The Old Orange Flute

The Old Orange Flute (also spelt Ould Orange Flute) is a folk song originating in Ireland. Having likely been originally composed to parody "images of Protestant martyrdom",^[1] it later became adopted as a genuine Orange song and is now often associated with the Order. Despite this, its humour ensured a certain amount of cross-community appeal, especially in the period before the commencement of The Troubles in the late 1960s, and it has also been recorded by artists better-known for songs associated with Irish nationalism, such as The Dubliners.

History

The tune itself, often referred to as Villikins and his Dinah after a music hall song of the 1850s (and in America as Sweet Betsy from Pike), has been used with many variations for a large number of folk songs and sea shanties, and has been called the "primal tune".^[2] Related fiddle tunes are found as early as the 18th century. The Old Orange Flute, however, originated more recently, probably in the 19th century, when a variant of the tune was used to set an anonymously-authored broadside. The tune is sometimes attributed to a "Nugent Bohem",^[3] though this is probably pseudonymous; C. Desmond Greaves argued that "Bohem"'s version, first printed in the early 20th century in the nationalist newspaper Irish Freedom under the title The Magic Flute, demonstrated that the song clearly originated as a parody making fun of implacable Protestant sectarianism. However, it also appeared in Welsh's Golden Treasury of Irish Songs and Lyrics (1907) as an anonymous ballad several years before Irish Freedom was first published.^[4]

Text

The song tells the story of Bob Williamson, a weaver of Dungannon, who is considered a "stout Orange blade" by his associates. However, after marrying a "Papish named Brigid McGinn" and converting, he is compelled to flee to Connacht, taking with him his flute. Enrolled into a Catholic church choir, he finds that the flute will only play aggressively Protestant songs such as The Boyne Water. Eventually the priest buys him a new instrument and the flute is condemned to be burned for heresy, though in the flames a "quare noise" can be heard as the flute still whistles "The Protestant Boys". The text was reproduced in Colm Ó Lochlainn's Irish Street Ballads (1939).

Modern renditions of the song often include the repeated refrain "Sure it's six miles from Bangor to Donaghadee". This seems to have been popularised by versions by The Clancy Brothers and subsequently The Dubliners; the line is taken from the refrain (and title) of another folk song, Six Miles from Bangor to Donaghadee, describing a series of absurd episodes and also set to the tune Villikins, and which was recorded by the Larne reared but Southport born singer Richard HaywardRomancing Ireland by Paul Clements, amongst others. Hayward also made the first recording of The Old Orange Flute, in around 1920.

References