The translation of the title means “Go away home” or “home you’ll go.” A girl named Mary is told in no uncertain terms that she’d better “go away home and stay there because your (marriage) contract Is made.” It doesn’t matter whether or not she’s the one who made the contract; it’s done, and that’s it. Or, as the notes on one version of the sheet music say, “The girl, Mary, having been forced into an arranged marriage with a piper, is advised to go home and accept it.” Seems a little harsh, doesn’t it? And not the mood that would fit the rousing music. That meaning would mesh better with some kind of melancholy ballad, with perhaps the unhappy girl drowning herself at the end.
But I think this interpretation is mistaken. The website SongsInIrish.com says, “This traditional song teases the girl ‘Máire’ about her possible relationship with the piper at the dance. The singer and Máire argue back and forth about whether her ‘match is made.’”
So she’s told, “Marry the piper early at night/And you’ll have him in the morning,” a translation at odds with ours, which says, “Marry the piper at eventide and your contract will be made.” My knowledge of Irish Gaelic is a little rusty, so I don’t know which one is correct, but, again, the rather dour version seems a little off. The music lends itself much more to the idea that Mary is being teased, not coerced, with additional support for this view coming from the fact that Mary gives as good as she gets, as she keeps insisting, “My contract isn’t made.” The upbeat version has a scene that we’re all familiar with: an attraction has sparked between two people, perhaps at a party, others have noticed, and now the back-and-forth begins: “You know you like him!/No I don’t!”
Here are the lyrics for this version of the song:
Go home with you !
Go home with you !
Go home with you, Mary !
Go home with you and stay at home,
Because your match is made.It doesn’t matter who made it or who didn’t.
It doesn’t matter who made it, Mary.
It doesn’t matter who made it or who didn’t.
Because your match is made.Marry the piper !
Marry the piper !
Marry the piper, Mary !
Marry the piper early at night,
And you’ll have him in the morning.My match isn’t.
Your match is.
My match isn’t made.
Your match is,
My match isn’t.
Your match is made.
Just to make things even more confused, there’s another, very different variant of the song, which reads as follows:
the lights of the town are shining now
Tonight I’ll be dancing around
I’m off on the road to Galway now.
Look how she’s off on the town
She’s off on a search for sailors though
There’s fine fellas here to be found.
She’s never been one to stay at home
Home you’ll go and it’s there you’ll stay
And you’ve work to do in the morning.
Give up your dream of going away.
Forget your sailors in Galway.This version gives us a little different view of Mary, doesn’t it? Now she’s a total party girl, off to the bright lights of the town and lookin’ for love in all the wrong places. Who’s telling her to go home? Maybe the other women in the town, or her mother or grandmother(s). A scene with the respectable women of the town berating a young, pretty girl for her behavior is pretty common: I was irresistibly reminded of “Pick a Little/Talk a Little” from The Music Man in which the town matrons gossip about Marian the Librarian and her (in their minds, anyway) scandalous relationship with the man who “left River City the library building/But he left all the books to her.” We know that any true folk song (of which this seems to be one) will always have multiple versions, since they weren’t composed in any formal way and were passed down orally for some time before being written. One aspect or the other of the original story may be prominent in each variant. It almost seems to me, though (wild speculation alert) that what we have here is two entirely different songs that came to be sung to the same music. The party/romance aspect is present in both, but Mary’s behavior (promiscuous vs. flirting) and the advice she’s given (marry the piper vs. go home and do your work) are quite different. Well, I’m rooting for Mary and the piper to live a long happy life together. The whole question is left open, but the last words in our version are “Your contract is made,” so I guess the marriage will indeed take place, or the contract will indeed be signed. So we’ll hope for the best for the two of them!
Interesting note on what instrument the piper is playing: I had originally said that he couldn’t be playing bagpipes since this is an Irish folk song and not a Scottish one; I postulated that the instrument was actually a flute or fife. A member of my choir pointed out that the Irish had bagpipes too. I think I said I’d change the post but I never did. Then, almost four years later, just this week, someone called “Renaissance Guy” apparently read my post–probably because he had looked up this particular song–and wrote to tell me that there are indeed Irish bagpipes. He even included a video showing how it’s played! Watch it below to get the full effect:
And then listen to the Celtic Women sing the song. Hey, ten million viewers can’t be wrong! (They are singing the second version I listed in the article above. Oh, and the most impressive part? The woman who dances and plays a fiddle at the same time.):
© Debi Simons
