The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1897-05-22
Importance of Proper Rendition
of National Music.
A PATRIOTIC CONTRIBUTION
By the Popular Irish Baritone,
Chauncey Olcott.
IRISH SONGS AND SINGERS.
Simplicity in Tone and Execution
Is the DeSideratpm.

OJu1pllt1Iy lii 1VuC 0uV EACkUIlVu
Is the Desideratum.
The parsonage who won immortal
fame by his utterance of q desire to
write nations ballads might, with the
greatest of propriety, have interjected
about the middle of his axiom, "and if
they are once properly sung'-for there
Is noting more important in popular
song than the expounding of it's mean
ing to the masses. OF Irish song In
particular is this most necessary; and
should the spirit of it be lost, it's value
in the song-world will have disap-
peared, says Chauncey Olcott in the
Buffalo Union and Times.
There is no ballad poetry in the
world so abstruse as. the Irish. Since
the Introduction of the English Ian
guage into that unhappy country, the
people have been facing series of per-
secutions that are capable of elimina-
ting a race of less vitality from the
peoples of the earth. Penal laws for
bade the dissemination of patriotic SEN
timents; aye, even the very name of the
land that bore them was forbidden to
be spoken. Their heroes were rendered
nameless by tyrant laws and every his
torical incident that might serve to
keep. alive the fires of patriotism was
? ordered forgotten.
The despot little knew the people
with whom he dealt. Eternally be-
meath his feet and only waiting for an
opportunity to burst forth again with
all the force of it's pent-up and long
gathering energy was a slumbering
volcano of sentiment, whose fires were
fed by streams Of ballads, the meaning
of which lay hidden in metaphor and
abstruse terms.
Some of the more daring spirits gave
vent to their feelings in no ambiguous
terms, but their works were not as use
full in serving cause as those appar-
emily harmless lyrics in whose every
line lurked treason to hated govern:
ment.
We need not go down to the more an
cient poets to find excellent examples
of this species of poetry. AS late as
Moore we find poems in which the read
er is left to discover from tradition
what is meant by the illusions and in
cidents In their lines. This is peculiar
ly the case In his Irish melodies. Let
: us take for an example his magnificent
lyric, after the Battle" To the casual
reader of words, it will strike the mind
as polished lyric only; poem full of
varied sentiment and sorrow. Students
of Irish history and traditions find in it
hidden beauties and sad defiance that
brings the gloom rushing to the cheek
and CLEAN of pride in the eye. In
that grand song they see again that
of Aughrim, determined to fight to the
death sooner than yield to the enemy
one inch of the ground near which they
had been born and which had been the
withdrawn his troops to Limerick, but
a Galway regiment refused to leave,
saying that they had lived on that spot
and would die there. They covered
ho{ %
perished to man on the slopes of
Aughrim. What fash of defiance is
in those four last lines,
There Is world where souls are free,
Where tyrants taint not natures bliss;
II death that worlds bright opening be,
Oh! who would live slave in this.
How can the singer, who knows moth
ing of the hidden meaning of this song,
render 1t in it's proper spirit? With
but a blank in his mind instead Of the
awful picture of that little band of
heroes, who, though wounded and dy-
ing, were seen by the lightning flashes
re forming their lines and awaiting the
morning light to terminate that glori-
sous though unequal struggle, how can
he deliver that song as its author meant
It to be sung? Such a thing is impossible
and the Irish audience which listens
10 the song always feels the difference,
and is only thrilled and enthused by
the singer who is placing that picture
before them. In Forget Not the Field"
We again find Aughrim commemorated
by Moore.
ss To sing "She is Far From the l4a,ldi'
without kIowing the sad story of Sarah
sCurran is to make it meaningless. 1T
rs Not the Tear" although published
sA:tf q foot-note ascribing It's creation
is grief at the death of 2 relative, is
& hi known Is M Irish National
q 8, q