Beethoven and Saint Patrick's Day

[Michael]

Happy St. Paddy's Day to everybody. And you must be asking yourselves how could I connect St. Patrick with Ludwig van?
Well, it's a bit tenuous but one of B's folk-song arrangements was for a tune called "The Pulse of an Irishman", and the words go:

"And darkling confusion
Like mists from the river
Shall vanish forever
And true Irish hearts
With warm loyalty glow
And proud exaltation
Break forth from the nation
On Patrick's day in the mornin'"

In fact, the tune is known here as "St. Patrick's Day in the Morning".
And for good measure, my home town of Killarney is mentioned in two songs arranged by the great man. (Smirk!)
And now excuse me while I get drunk.

Michael

[PDG]

Hey Michael, don't get too drunk. You've already been roped in to pay for the entire evening out for all 114 members (& we all LOVE Guinness ). --- (see `Moonlight sonata` topic) ---

On a less serious (but more sober) note, isn't it odd that when Beethoven was commissioned to write his Scottish & Irish song arrangements, he was sent only the songs' music, & not their words? Okay, you could argue that he shouldn't have needed the words, but I can't believe he wasn't at least a tad curious about them.



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Peter (PDG)

[Rod]

Originally posted by PDG:
Hey Michael, don't get too drunk. You've already been roped in to pay for the entire evening out for all 114 members (& we all LOVE Guinness ). --- (see `Moonlight sonata` topic) ---

Make that 113 (see 'Moonlight sonata' topic). Strange have everybody here suddenly appears to be of Irish stock!

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"If I were but of noble birth..." - Rod Corkin