Just Irish Music

The Night Before Larry Was Stretched — A Gallows Ballad of Wit, Grit, and Irish Black Humour “The Night Before Larry Was Stretched” is one of Ireland’s most unique and compelling traditional ballads. A product of early 19th-century Dublin street balladry, this song stands apart from the usual sorrowful laments of Irish rebel tradition. Instead of weeping over a doomed hero, it gives us Larry — a condemned rogue, full of wit and mischief, facing his final hours with a mix of gallows humour, bravado, and undeniable charm. The ballad is set in a prison cell on the eve of Larry’s execution. His friends have come to visit, to drink, smoke, and say farewell. What follows is a vivid, humorous, and strangely human portrait of a man who knows the rope is ready for him at dawn — yet refuses to let despair take hold. He jokes, he drinks, he reminisces. Larry isn’t just a prisoner; he’s a symbol of the Irish spirit — defiant even in the face of death. This version remains true to the tone of t...

The Lakes of Pontchartrain – A Timeless Story in Song “The Lakes of Pontchartrain” is one of the most haunting pieces in the old folk tradition, travelling across time, oceans, and cultures. Most people today associate the ballad with Ireland, because countless singers in the Irish folk revival brought it to new audiences. However, the scene in this song is firmly set in Louisiana. The lonely traveller is far from home, broke, and facing a future with no certainty. He is taken in by a Creole girl who shows him kindness when everyone else looks the other way. That mix of hospitality, heartbreak, and quiet gratitude is what gives the song its lasting emotional weight. The song seems to have appeared sometime in the early 1800s. It likely grew out of the chaotic period after the War of 1812, when soldiers, sailors, traders, and drifters moved restlessly through the American South. New Orleans was a port full of goodbyes. The wilderness around the lakes could be beautiful one moment and ...

The Croppy Boy is one of the most haunting and sorrow-filled rebel ballads to survive from the 1798 Rebellion. It tells the personal story of a young Irish volunteer — a “croppy,” named for the cropped hair worn by the United Irishmen — who stands proud for Ireland, only to be betrayed, condemned, and executed. Unlike the big broad histories of empires and armies, this ballad is intimate. It speaks through the voice of one doomed man — and through him, it speaks for thousands. The imagery in the lyrics is devastatingly direct. The song begins in the bright freshness of spring — birds singing, Ireland seemingly alive with hope — but the mood shifts instantly as the Yeoman cavalry seize him and drag him before Lord Cornwall. From there, the betrayal tightens like a noose: not only soldiers, not only magistrates, but his own kin turn against him. A cousin sells his life for a single guinea. A father denies him on the gallows. His mother tears her hair in grief. The tragedy is...

The Fenian Boy — The True Story of Billy Byrne of Ballymanus The Fenian Boy is a ballad rooted not in legend or romantic invention, but in hard Irish history. Billy Byrne of Ballymanus was a living man — a Wicklow farmer, born into ordinary soil, who made an extraordinary choice during the Rising of 1798. When the Crown demanded loyalty, when neighbours took the oath to save their own lives and livelihoods, Billy refused. He would not kneel. He would not sign. He would not surrender his country for safety or coin. The story of Billy Byrne has survived not because he led armies — but because he embodied the quiet, stubborn integrity that terrified empires more than muskets ever could. While his own brother swore the redcoat oath, Billy would rather face the scaffold than confess submission. For that defiance he was betrayed — not by an English rifle, but by whiskey-loosened tongues and fearful men in dark corners. He was dragged to Wicklow Gaol, tried in haste, and hanged in 1799. H...

The Echo of Sixteen — A Ballad Remembering the 1916 Rising The Echo of Sixteen is an original Irish ballad that honours the leaders, volunteers, and ordinary citizens who stood against the British Empire in the Easter Rising of 1916. It is a song set not in myth, but in the real streets of Dublin — where history shifted in smoke, blood, and fire. The ballad opens with the city stirring to rebellion in Easter Week. From the soot-blackened tenements to the granite pillars of the General Post Office , the Citizen Army and Irish Volunteers raised the green flag and claimed the right of a nation to exist. The song invokes the names that still command reverence — Patrick Pearse , James Connolly , Thomas MacDonagh , Joseph Plunkett — but it never forgets the unnamed men, the young messengers, the women who ran dispatches under fire, and the civilians caught in the crossfire. They were the people who, in that moment, believed Ireland could be free. The verses echo the devastation of t...

