Bibiel Hears Things: Kim Robertson – “Lord Galloway’s Lamentation”

Hey people! Today I thought I would share with you a traditional tune that’s got a bit of a strange history to it. From the title of it, one could easily expect it to be Scottish – Galloway is, after all, a region of Scotland. But it’s actually Irish, and the “Galloway” is more than likely a corruption of Galway. Already the first collection of tunes that it appears in misspells the name as “Gallaway”. The lament later travelled to London and Scotland as well, and in London it got further mangled to “Galloway”. This lament is attributed to Turlough O’Carolan, the famous blind Irish harper, many of whose tunes I’ve shared on this blog over the years in different interpretations. However, that too is probably wrong. Irish musicologist and historian Donal O’Sullivan, whose study of O’Carolan’s life and work remains the most authoritative source, could find no real evidence that the piece was authored by him. According to him, there’s no credible Lord Galway person that he could have been…