Loch Lomond

The torches come out and you know what time it is, we get to play Loch Lomond! Always a great sing-a-long and we love the reaction from the crowd everytime, this version shows Loch Lomond at our own Rapalje Zomerfolk Festival played on saturday after dark.

Background Info – Loch Lomond

There are several stories surrounding this song, David Myles looked into the history and was able to find the facts to tell our story about the song. “The Bonnie Banks o ‘Loch Lomond”, or “Loch Lomond” for short, is a well-known traditional Scottish song first published in 1841 in Vocal Melodies of Scotland. The track prominently features Loch Lomond, Scotland’s largest lake, located between the counties of West Dunbartonshire, Stirling and Argyll and Bute. In Scottish, “bonnie” means “beautiful”, often in reference to a lady.

Loch Lomond is anything but a sweet Scottish song of love, written by a Jacobite highlander at the time of the Jacobite Rebellion.

The last serious battle of the war between Scotland and England took place on the field of Culloden. Now known as “the Battle of Culloden” The Jacobite Rebellion was an important time in Scotland; this ended at the battle of Culloden in 1746.

The Jacobites were created when the Roman Catholic King James II was dethroned from the English throne by the Protestant Dutch stadtholder William III of Orange, who was married to a daughter of James II, Maria Stuart. The Jacobites were part of the political movement that aimed to restore the Roman Catholic Stuart King James II of England and his heirs to the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland.

A superior English army defeated the weary and hungry Jacobite army on April 15, 1746, chasing and crushing the Jacobites without mercy. The Battle of Culloden was the last major battle on British soil.

The Privy Council in London had decided that prisoners of the uprising in Scotland should be tried in England. The Jacobite prisoners were transported to Tilbury Fort for trial. Many were found guilty and executed in the most vile ways possible, prisoners were sold, bartered, deported, died of disease and some were pardoned.

Once the execution was completed, to set an example to anyone who would walk out of line, the bodies and especially the heads on the tops of spikes were put on display in all the cities between London and Glasgow in a monstrous procession. The loved ones and families who watched the trial had to walk back to Scotland along the same route.

“The Low Road” is the normal road on Earth and “The High Road” is the road in the sky you take when you’re dead.

Farewell to the Creeks

It is an old pipe tune called “Farewell to the Creeks”.The tune was written by a Pipe Major J.B. Robinson from the Gordon’s who was captured at Le Cateau in August 1914 as the German Army swept into France. “Creeks” referred to in the tune are at Portknockie on the Mory Firth in Scotland. In 1943 a text was written on the melody by Hamish Henderson: Farewell Ye Banks O’Sicily

We play it with our torches and the bagpipes, after Loch Lomond we play “Farewell to the Creeks”. It’s in “The Scottish Guards.” It’s also a traditional Scottish tune.

Lyrics – Loch Lomond

By yon bonnie banks and by yon bonnie braes
Where the sun shines bright on Loch Lomond
Where me and my true love were ever wont to gae
On the bonnie, bonnie banks o’ Loch Lomond

Chorus:
O ye’ll tak’ the high road and I’ll tak’ the low road
And I’ll be in Scotland afore ye
But me and my true love will never meet again
On the bonnie, bonnie banks o’ Loch Lomond

‘t Was there that we parted in yon shady glen

On the steep, steep side o’ Ben Lomond
Where in deep purple hue, the hieland 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 waefu’ may cease from their greeting

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