The Skye Boat Song - Scottish Song

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Description

Vocals by Farya Faraji. Most non-Scottish people like me will have known this song thanks to the Outlander TV show, which uses a more recent version of the lyrics written by Robert Louis Stevenson. The original lyrics used here were written by Sir Harold Edwin Boulton. The song dates to the late 18th century and describes the flight of Prince Charles Edward Stuart to the island of Skye after his defeat in the Battle of Culloden, where Scottish Jacobite rebels were defeated by the forces of the British Empire. The melody was recorded in writing by Anne Campbelle MacLeod in the 1870’s, based on her recollection of a folk melody sung by Gaelic speaking Scots. My a cappella rendition seeks to present the typical forms of harmonic polyphony typical of the West in the past two centuries: the main voice carries the tune while my additional voiced layered underneath provide a chord progression; this sort of a cappella harmonic arrangement is typical of Celtic traditions of Ireland and Scotland. This rendition is a capella, with only my voice and no instruments, but I’ll make a second arrangement with instruments in Gaelic lyrics at some point.

The song relates the aftermath of the Battle of Culloden, which was the culmination of the Jacobite rebellion, a Scottish-centered rebellion that sought to reinstate the House of Stuart, amiable to Catholics, to the British throne. In generations since the battle, the rebellion has become nationalised as part of Scottish identity and national pride.

Lyrics:
Speed, bonnie boat, like a bird on the wing,
Onward! the sailors cry;
Carry the lad that's born to be king
Over the sea to Skye.

Loud the winds howl, loud the waves roar,
Thunderclaps rend the air;
Baffled, our foes stand by the shore,
Follow they will not dare.

Many's the lad, fought on that day
Well the claymore did wield;
When the night came, silently lay
Dead on Culloden's field.

Though the waves leap, soft shall ye sleep,
Ocean's a royal bed.
Rocked in the deep, Flora will keep
Watch by your weary head.

Burned are our homes, exile and death
Scatter the loyal men;
Yet ere the sword cool in the sheath
Charlie will come again.