OUR special thanks go to Kimmo Vennonen and Bill Arnett for their support, and a very special thank you to Christine Primrose for help with Gaelic pronounciation (although I accept full responsibility for any mistakes that may have crept in), for her generosity and hospitality while the band was in Scotland, and especially for her heart-felt musicality that she was so happy to share.
Traditional
Arranged Eilean Mor
Tha mi'n duil, tha mi'n duil
Tha mi'n duil-sa bhith tileadh
Dh'ionnsaigh Dùthaich MhicLèoid
Far an og robh mi mire.
Fhuair sinn litrichean o'n righ
Gus sinn fhin dheanamh ullamh
Gos a dhol a-null d'on Fhraing
A chur braing 'san fhear-mhilidh.
Nuair a chuir iad sinn air tir
A-measg shiobain is murain
Thug sinn batal air an traigh
'S gun d'rinn pàirt againn fuireach.
Fhir a dh'imicheas do'n iar
Ged robh bliadhna mun ruig thu
Thoir an t-soiridh seo do m'gradh
Ma is slàn mi gun tig mi.
I expect, I expect
I expect to return
To the land of Macleod
Where I played when I was young
We got the letters from the king
So that we could prepare
To go over to France
To upset the destroyer
When they put us ashore
Among the waves and the sea-bent
We fought a battle on the beach
And some of us remained
You who travel to the West
Though it were a year before you arrive
Bring this greeting to my loved one
"If I am alive, I will come"
Tune and Lyrics Ruth Lee Martin
Arranged Eilean Mor
The cold seeps through your clothes, grabs fingers, touches skin
While the wind plays tag with rubbish in a bin
The colourless apartments forbidding and grim
But don't be fooled by the sights, music's in the sound.
A light rain patters down on the roofs, on the streets
Tyres on wet cobbles drum an odd-sounding beat
The roar of the buses, the people as they speak
But don't be fooled by the sights, music's in the sound.
There's a woman on a corner in the cold wintery dusk
She sells the 'Big Issue' just to make a crust
"Come on, Lady, buy it, it's a pound, it's a must"
But don't be fooled by the sights, music's in the sound.
Lights from the roundabout reflect in puddles on the path
That leads to the stairs, to The Mound, and the grass
Where a beggar sits forlorn, and a piper plays a march
But don't be fooled by the sights, music's in the sound.
Solid as the rock the castle sitting high
Canons in the New Year, while Auld Lang Syne
Echoes in the gardens, carries in the sky
But don't be fooled by the sights, music's in the sound.
Lyrics Robert Burns
Tune Ruth Lee Martin
Arranged Eilean Mor
O Can Ye Sew Cushions? And can ye sew sheets?
And can ye sing ballooloo when the bairn greets?
And hee and haw birdie, and hee and haw lamb;
And hee and haw, birdie, my bonnie wee lamb!
Chorus:
Ba li loo la I've little for you
Ba li loo la oh what will I do?
I biggit the cradle upon the treetop,
And aye as the wind blew, my cradle did rock.
And hush a baw baby, O ba lil li loo,
And hee and baw, birdie, my bonnie wee doo.
Now hush a baw lammie, and hush a baw dear,
Now hush a baw lammie, thy minnie is here.
The wild wind is ravin', thy minnie's heart sair,
The wild wind is ravin', but ye dinna care.
Sing bal la loo lammie, sing bal la loo dear,
Does wee lammie ken that its daddie's no here?
You're rockin' fu' sweetly on mammie's warm knee,
But daddie's a rockin' upon the saut sea.
Tune and Lyrics Ruth Lee Martin, (December 18, 2004, Edinburgh)
Arranged Eilean Mor
Caught between the North and South
Suspended high above the clouds
The air's so thin it's sometimes hard to breathe
I mark the longitude and latitude
And the complacent, off-hand attitude
No understanding lights the darkened eyes
The In-Between's a frozen place
A wasteland of encoded space
A place of myth, identity
And manufactured memory
The In-between's a formless land
Just barren plains and shifting sands
And all the time I'm hanging in between
Scents and sounds come floating back
I grasp elusive threads that snap
And try to hold the fragments in my hands
But the broken pieces won't align
They're from a distant fractured time
The captured moments slipping in the past
Sometimes in dreams I'm still the child
That knew the way, knew the style
But now the walls are threatening to fall
And coming here I watch the line
I trace the path and trace the time
The places, years, and spaces in between
Traditional
Arranged Eilean Mor
Mile marbhaisg air a' ghaol
Ho hi ri ri ri ri u
Asam fhìn a thug e chlaoidh
Ho hi u a ho hug o
Ho i u a ho i u
Hao ri u a ho hu go
Sgoilt e mo chridhe 'nam chom
Dh'fhuasgail e falt far mo chinn
Cha téid mi le Mac a' Mhaoir
Na idir le Mac an t-Saoir
Cha téid mise cha téid mi
Cha téid mi do ghin 'san tìr
Gus an till mo leannan fhìn.
A thousand curses now on love
That from me sapped all strength away
Within my body broke my heart
Loosed the hair from off my head
With the factor's son I will not go
Nor will I with the joiner's son
I will not go, I will not
I will not go with anyone in the land
Until my love returns.
Tune and Lyrics Ruth Lee Martin
Arranged Eilean Mor
She moves and she glides with the grace of a swan
Sense of the summer air
Her keel cuts the waves like a ribbon a song
Floats in white sails and then is gone.
Chorus:
Ilean o ro ho bha
E hoirean o ho ro eile
Ilean o ro ho bha
E hoirean o ho ro eile.
Raise your white sails
Raise your sails.
She moves and she dances on garlands of foam
Warm in the summer air
She runs with the whale, with the tide, and the breeze
Fills her white sails as she ploughs the sea.
Chorus
She moves with light rhythm on swells rocking deep
Soft on the summer air
She steers by the stars by the light of the moon
That ghosts the white sails, she remembers the tune.
Chorus