I Wish I Wish- Charlotte Higgins (Perth) 1953, 1955 and 1961 REC
[Collection - School of Scottish Studies; Track ID - 37180, Original Tape ID - SA1961.044 (1961 rec)
Listen: http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/en/play/37180;jsessionid=DB4BCD60CBA4D262CF7F8B187E7EECCA
Bio: Charlotte Higgins (nee Riley) was born in Perkmass, Lumphanon, Aberdeenshire, in 1893. Her father Thomas Lucas from Bristol was a fisherman who arranged for Charlotte to be brought up by the Riley's a family of travellers after her mother Mary Paul died. Her first husband a MacGuire, was killed in the First World War and her second husband, Jock Higgins was a cousin of Jeannie Roberston who married a Higgins. (see MacColl for a more detailed bio).
The melody sung by Higgins is very close to the one sung by Jeannie Robertson in "What a Voice." In her 1955 recording she adds this stanza:
It's when my apron it was new,
It wis a bricht and bonny blue
But noo my apron's tae my knee,
He cares nae mair what becomes o' me.
Higgins also sang this variant in 1953 and for Hamish Henderson, titled "The Blackbird." It began with this stanza.
R. Matteson 2017]
Summary - In this song, a young woman has been abandoned by her lover after falling pregnant by him. She sees him courting another girl and telling her "things he once told me". She wishes she were a maid again but knows that this will never be "till an apple it grows on an orange tree". She wishes her own baby could be born so that she might die.
I Wish, I Wish- sung by Charlotte Higgins (1895-1971) of Blairgowrie, Perthshire in July, 1961. Recorded by Hamish Henderson; Maurice Fleming. Learned from her great grandmother.
1. The blackbird sits in yonder tree,
Some say he's blind and cannae see;
Some say he's blind and cannae see,
So is my, true love to me.
2. O I wish, I wish, but I wish in vain,
I wish I were a maid again,
But a maid again I'll never be,
Til the apple grows on the orange tree.
3. O, I wish, I wish my babe were born,
And sitting on his nurse's knee.
I wish myself was dead and gone,
And green, green grass growing over me.
4. There is a tavern in this toon,
Where my true love gangs and he sits doon
He takes a damsel on his knee,
He tells her what he once told me.
5. O I wish, I wish, but I wish in vain
I wish I were a maid again,
But a maid again I'll never be,
Til the apple grows on the orange tree.
6. O I wish my father ne'er had whistled,
O I wish my mother never had sung,
I wish the cradle never had rocked
I wish I died when I was young.
7. O I wish, I wish, but I wish in vain
I wish I were a maid again,
But a maid again I never will be,
Til the apple grows on the orange tree.