Whispers from the Coffin Ships — A Great Famine Ballad of Exile, Silence & the Sea Whispers from the Coffin Ships is a haunting Irish famine ballad set during the darkest years of 1845–1852 — when millions of Irish souls were starved out of their homeland, and another million fled across the Atlantic on vessels so deadly they were remembered not as emigrant ships, but as coffin ships . This piece stands as a lament for those who left Ireland half-alive, and those who never arrived at all. The ballad blends acoustic guitar, tin whistle, and violin to paint a bleak but truthful picture of forced emigration — cottages left in ruin, families torn from hearth and kin, children dying from fever before landfall, and the cold indifference of empire. Each verse is rooted in history: seized crops, sealed grain stores, mass evictions, and landscapes scarred by famine roads. In this interpretation, human-directed AI visuals deepen the storytelling — pairing every lyric with imagery of salt-...

“ Whiskey in the Jar ” is one of the most beloved and widely performed traditional Irish folk songs, immortalized by generations of singers from the hills of Kerry to the pubs of Dublin — and far beyond. Known for its rollicking melody and defiant lyrics, the song tells the tale of a highwayman who robs a military officer and is later betrayed by his lover. Sometimes set around Kilgary Mountain (or Kilmagenny, depending on the version), the story follows the classic theme of rebellion, romance, and betrayal. The protagonist, often referred to as a bold Irish rover or a highwayman, steals gold from a British officer — typically “Captain Farrell” — only to be turned in by his sweetheart, Molly or Jenny. In many renditions, her betrayal leads to his capture or death, though some versions allow him to escape. What makes “Whiskey in the Jar” endure is its infectious chorus and the blend of humour, tragedy, and pride. The title line — “Musha ring dum a doo dum a da” — is instantly recogni...

The Maid of Mourne Shore — An Irish Ballad of Love, Loss & Departure The Maid of Mourne Shore is one of Ireland’s most tender and bittersweet traditional ballads — a song of unreturned love and exile set along the beautiful, windswept coast of County Down. Its verses combine the quiet poetry of the countryside with the ache of separation that echoes through so many Irish songs. The story follows a young man who wanders the hills and dales by Mourne’s fair shore , remembering days of youth spent fishing and courting. When he visits his beloved to ask her heart, she gently turns him away — her promise already given to a sailor boy across the sea. Though the rejected lover warns that the sea may take her sailor, she stands firm in loyalty: “If the sea proves false to me, no other lad I’ll enjoy.” The song then shifts from affection to farewell. The young man bids goodbye to Lord Edmund’s leafy groves and the linen greens of the Mourne countryside — scenes of peace and industr...

Who is Ireland's Enemy..Not Russia, France nor Austria — Ireland’s Cry of Wrath and Memory Not Russia, France nor Austria is one of the fiercest patriotic poems ever composed in the Irish tradition — a thunderous indictment of England’s centuries of conquest and cruelty in Ireland. Written in the voice of the dispossessed and the dead, it spares no detail and softens no truth. The poem begins with a striking declaration: Ireland’s suffering did not come from distant empires. “ Not Russia, France nor Austria — they forged for her no chains. ” Her destroyer was closer to home. Across each verse, the poet calls out the long litany of wrongs: the murder of Shane O’Neill , the poisoning of Owen Roe , the slaughter of priests, children, and innocents, and the burning of villages from Clare to Donegal . It’s a roll call of grief stretching over “twice four hundred years,” until, as the poet writes, “every blade of Irish grass was wet with blood and tears.” Yet behind the rage lie...

