Wednesday 9 December 2020
Tune of the Day: Edmund McDermot Roe
Traditional Irish air
This air was composed by the celebrated blind Irish harper Turlough O'Carolan (1670–1738). The MacDermot Roes were a powerful family from County Roscommon. Tune collector O'Neill remarks:
Among Carolan's many distinguished friends and patrons, no one was more generous and loyal than Mrs. McDermot Roe, of Alderford House, County Roscommon. At the outset of his professional career in 1693, it was she who equipped him with a horse and an attendant harper; and it was to her hospitable home he directed his feeble footsteps in his declining days. Exceptionally honored in death, Carolan's remains were interred near the family vault of his benefactress.