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Fair Creggan Churchyard

from Transcendence by Ilse de Ziah

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Fair Churchyard of Creggan (Úir Chill a’ Chreagáin)
The Aisling or vision poem sung to this melody was written by Art Mac Cumhaigh (1738?-1773). In the poem the poet falls asleep in Creggan cemetery where a fairy woman comes to him at daybreak with a kiss. She urges him to leave his sorrow and travel west with her to a sweet land of honey where the foreigners are not yet in control and he will be enchanted by sweet music. He would love to go, he says, but he cannot desert his wife and friends. The maiden tells him his friends mock his poetry and leave him impoverished. The poet asks her where she is from, and she answers;

Of fairy race I'm sprung;
It is I who stir music where
There are true poets - in Tara by deep
Night, by morning on the plains of Tyrone.

By the end he is softening when he says;

If it is foretold,
Princess, you are to be my love.
I would have to hold
You to an oath before we move
West on the road. Swear
That when I die, no matter where,
By the Shannon, the Isle of Man, in Egypt old,
I will be laid under in Creggan, its sweet soil above.

The song was often sung by mothers as they spun, as a way to vocalise their hopes and sorrows in times of oppression. The passages using harmonics gives expression to the otherworldly aspect of this Aisling.

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from Transcendence, released September 18, 2020
Ilse de Ziah composer, cello

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Ilse de Ziah Ireland

Irish-Australian cellist and composer Ilse de Ziah has a deep passion for composing, arranging and performing music for the cello. Using traditional Irish melodies as source material, she creates contemporary arrangements perfectly suited for the cello. With the marriage of classical detail and folkloric tradition, this makes for a transcendent musical experience. ... more

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