Eugene Dunphy charts the meteoric rise of another classic song.

Eugene Dunphy charts the meteoric rise of another classic song.

Piper and songwriter Francis McPeake (right), with his sons Francis II (left) and James (middle)

Writing in the Sunday Life in March 2002, veteran journalist Eddie McIlwaine stated that the acclaimed uilleann piper from Belfast, Francis McPeake (1885-1971), penned Will Ye GoLassie Go in 1942, and that the song was ‘first published in 1948’. Below, the first verse and chorus of the classsic which is also known as ‘Wild Mountain Thyme’ or ‘Purple Heather’:

O the summertime is comin’, and the trees are sweetly bloomin’,

And the wild mountain thyme, grows around the bloomin’ heather,

Will ye go lassie, go.

And we’ll all go together, to pull wild mountain thyme,

All around the bloomin’ heather,

Will ye go lassie, go...

Some of the lyrics bear a marked resemblance to The Braes o’ Balquidder, a poem by Robert Tannahill (1774-1810), the weaver poet from Paisley, Scotland. Tannahill’s poem included the phrases ‘let us go, lassie go’ and ‘wild mountain thyme’, but the song we know today as Will Ye Go Lassie Go (or Wild Mountain Thyme) has become synonymous with the name ‘McPeake’. 

So what of the songwriter and piper, Francis McPeake? In the early 1900s, he was encouraged to learn to play the uileann pipes by F. J. Bigger, and received tutelage on the instrument from John O’Reilly, a blind Galway piper who came to Belfast at Bigger’s invitation. As O’Reilly soon discovered, his youthful pupil was not only able to play tunes, but often sang songs to his own accompaniment, songs like The Jug of Punch and The Old Piper. McPeake was a frequent visitor to F. J. Bigger’s ‘Ardrigh’ home in Belfast, a hub for musicians and writers connected with the Celtic Revival; one of Bigger’s visitors, Roger Casement, was so impressed by McPeake’s playing he handed him a gold coin.

Francis’ sons, Francis II and James, also became musicians, as did Francis III and future generations of a family-group thatwould become known throughout the world. Some fifty years after the Celtic Revival, the family became the poster boys for a new global movement, the folk revival, and their earthy style soon attracted the attention of festival organisers, concert promoters, and record company executives. When the English folk song collector, Peter Kennedy, heard the family for the first time in 1952, he described their music as ‘timeless’, and imbued with ‘a sense of bardic dignity’.

In July 1957, the family performed at the World Youth Festival in Moscow, and two years later, released their firstalbum, ‘The McPeake Family of Belfast’, which was closely followed by another two albums. The recordings had an immense impact, so much so that in 1964, American folk singer Pete Seeger arrived at the McPeake’s Springview Street home in west Belfast, and filmed the family playing on pipes and harps, and singing songs in close harmony. The following year, while on a tour of the United States, the family played at the White House before President Lyndon Johnson.

Pete Seeger returned to Belfast in November 1966, to stage a concert at the Whitla Hall, with the McPeakes as his guests. It was an emotional evening, said a correspondent for the Belfast Telegraph, as it marked the last public performance of eighty-one-year-old Francis senior. Not surprisingly, the nightconcluded with the audience joining in with a spiritedrendition of Will Ye Go Lassie Go. 

The other McPeakes continued to tour under various line-ups,and made even more guest appearances on radio and television. When they appeared on a television show hosted by the Irish comedian and raconteur, Dave Allen, Beatles member John Lennon was enchanted by what he heard and saw. Having staged a concert on the 19th of December 1967, at St. George’s Hall, Liverpool, the McPeakes were contacted bya member of the Beatles’ management, inviting them to a Magical Mystery Tour shindig at the Royal Lancaster Hotel, London. Naturally, they accepted. 

Complementary airline tickets in hand, the family flew to London where they were treated like royalty by their hosts. But Francis could not help but notice that the who’s who of rock and folk were all in fancy dress – Lulu was dressed as Little Bo Peep and the Beatles producer, George Martin, as an RAF fighter pilot. ‘There was quite a lot of noise’, said the unshakable Francis, ‘and we told them to shut their gobs and listen ... we told them in Irish and then translated it for them’. It worked! The audience sat enthralled, spellbound. Paul McCartney’s brother, Mike, asked the family to sing Will Ye Go Lassie Go, and they obliged, much to the satisfaction of the showbiz fraternity. 

Shortly after the Lancaster Hotel performance, a reporter for the Liverpool Echo whose name, oddly enough, was George Harrison (no relation to the Fab Four’s guitarist), asked the Beatles what they thought of the McPeake’s music, to which Paul McCartney replied, ‘I’ve never heard anything so beautiful in all my life’. Lennon described it as ‘wonderful fairy music – fantastic’. It’s no surprise then that Francis IIIlater found himself at Abbey Road studios teaching Lennon the uilleann pipes.

The McPeakes took a break from music for a few years, during which time Francis senior passed away; he died on St. Patrick’s Day 1971. On the 21st of April 1977, the surviving members of the family-group were persuaded to return to the stage, to give a special reunion concert at the Ulster Museum. Over the next forty years, Will Ye Go Lassie Go would be recorded by folk and rock artistes from all over the world. Things seemed to be going swimmingly, at least until 1995 when Rod Stewart recorded the song as ‘Purple Heather’ on his perhaps aptly titled album, ‘A Spanner in the Works’.500,000 CD cover sleeves credited the song to Stewart, but when Stewart’s publishing company, Warner Chappell, wasmade aware of the glaring error, new sleeves had to be printed. ‘It was just a simple mistake’, said a Warner Chappell spokesman, ‘Rod never intended to be thought of as the composer, and the McPeake royalties won’t suffer’. 

The following year, the Scottish Tourist Board included the song (sung by The Silencers) in a television ad which was produced to promote the beauties of Scotland. But this action caused a certain level of consternation among readers of the Aberdeen Press and Journal. In ‘Letters to the Editor’, areader claimed that the song was Scottish in origin, and was not written by an Irishman: ‘Name the Irishman!’, he fumed. In response, two less impassioned readers (one from Stonehaven, the other from Sutherland) wrote to assert that Wild Mountain Thyme was in fact written ‘by Francis McPeake’.

Will Ye Go Lassie Go (or Wild Mountain Thyme) wasrecorded in the 1960s by Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, The Byrds, Marianne Faithfull, and the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem; in the 1970s by Nana Mouskouri and Van Morrison; in the 1990s by Glenn Frey (of the Eagles). Between 2001 and 2015, it was recorded by Mark Knopfler; by the Chieftains (with Don Williams on lead vocal), and by Ronan Keating and James Taylor. It is frequently performed by Ed Sheeran at his live shows, and featured as part of the soundtrack for the 2020 movie, Wild Mountain Thyme. Not bad for a song written at the kitchen table of Francis McPeake’s Springview Street home.

Watch Eugene’s video on this ballad here:

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