Wistful Sad Songs

[thescot]

I think music moves us like nothing else. Sad Gaelic tunes especially have that ability. When I hear the pipes or whistle play a mournful tune, it touches like nothing else. "Reel Around the Sun" by Maire Breatnach on the original River Dance will make you cry. Or "Caoineadh Cu Chulainn" form the same cd. Man!

here this:

William Congreve, in The mourning bride, 1697:

Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast,
To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak.
I've read, that things inanimate have mov'd,
And, as with living Souls, have been inform'd,
By Magick Numbers and persuasive Sound.
What then am I? Am I more senseless grown
Than Trees, or Flint? O force of constant Woe!
'Tis not in Harmony to calm my Griefs.
Anselmo sleeps, and is at Peace; last Night
The silent Tomb receiv'd the good Old King;
He and his Sorrows now are safely lodg'd
Within its cold, but hospitable Bosom.
Why am not I at Peace?

[DryFly]

Foggy Dew, The Chieftains w/ Sinead O'Connor

Amy Grant's "Raining on the Inside"

and Ten Years Gone, Led Zeppelin

[Lachlan09]

Another couple of songs which have run around inside my brain from time to time is a song by Fairport Convention, from their albums “Liege and Leif” (1969) and “Babbacombe Lee” (1973 ?).

Leige and Leif was a seminal album which largely put folk-rock on the map. The song which gets to me most is a band-written song called “Crazy Man Michael”. The words are self-explanatory and the melody is haunting.

Within the fire and out upon the sea
Crazy Man Michael was walking
He met with a raven with eyes black as coals
And shortly they were a-talking

"Your future, your future, I would tell to you
Your future, you often have asked me
Your true love will die by your own right hand
And Crazy Man Michael will cursed be"

Michael he ranted and Michael he raved
And beat at the four winds with his fists-oh
He laughed and he cried, he shouted and he swore
For his mad mind had trapped him with a kiss-oh

"You speak with an evil, you speak with a hate
You speak for the devil that haunts me
For is she not the fairest in all the broad land?
Your sorceror's words are to taunt me"

He took out his dagger of fire and of steel
And struck down the raven through the heart-oh
The bird fluttered long and the sky it did spin
And the cold earth did wonder and start-oh

"Oh, where is the raven that I struck down dead
That here'd lie on the ground-oh?
I see but my true love with a wound so red"
Her lover's heart it did pound-oh

Crazy Man Michael, he wanders and walks
And talks to the night and the day-oh
But his eyes they are sane and his speech it is clear
And he longs to be far away-oh

Michael he whistles the simplest of tunes
And asks the wild woods their pardon
For his true love is flown into every flower grown
And he must be keeper of the garden

Sad innit ?

“Babbacombe Lee” is a concept album telling the life story of John Lee, a late 19th Century man who joined the Royal navy as a boy and later took up many jobs, one being in Babbacombe, Torquay, Devon as handyman for an old lady called Emma Anne Keyes. After she was brutally murdered, Lee was arrested and tried and found guilty, despite the evidence being circumstantial. He was sentenced to hang at Exeter Gaol and on the fateful day, he went to meet his fate. Fate decided he should live however. Though working perfectly during testing, the gallows trap-door failed to open properly on 3 attempts to hang Lee. Staff hurried to repair the glitch and re-tested each time, but each time it opened just a little, causing Lee to choke, but not fatally. By the 3rd attempt, Lee was a wreck and just wanted to die and get it over with. However, it too failed and as English Law demanded 3 attempts only, Queen Victoria commuted his sentence to life imprisonment.

This little ballad/song imagines the scene in Lee’s condemned cell as the day of execution nears and what may have been going through his mind.

There's a tiny little window and the sun comes shining through
Dancing with the dust that's in my cell
There's a sparrow sitting on the sill and he stays for a minute or two
But he's frightened by the ringing of the bell

There's a bed that I must lie on when at night I take my rest
And a chair for me to sit on through the day
The men who wait beside me always know what's best
For a man who doesn't have too much to say

Throw a laugh into the corner, blow a tear against the wall
Learn a game to play, improve the mind
Confess your sins, you sinner, and think how the seconds fall
Leave all earthly cares and woes behind

And when my short affair with life is ended and I'm gone
Will you tell the world the story of John Lee?
All you see is nothing and yet everything lives on
I was born to pay the hangman's fee

Even as I write this, the simple melody and words make my eyes gloss over a bit !