The Vow of Tipperary — A Defiant Ballad of Ireland’s Rebel Heart The Vow of Tipperary is one of the great rebel anthems of 19th-century Ireland — a proud declaration of independence born from betrayal and courage. Its verses call out from Carrick streets to the Shannon shore , summoning the sons of Tipperary to stand as one and cast off the yoke of empire. The song opens as a rallying cry that sweeps across the Irish landscape — from Slievenamon to Galtymore , from Longford Pass to Ballindeary — every mountain and field answering the call. It unites a people long divided by poverty and politics beneath one simple, sacred promise: “Never to list in British ranks.” In just a few verses, the ballad captures centuries of struggle. Ireland’s young men had fought in Britain’s wars — on European battlefields and distant colonies — shedding their blood for a crown that rewarded them only with tyrant laws and eviction from their own homes. When they returned to Tipperary, they found h...

Gráinne Mhaol’s Lament — A Satirical Visual Chronicle of Ireland’s Occupation Gráinne Mhaol’s Lament re-imagines the life and legend of Gráinne Ní Mháille (Grace O’Malley) — Ireland’s fearless “Pirate Queen” of the 16th century — through the lens of satire and sorrow. Rather than the usual heroic ballad, this modern lament becomes a visual and musical chronicle of Ireland’s long occupation: proud, defiant, and bitterly aware of the cost of resistance. Born into the chieftain family of Umhaill in County Mayo, Gráinne commanded ships and men at a time when women were expected to obey rather than lead. She traded, raided, and fought to preserve Irish autonomy along the western coast while Elizabethan forces tightened their grip on the land. In legend she became the embodiment of Irish defiance — a woman who would parley with a queen yet never bow to one. In Gráinne Mhaol’s Lament , that defiance is refracted through art and irony. The song and imagery weave together scenes of bu...

Skibbereen — An Irish Famine Ballad of Loss, Exile & Eviction Skibbereen stands among the most heartbreaking of all Irish ballads — a father’s story told to his son about why they left their homeland. It is a song born from the Great Famine (An Gorta Mór) of the 1840s, when hunger, eviction, and exile scarred every parish in Ireland. In the ballad, a young man asks his father why they now live in exile. The old man answers with quiet pain: their home in Skibbereen, County Cork was destroyed, their crops failed, and their people starved while landlords seized the land. Soldiers came “to drive us from our home,” and his wife — the boy’s mother — died in the chaos that followed. Every verse deepens the tragedy. The father’s memories are not just personal; they are the voice of an entire nation cast adrift. The famine years saw more than a million Irish people die, and another million forced to sail for America, never to return. Through the song’s haunting refrain — “And th...

The Hills of Connemara — A Poitín Ballad from Ireland’s Wild West The Hills of Connemara is one of Ireland’s liveliest traditional songs — a spirited celebration of the old art of poitín-making , the illicit distillation of homemade whiskey that once sustained families across the rugged West. Set among the misty mountains and bogs of Connemara, County Galway , the song tells of the quick-witted moonshiners who outsmarted the taxmen and kept Ireland’s spirit — in every sense — alive. The verses follow the frantic energy of a poitín raid: “Keep your eyes well peeled today, The excise men are on their way…” With humor and defiance, the singer describes hiding barrels in streams, rolling casks down hills, and warning the neighbors as the lawmen approach. It’s half chase-song, half celebration — a musical wink to a centuries-old cat-and-mouse game between the people and authority. Beneath the laughter lies something deeper: a reflection of Irish resilience and independence. For ma...

The West’s Awake — A Cry of Freedom from Ireland’s Western Heart The West’s Awake is one of the great anthems of Irish nationalism — a song that rouses the sleeping spirit of the western counties to remember their courage, their pride, and their duty to a free Ireland. Written by the 19th-century patriot Thomas Davis , founder of The Nation newspaper, the song appeared during the Young Ireland movement — a time when poetry and song were weapons of conscience against British rule. In the ballad, Davis calls to the long-silent West — Connacht, Clare, and Kerry , lands that had suffered centuries of invasion, famine, and silence. “Long, long the West’s asleep,” he writes, lamenting how its proud people have been subdued by poverty and despair. Yet the song is no elegy — it’s a call to rise. He recalls how the West once rose for freedom: the men of 1798, the defenders of faith and land, those who refused to bend the knee. The refrain — “The West’s awake!” — is both prophecy and c...

