{"id":6362,"date":"2020-11-02T16:22:58","date_gmt":"2020-11-02T16:22:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/?page_id=6362"},"modified":"2022-05-02T10:30:40","modified_gmt":"2022-05-02T10:30:40","slug":"nora-magee","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/index.php\/nora-magee\/","title":{"rendered":"Nora Magee"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
AKA<\/strong><\/td>Sweet Norah Magee
Nora McGee etc
Come back to old Ireland<\/td><\/tr>
First Published<\/td>c1870-75<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Writer\/composer<\/td>Harry Linn?<\/td>Roud<\/strong><\/td>RN4718<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Music Hall Performers<\/strong><\/td>Harry Linn<\/td><\/tr>
Folk performances<\/strong><\/td>Source Singers<\/strong>
Smylie, Jock \/ John Brennan 1938 N. Ireland : Co. Antrim
O’Keefe, Art 1947 Ireland : Co. Kerry
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From Harry Linn's Fire Side Song Book 1880<\/strong>\n\nNora, dear Nora, I can't live without you\nWhat made you leave me to cross the wide sea?\nNorah, dear Norah, oh! why did you doubt me\nThe world seems so dark and so dreary to me?\nWhy from old Ireland have you been a ranger\nWhy have you chosen the wide world to roam\nWhy did you go to the land of the stranger,\nAnd leave your own Barney alone, all alone?\n \nCome back to old Ireland the home of your childhod\nThe old village well, and the old willow tree,\nCome back to the mountain the valley the wild wood\nI can't live without you, sweet Norah Magee.<\/em>\n\nWhat have I done that my Norah should leave me?\nOh! how I loved her, and thought that she knew,\nHer leaving old Ireland, so sadly would grieve me,\nWas she afraid that my heart was not true?\nWhy was I silent when I might have spoken\nAnd told her my heart was her own, all her own\nA true Irish heart that is shattered and broken\nWhy did she leave her own Barney alone?\n\nI wander all day by the field and the farm.\nI wander at night by the hill and the dell.\nLife's all a blank, it has lost all of its charm\nHow I loved Norah, no tongue e'er could tell\nStill I must wait while the pain here is burning,\nI'll watch and I'll pray, when the wild billows roar\nThat the ship may be safely with Norah returning.\nBack to old Ireland and Barney once more.<\/pre>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
As Norah Magee <\/em>appears in his songbook we can reasonably assume that this was a song in the repertoire of Harry Linn<\/a> and its pretty certain that he wrote this song. Several songs were published between 1870 and 1920 with similar names, or called Come back to old Ireland <\/em>so its not always easy to be certain its this song.   Newspaper searches indicate that various amateur and professional singers were singing a song called Norah MaGee<\/em> from 1875 on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Norah Magee<\/em>  was remembered by traditional singers from Ireland in the mid-20th century: collected by Sam Henry who described it as “a song very popular in the 1870s<\/em>.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thanks go to Rosa Michaelson<\/a>, who  has found further information about this song:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I have just found 4 of Harry Linn\u2019s songs listed on the back of a copy of James Kerr\u2019s \u201cCollection of Reels, Strathspeys, Highland Schottisches, Country Daces, Jigs, Hornpipes, Flirtations, etc. arranged for the Pianoforte\u201d in the National Library of Scotland. This music is found in Mr Moffat\u2019s Owner Bound Music Volume, which has the date May 1883 inscribed inside the frontispiece. The songs listed are: \u201cI love the Bonnie Lassie\u2019s, The Grass Will Grow Again\u201d, \u201cThe Highlandman\u2019s Toast\u201d and <\/em>\u201cCome Back to Old Ireland\u201d<\/strong>. <\/strong>This means that Kerr had published these songs by at the latest 1883. In addition, so far the earliest date I have found for any of Kerr\u2019s publications is 1879.”<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n