Cuckoo in the nest
Edward Bunting is the first authority to identify the tune Bonny Cuckoo (an Chuaichín Mhaiseach)
as the tune of an tSí Bheag is an tSí Mhór and he left note that the Fairy Queen was not made by
Carolan originally but adapted by him as an instrumental piece for the harp and not intended for
words.
The first two sections of the Fairy Queen are in fact the tune of the song Ciste nó Stór (chest or
store, ie wealth or possessions) but the last two sections seem like additions for the harp. Carolan
was certainly not against working with pre-existent music: his lyric Seabhac na hÉirne, the Hawk of
Ballyshannon, is set to Ruaidhrí Dall Ó Catháin's Port Atholl. But it might be strange to add
divisions to a popular song and, without a new lyric, give the whole a completely different title for
no reason.
One possible reason is that the song Ciste nó Stór was Carolan's basis for his first song an tSí
Bheag agus an tSí Mhór. In both lyrics, the last rhyming vowel of each verse is the same and,
perhaps as a deliberate reference, the line 'is coinnigh do chos is do lámh uainn' appears at the
same point in the fullest version of an tSí Bheag is an tSí Mhór as does the famous line 'is coinnigh
dhuit féin ón mbás mé' in Ciste nó Stór. Bunting gives 'Sí Mór' as a masculine term but it is
unquestionably feminine in the surviving lyric; the fairy queen could be the voice of the Sí Mhór.
The similarity of the tunes of Ciste nó Stór and the Bonny Cuckoo would make any musical
confusion understandable: Carolan could have sung his first song to either tune. However, the
scan of the lyric of an tSí Bheag is an tSí Mhór fits the tune of Ciste nó Stór as closely as the lyric
of the Bonny Cuckoo fits the Bonny Cuckoo tune. Both lyrics are less musically successful when
the tunes are swapped round.
It might be that Carolan modified the metre of the melody of the Bonny Cuckoo slightly and added
a second part so that it would suit a song on the model of Ciste nó Stór such as an tSí Bheag is an
tSí Mhór. Bunting's tradition may be accurate.
Whatever the case, the fairy queen title has been associated with Carolan's set of Ciste nó Stór,
leading to the tune's appearance in two places in Mulholland's A Collection of Ancient Irish Airs
adapted for the Harp, Violin, Flute and Pipes (1810) under both titles 'Bainrioghuin na
siothbhraca' and 'Hide me from death' (ie, Coinnigh dhuit féin ón mbás mé, the other title for Ciste
nó Stór).
Fairy Queen
Cuckoo in the nest