Skeealyn Vannin, Disk 3 Track 12i: Introduction: John (Jack) Gell, Arbory
https://www.youtube.com/embed/wqolWcoHp3EDate(s): 1948
Creator(s): Irish Folklore Commission
Transcript: The Kirk Rushen Funeral Dirge
This bardoon or funeral dirge was sung at every funeral at Rushen Church in the south of the Island and is peculiar to this parish. The custom is unknown in any other part of the Island. Mr John Joseph Sansbury who sings it is now 86 years old and is the only survivor of the men who sang this dirge.
He usually took the tenor part while the air was sung by the late Parish Clerk, Evan Qualtrough, who died in 1947. The custom was for the Parish Clerk and singers to meet the cortege about a hundred yards from the Church gate and to complete the chant as they reached the Church Yard.
It was never sung in Manx in Mr Sansbury’s time but the Manx words are to be found in the metrical psalms number 90 - excepting the second verse which appears to be taken from another psalm.
(Transcribed by Phil Gawne, Cregneash, Rushen)
Language: Manx
Collection: Sound Archive
Level: WHOLE
ID number: SA 0579/3/12i