THEY cancelled the Oxford versus Cambridge boat race this year. The one, you know, where a cox at the stern shouts “In-out-in-out” to a floating pencil-load of university students who respond energetically to this suggestive and unmusical exhortation. What’s wrong with them? Have they never heard of a rowing song? Have they no aesthetic interests whatsoever?
Is their sense of rhythm only stimulated by what Lady Mountbatten memorably described as the “hydraulics’ of love?”. She enjoyed the chase, but apparently found the inevitable conclusion tiresome. Well so she would if it were practised in the manner of the boat race.
But there is a better way. The iorram – Gaelic for a rowing song. There is one local to where I live and it’s a great help in increasing efficiency and overcoming exhaustion if you’ve a long row and worsening weather.
Chaidh na fir a Sgathabhaig, fàill ill o ho-rò
Tha’n là’n diugh fuar ac’, o hì ho-rionn o
Hi ri ri ho-rò-o gù, fàill ill o ho-rò
The men have gone to Scavaig;
It’s a cold day for them.
There are different kinds
of rowing song according to the weather and the human cargo – and there are also ones about love. Among the most famous is Beinn a’ cheathaich,
known also as Kishmul’s Galley, celebrating MacNeil’s ship as she is brought in
to harbour.
This is a waulking song used for the hard work of fulling tweed, but it shares its rhythm with rowing songs and it describes MacNeil of Barra’s galley or birlinn as it makes its way to Kishmul Castle, the stronghold of the MacNeils, set on a rock
at Castlebay.
These Highland birlinns were smaller faster versions of the Viking longboat and required tremendous skill in handling, whether under oars or under sail. The song is more than 300 years old and is attributed to NicIain Fhinn who is proud to claim:
Cha sìninn mo thaobh geal ri taobh balaich shuaraich;
B’ annsa leam agam fear geal nach biodh gruaim air.
I would never stretch my white body beside a mean boy;
I’d rather have a fine good-tempered man.
Many waulking songs had snatches of older songs embedded in them, but much was improvised on the spur of the moment and there was often laughter
and teasing.
It was unlucky to repeat a song while still working the same length of cloth, and some lengths took well over an hour to bring to the right condition.
The songs were sung exclusively by women and you may imagine the hilarity this allowed as the women and girls took it in turns to improvise
the verses.
According to the Scottish writer Martin Martin, an English sea-captain chanced on women waulking cloth, back in the late 17th century and truly believed he had entered a madhouse. One can imagine that the moment he showed his face, the women thought him
fair game.
Something like it happened to me once. I was lecturing to a women’s group for the Workers Educational Association. I mentioned Bronze Age rattles symbolising a bull’s testicles, and described the sound. The lady next to me turned to her neighbour and declared loudly: “Ma man’s dinnae go tinkle tinkle!”
That was that. The “lecture” evolved into an evening of uninhibited ribaldry and I,
being the only male present, was not spared! If only they’d known a waulking song, they could have gone to town with it.
IN between the lines of the verses of these work songs are chorus lines with meaningless words. But they are memorable and, to help the work and raise the spirits, have always a wonderful energy and swing to them:
Air far al a leò ro ho bhì ò, hoireann is ò ho rò bhi o ho, hi rì ho ro ho bha ò hug ò.
You can hear a splendid lively version of Beinn a’ cheathaich by Christine Primrose with Duncan MacGillivray on moothie
and Robin Morton on bodhran, both apparently allowed in beside NicIain Fhinn and good luck to them! It’s on Christine Primrose’s tu nam chuimhne, Temple Records COMD2024.
Another proud waulking song is An Fhideag Airgid – The Silver Whistle. The refrain is beautifully shaped, a rising welcome balanced by a more modest and tender phrase.
It was composed just at the time Prince Charles landed on the island of Eriskay on July 18, 1745.
Who will sound the silver chanter
Now that my King’s son has come to Scotland?
On a great ship across the waves
On a stately ship with silver rigging?
Who if not I?
One of the most beautiful of rowing songs is Thoir mo shoraidh thar Ghunaigh – Bear My Farewell Across Gunna Sound. This is a rowing song for a boat carrying the coffin of a girl whose lover is “so distraught at her death that he wishes he had never laid eyes
on her.”
That’s how Anne Lorne Gillies puts it in her quite wonderful collection Songs of Gaelic Scotland – a book full of beauty, complete texts and translations, copious and knowledgeable notes, and references to recordings.
This is a slow rowing song – a coffin is no light load and not to be rowed lightly either. It has a deeply affecting melody and a chorus Hug òireann o rò hù bha hò which means nothing and everything.
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