South Wind

5.South Wind 3:27
Traditional, compiled and edited by Donal O’Sullivan

In this Irish song (as in the Scottish song "Norland Wind"), a homesick person discusses their longing for their former home with the passing wind. In this case, the person is living in Munster, and in the first and third verses pines for their home country of Mayo (while stipulating that life in Munster isn't at all bad); the south wind answers in the second verse to boast of its warming influence and promise to help.

The tune was already well-known and widely played on its own when Archie Fisher showed up in the US circa 1976 with the words. On his Folk Legacy record, Man With a Rhyme, he gave the origins this way: "Composed by Donal O'Sullivan from the translation of the song by 'a native of Irrul, County Mayo, named Domhnall Meirgeach Mc Con Mara (Freckled Donal Macnamara)' and published in O'Sullivan's Songs of the Irish (Crown, New York, 1960)."

Played on tenor-treble concertina in Bb.