O’Sullivan’s Return — A Ballad of Homecoming and Tragedy O’Sullivan’s Return is one of the most powerful narrative ballads in the Irish tradition — a song that begins in hope and ends in heartbreak. It tells of a chieftain returning to his ancestral home in Beara , West Cork, after long years in exile. As his ship draws near the coast, he looks toward his castle with tears in his eyes, dreaming of reunion with family, clan, and country. The early verses are filled with emotion and anticipation. O’Sullivan imagines the joyful welcome awaiting him: banners shaking in his great hall, the clasp of loyal hands, and the sound of his people’s cry — “O’Sullivan abú!” — echoing across the shore. He envisions not only homecoming, but freedom: Ireland rising once again, the Norman oppressors driven out, and Desmond and all Éire restored. But the sea, so calm at day’s end, turns violent as darkness falls. A sudden storm rises — almost as if the wind itself heard his proud vow. The ship is s...

The Fairy Child is one of Ireland’s most tender and sorrowful ballads — a song that drifts between heartbreak and hope. Written in the 19th century and attributed to the poet Samuel Lover , it tells the story of a mother whose little boy is stolen by the fairies, leaving behind a frail changeling in his place. Her song is both a lament and a prayer — an appeal to the unseen world for the return of her “fairy boy.” Unlike many lively Irish tunes, The Fairy Child moves slowly and softly, with each verse painting a scene of quiet tragedy. We see the golden-haired child sleeping on his mother’s breast, the robin singing outside, the flicker of the rushlight dying, and finally the lonely midnight when the mother realises her true son has gone. The ballad carries the unmistakable mark of Irish folklore, where joy and sorrow often share the same breath — the living world and the Otherworld forever intertwined. Yet even through grief, the song finds light. In its final verses, the mot...

Lanigan’s Ball is one of the liveliest and most comical songs in the Irish folk tradition — a whirlwind of music, dancing, and pure mischief. Written in the 1850s by the Irish songwriter Dion Boucicault , it tells the story of young Lanigan , a proud Dubliner who throws a grand party after returning home from a trip abroad. Determined to impress the neighbours, he “borrowed the company’s hall” and set out to host the greatest dance the town had ever seen. The song is set to a fast, playful rhythm that captures the chaos of the evening — fiddles flying, feet stamping, tempers flaring, and laughter echoing through the hall. As the verses unfold, the guests dance wildly, fights break out, bottles clink, and poor Lanigan’s grand night spirals into hilarious bedlam. By dawn, the once-fancy gathering has turned into a tangle of bruised egos and broken furniture, yet no one regrets a moment of it. Like many Irish comic ballads, Lanigan’s Ball carries more than humour — it celebrates t...

  Finnegan’s Wake — A Comic Masterpiece of Irish Wit Finnegan’s Wake is one of Ireland’s most beloved and light-hearted ballads — a song that turns tragedy into laughter. It tells the story of Tim Finnegan, a Dublin labourer with a fondness for whiskey, who falls from a ladder to his apparent death. At his wake, the mourners drink, fight, and spill whiskey over his body — only for Finnegan to spring back to life with a roar for another drop. Originally written in the mid-1800s, the song became a favourite in Irish pubs and music halls across the world. Its chorus, “ Whack fol the dah! ”, captures the humour and resilience that run deep in Irish storytelling — the ability to face hardship with a grin and a glass raised high. Finnegan’s Wake reminds us that in Irish music, even death can be outwitted by laughter, community, and LYRICS Tim Finnegan lived in Walkin Street A gentle Irishman mighty odd He’d a beautiful brogue so rich and sweet To rise in the world he carried a ho...