Fair Annie of Lochroyan- Ritchie (KY) 1961 Recording
From: FOLKWAYS RECORDS Album No. FA 2301; ©1961 Folkways Records & Service Corp., 43 W. 61st St., NYC, USA 10023
CHILD BALLADS IN AMERICA, Volume 1; sung by Jean Ritchie; Notes by KENNETH S. GOLDSTEIN
[This version was also transcribed by Bronson in 1955. Some notes *online (see below) say it was written by Ritchie when it appears to be a rewrite of an 1802 version collected by Scott. Jean Ritchie told Goldstein she learned it from her Uncle Jason. From who did he learn it? Uncle Jason was a lawyer and contributed to McGill's 1917 collection of folk-songs. Both Jean and her Uncle Jason had access to printed materials. It seems unlikely that this is a traditional version and I regard it as an arrangement by Ritchie of Scott's version.
*Online quote: One of Jean's own songs was Child Ballad 76, "The Lass of Lochroyan". She was delighted to discover that Elizabeth Cronin, an elderly Irish woman, knew a version of the same song.]
SIDE II, Band 5: FAIR ANNIE OF LOCHROYAN (Child #76)
This tragic story is one of the most moving in the Child canon; nevertheless it has been recorded rarely from tradition. One can not simply blame the length of the ballad for this situation (though it must be taken into account), for longer ballads have been collected in recent years . Perhaps the indelicacy of a situation in which the heroine is an unwed mother has driven this ballad from a folk society in which pristine morality, religious 'hell-and-damnation' teachings, and general squeamishness hold sway. In this century the full ballad has not been reported from tradition in England, though several excellent variants have been collected in Scotland and Ireland. In America, prior to this recording of a Kentucky version by Jean Ritchie, the ballad has been reported only from North Carolina and West Virginia. Jean's version is a major addition to the store of American versions of the Child ballads, for her text contains certain elements not previously reported in any 5 American versions and found but rarely in older British forms of the ballad.
It should be noted that there is a great similarity between the version sung by Jean Ritchie and a Scottish text which was communicated to Sir Walter Scott by a major Hutton in 1802 (Printed in Child, Volume IV, pp. 411-474). The Hutton text contains 50 four-line stanzas; Jean's text has 14 1/2 double stanzas (8 lines each) which very closely correspond to 29 of Hutton's 50 stanzas . To be sure, Jean's text is almost totally Americanized, though some few Scots words appear unobtrusively here and there. Since the text published in Child has not appeared elsewhere in print, and since Jean has indicated to me that her Uncle Jason (from whom she learned the ballad) had no access to the Child volumes, we have here a truly remarkable instance of a unique version of a ballad appearing in two widely separated places 150 years apart. In T.F. Henderson's edition of Scott's Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border" Volwne III, page 254, the editor indicates his belief that the Hutton text was sent to Scott in 1802 (after the publication of the Minstrelsy), and that "Major Hutton has evidently fashioned his version by combining the recollection of his father and family with the stanzas of the minstrelsy version."
Either Henderson's supposition is incorrect, and Hutton's text represents a fully traditional version, or the text "fashioned" by Hutton then passed into oral tradition (without the aid of print) to turn up a century-and a - half later in Kentucky. Like most other published texts, Jean's version begins with the commonplace "who will shoe my feet" lines, which have frequently been reported as a separate lyric song or in combination with other song or ballad matter (see Coffin, p. 81, for a partial list of ballad to which these stanzas have been appended). Collectors have all too frequently resorted to listing a version of The Lass of Roch Royal among their finds when their contribution to recorded lore is merely another "who will shoe" text. This is all the more ludicrous when one realizes that it has never been determined whether these stanzas originated with this ballad. It should be noted that these same stanzas are also found in another Child ballad, "The New-Slain Knicht" (Chlld 11263); Child, however, thought that these stanzas were borrowed from The Lass of Roch Royal.
For additional texts and information, S22: Child, Volume II, p. 213 ff.; Coffin, pp. 30-31; Dean-Smith, p. 65; Greig & Keith, pp. 59-63; Brown Collection, Volume II, p. 88-92.
SIDE II, Band 5: FAIR ANNIE OF LOCHROYAN (Child #76)
Oh who will shoe my bonny feet
And who will glove my hand
And who will kiss my rosy cheeks
While you in a far off land?
Your Paw will shoe your bonny feet
Your maw will glove your hand
And I will kiss your rosy cheeks
When I come back again.
Oh who will build a bonny ship
And set her on the sea
For I will go and seek my love
My own love Gregory.
Oh up and spoke her father dear
And a wealthy man was he
And he has built a bonny ship
And set her on the sea.
Oh he has built a bonny ship
To sail upon the sea
The mast was of the beaten gold
As fine as it could be.
She had not sailed but twenty leagues,
But twenty leagues and three
When she met with a rank robber
And all of his company.
Are you the Queen of Heaven, he cried,
Come to pardon all our sins
Or are you the *Merry Magdelene
That was born at Bethlehem?
I'm not the Queen of Heaven, said she,
Come to pardon all your sins
Nor I'm the Merry Magdelene
That was born at Bethlehem.
But I am the Lass of Lochroyan
That's sailing on the sea
To see if I can find my love
My own love Gregory.
Oh see you now yon bonny bower
All covered o'er with thyme
And wilen you sailed around and about
Lord Gregory is within.
Now row the boat my mariners
And bring me to the land
For it's not I see my true love's castle
Close by the salt sea strand.
She sailed around and sailed around
And loud and long cried she
Now break, now break your fairy charms
And set my true love free.
She has taken her young son in her arms
And to the door she's gone
And long she's knocked and loud she's called
But answer she's got none.
Open the door Lord Gregory
Open and let me in
The wind blows cold, blows cold, my love
The rain drops from my chin.
The shoe is frozen to my feet
The glove unto my hand
The wet drops from my frozen hair
And I can scarce-lie stand.
Up then and spoke his ill mother,
As mean as she could be
You're not the Lass of the Lochroyan
She is far out o'er the sea.
Away, away, you ill woman,
You don't come here for good,
You're but some witch who strolls about
Or a mermaid of the flood.
Now open the doors love Gregory
Open the doors I pray
For thy young son is in my arms
And will be dead ere it is day.
Ye lie, ye lie, ye ill woman,
So loud I hear ye lie,
For Annie of the Lochroyan
Is far out o'er the sea
Fair Annie turned her round and about
Well since this all is so
May never a woman that's bourne a son
Have a heart so full of woe.
When the cock had crow'n and the day had dawned
And the sun begun to peep
lip then and raised Lord Gregory
And sore, sore did he weep.
Oh I have dreamt a dream mother
The thought it grieves me great
That Fair Annie of the Lochroyan
Lay dead at my bed feet.
If it be for Annie of Lochroyan
You make all of this moan
She stood last night at your bower window
But I have sent her home
Oh he's gone down unto the shore
To see what he could see
And there he saw fair Annie's barque
Come a-roarin' o'er the sea.
Oh Annie, oh Annie, loud he cried
Oh Annie, oh Annie, my dear
But all the loud tha t he did cry
Fair Annie she could not hear.
The wind blew loud, the waves rose high
And dashed the boat on shore
Fair Annie's corpse was in the foam
The babe rose never more.
Then first he kissed her pale, pale cheeks
And then he kissed her chin
And then he kissed her cold, cold lips
There was no breath within.
Oh woe betide my ill mother,
An ill death may she die
She has not been the death of one
But she has been the death of three.
Then he took out a little dart
That hung down by his side
And thrust it through and through his heart
And then fell down and died.
*Mary