It isnae me

"It isnae me" is a poem by Sally Holmes which was set to music by the English composer Edward Elgar in 1930.[1]

The poem was first printed in Country Life magazine, and the song published in 1931 by Keith Prowse & Co. Ltd, London.

It was written at Elgar's home, "Marl Bank", near Worcester, and was dedicated to the soprano Joan Elwes,[2] whom he had admired at Three Choirs Festival. The poem was performed by her in October 1930 at a concert in Dumfries, Scotland.

The poem is in the Scots language.

Lyrics

It isnae me that's keerin'—or no' an awfu' lot,
But—it's sair, whiles, mindin' things ye thocht ye had forgot.
An' when wee Tam the Fiddler played 'The Lea Rig'[3] doon the street,
I gie'd masel'a shock tae find that I wis near tae greet.

It isnae me that's keerin'—or no' for vera lang,
But—there's mony happy times awa' since last I heard yon sang.
An' someway—Och, I dinnae ken! I cannae say things richt—
I wish young Tam the Fiddler hadnae played yon sang last nicht.


Scots translations
  • keerin' = grieving, complaining
  • sair = sad
  • whiles = meanwhile
  • mindin' = remembering
  • wee = little, young
  • lea rig = meadow-ridge
  • gie'd masel' = gave myself
  • greet = cry
  • awa' = ago
  • dinnae ken = don't know

Recordings
gollark: Oh, no, I was just randomly saying that it would be neat if I had good autosummarization algorithms available.
gollark: Still it's a good enough bad pun that I am unlikely to change it.
gollark: It's my notes wiki thing and a bad pun.
gollark: It would be neat if I could make minoteaur™ automatically generate a rough summary of what a revision is about.
gollark: It's a shame text autosummarization or at least interesting-keyword-extraction is so apiologically hard.

References
  1. Kennedy, Michael (1968). Portrait of Elgar. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-315414-5.
  2. York Symphony Orchestra People. "Photograph of Joan Elwes".
  3. "'The Lea-Rig' by Robert Burns". Archived from the original on 2011-08-26. Retrieved 2008-07-21.
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