Ye Vagabonds - The Lowlands of Holland

 

 

      Brothers Brían and Diarmuid MacGloinn, of the Irish duo Ye Vagabonds, put their rich influences of Irish traditional music and Appalachian singing to good use on their version of this popular traditional song. Joined by Alan McFadden on harmonium, this performance was recorded during the Shaped by Music concert at Cape Breton Highlands Academy in Belle Côte on October 11, 2018.

The love that I have chosen, I’ll therewith be content

The salt sea shall be frozen, before that I repent

Repent it shall I never, until the day I die

For the Lowlands of Holland have twined my love and I.

My love lies in the salt sea, and I am on the side

Enough to break a young thing’s heart, what lately was a bride

What lately was a bonny bride, and pleasure in her eye

For the Lowlands of Holland have twined my love and I.

My love he built a bonny ship and set her on the sea

With seven score good mariners for to bear her company

But the weary winds began to rise, the sea began to rout

And my love then and his bonny ship turned withershins about.

There shall neither coif come on my head, nor comb come through my hair

There shall neither coal nor candle-light shine in my bower mair

Nor will I love another one, until the day I die

For the high winds and stormy seas have twined my love and I.

Oh hauld your tongue my daughter dear, be still and be content

There are mair lads in Galloway, ye need na sair lament

Oh there is nane in Galloway, there’s nane at a’ for me

For I never loved a love but one, and he’s drowned in the sea.

      The Lowlands of Holland is a Scottish folk song in which a young woman sings about her husband, who was conscripted or "pressed" by the English into an Anglo-Dutch conflict in the West Indies. Versions of the song exist in Ireland, Scotland and at times England, and several variants of the lyrics exist. The song variously describes the young man's conscription, the woman's grief at his death and her refusal to adorn herself or marry again, and sometimes a verse where the woman's mother advises her to find a new partner, or an account of the man's ship sinking.