[james a. husky]

"That's No Way To Say Goodbye".

Leonard Cohen.


I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
Your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm,
Yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new,
in city and in forest they smiled like me and you,
but now it's come to distances and both of us must try,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.

I'm not looking for another as I wander in my time,
walk me to the corner, our steps will always rhyme,
you know my loves goes with you as your love stays with me,
it's just the way it changes, like the shoreline and the sea,
but let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't untie,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.

I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm,
yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new,
in city and in forest, they smiled like me and you,
but let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't untie,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.


Ah... Memories...

Jim aka kiltiemon

[SoulFyre777]

Love Song by Five for Fighting has been playing through my head of late... The original version though... Slower...

[Woodsman]

For sad, wistful songs that you could make into a video or short film? My head went right to Harry Chapin - songs like Better Place to Be, Cat's in the Cradle, W*O*L*D, Taxi . . . they all tell a poignant story or situation.

I agree with this. Harry Chapin was one of my favorite singers. I had the please of seeing him twice in concert. So I had the pleasure too of shaking his hand twice and telling him I enjoyed the show because of his habit of greeting everyone after the show and signing shirts, etc. for his World Hunger cause.

On another note (no pun intended) I'm surprised on St. Patrick's Day that no one mentioned Danny Boy. I saw a TV program years ago where Eric Clapton covered the history of this song. He recorded many an Irish pub singer doing their renditions. I would love to get a copy of this on DVD but I can't find it anywhere and most people never even heard of it. At the end of the program Eric Clapton does his own rendition of Danny Boy and that, in my opinion, was a wistful sad song if there ever was.

[Lallans]

I
On another note (no pun intended) I'm surprised on St. Patrick's Day that no one mentioned Danny Boy. I saw a TV program years ago where Eric Clapton covered the history of this song. He recorded many an Irish pub singer doing their renditions. I would love to get a copy of this on DVD but I can't find it anywhere and most people never even heard of it. At the end of the program Eric Clapton does his own rendition of Danny Boy and that, in my opinion, was a wistful sad song if there ever was.

The Londonderry Air, which I mentioned, is the original title for what is now know as "Danny Boy".

[NewGuise]

Not songs but instrumentals: today I listened to Lament (for Derry), as I do every year at this time (among others), and the two that continue to stand out are "Plunkett" as performed on solo piano (rather than the usual harp) by Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin, and "O'Carolan's Farewell" a performed by the great, late Derek Bell of the Chieftains (on harp, although he also played piano). Either piece would qualify as a great sad, wistful piece of music, worthy of film.

I once lent the CD itself to a friend who ended up bringing it on a trip home to Ireland, where he visited Derek Bell, who saw the CD and asked about it. "You're on it," said my friend. "Am I any good?" asked Derek Bell.

He is very good.

[Jerry]

For sad songs, dog lovers can't beat "Old Shep", originally done by Red Foley, with a later narrative version by Walter Brennen. It tells the story of a man and dog who grew up together, and now the time has come for the man to have to put his dog down. It is especially sad to me because soon I'll have to face the same thing with "Chewy" my 12 year old mixed lab.I just learned last week he has a large tumor, which may be operable, but chances of survival are 50/50 at best.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dw9ce27sX1k

Most any country and western song. One which comes to mind is Ricky Van Shelton's "I'll leave This World Loving You".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=II3cVrOrqMo

Then there is Ray Charles version of "I Can't Stop loving You"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WU-MBTW86U8
"Blue Eyes Crying in The Rain" by Willie Nelson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJTsTwD587I

For the Good Times by Ray Price.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1ZKIX0ICZo

Angels Among Us By Alabama

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPgtSVXi63I

Old Flame also by Alabama

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otoqv34QCb4

And lastly There Were Roses, by Tommy Sands, written about the troubles in Northern Ireland

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omPltWNzLcM

[auld argonian]

The Londonderry Air, which I mentioned, is the original title for what is now know as "Danny Boy".

The most misty-eyed version of that was in Brassed Off when the band played it outside the hospital where their director was lying in bed suffering from black lung.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6F5vBsY9VZ8

...always gets me...

Best

AA