be explained as a memory of her long-forgotten childhood.


To me even the truth is amazing. That we can bury our memories so well that we don't even recognize them as memories.

[tavernier]

25. I read that book years ago

I agree with you; the mind is a fascinating thing, either way!

There is a more recent book - a lady who was convinced she died leaving behind many young children, and had memories all her life of these children, home, etc., until one day she went on a search for them (now grown), and found them and met with them, all older than herself, of course.

The lady is still alive, but I think the youngest sibling died recently? Anyway, they accepted her story.

Wish I could remember the name of the book. She was on a few talk shows.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

24. Happy St. Patrick's Day!

[tavernier]

26. Thanks

And the same to you!