Loch Lomond

Title: Loch Lomond
Artist(Band): Rosalind McAllister







By yon bonnie banks and by yon bonnie braes
Where the sun shines bright on Loch Lomond
Where me and my true love will ne-er meet again
(alternate: Where me and my true love were ever lak/wont to gae)
On the bonnie, bonnie banks o’ Loch Lomon'.

Chorus:
O ye’ll tak’ the high road, and I'll tak' the low road
And I’ll be in Scotland afore ye
For me and my true love will ne-er meet again
On the bonnie, bonnie banks o’ Loch Lomon'.
‘Twas there that we parted in yon shady glen
On the steep, steep sides o’ Ben Lomon'
Where in (soft) purple hue, the hielan hills we view
And the moon comin’ out in the gloamin’.

Chorus
The wee birdies sing and the wild flowers spring
And in sunshine the waters are sleeping
But the broken heart, it kens nae second spring again
Tho’ the waeful may cease frae their greetin'.
(alternate: Tho' the world knows not how we are grieving)

Chorus

The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
 
"The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond", or simply "Loch Lomond" for short, is a well-known traditional Scottish song (Roud No. 9598). It was first published in 1841 in Vocal Melodies of Scotland.[1]

Loch Lomond is a large Scottish loch located between the traditional counties of Dunbartonshire and Stirlingshire. The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond is often the final piece of music played during an evening of revelry (a disco or dinner, etc.) in Scotland, a phenomenon not seen in other parts of the United Kingdom.

Origins
Andrew Lang
 
About 1876, the Scottish poet and folklorist Andrew Lang wrote a poem based on the song titled "The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond". The title sometimes has the date "1746" appended[2]--the year of the defeat of Bonnie Prince Charlie's rebellion and the hanging of some of his captured supporters. Lang's poem begins:

There's an ending o' the dance, and fair Morag's safe in France,
And the Clans they hae paid the lawing,
Morag--great one in Gaelic--referred to Bonnie Prince Charlie, who fled to France after his forces were defeated.[3] Lawing means reckoning in Scottish dialect. The poem continues:

And the wuddy has her ain, and we twa are left alane,
Free o' Carlisle gaol in the dawing.
Wuddy means gallows, according to Lang's own notes on the poem; dawing is dawn.[4] The poem continues with the song's well-known chorus, then explains why the narrator and his true love will never meet again:

For my love's heart brake in twa, when she kenned the Cause's fa',
And she sleeps where there's never nane shall waken
The poem's narrator vows to take violent revenge on the English:

While there's heather on the hill shall my vengeance ne'er be still,
While a bush hides the glint o' a gun, lad;
Wi' the men o' Sergeant Môr shall I work to pay the score,
Till I wither on the wuddy in the sun, lad!
"Sergeant Môr" is John Du Cameron, a supporter of Bonnie Prince Charlie who continued fighting as an outlaw until he was hanged in 1753.[4]

Interpretation

There are many theories about the meaning of the song. One interpretation is that it is attributed to a Jacobite Highlander who was captured after the 1745 rising. The English played games with the Jacobites, and said that one of them could live and one would die. This is sung by the one who was sentenced to die, the low road referred to being the passage to the underworld. Some believe that this version is written to a lover who lived near the loch.

Another interpretation is that the song is sung by the lover of a captured rebel set to be executed in London following a show trial. The heads of the executed rebels were then set upon pikes and exhibited in all of the towns between London and Glasgow in a procession along the "high road" (the most important road), while the relatives of the rebels walked back along the "low road" (the ordinary road travelled by peasants and commoners).

It captures some of the romantic spirit of the lost cause of Bonnie Prince Charlie.[5]