No. 154. Thou has left me ever, Jamie.

Source: «traditionalmusic.co.uk»

No. 154. Thou hast left me ever, Jamie. Scotish Airs, 1799, 90. 'Written for this work by R. Burns.' After hearing Fraser play the tune Fee him, father, fee him, Burns wrote to George Thomson, in September, 1793 : 'I enclose you Fraser's set of this tune ; when he plays it slow, in fact he makes it the language of despair. I shall here give you two stanzas in that style, merely to try if it will be any Improvement. Were it possible, in singing, to give it half the pathos which Fraser gives it in playing, it would make an admirable pathetic song. I do not give these verses for any merit they have.' Thomson kept the song for six years, altered Jamie into Tarn, and what is more deplorable, set it to the tune My boy Tammie.

Thomas Fraser was a native of Edinburgh, and the principal oboe player in the orchestral concerts of the city at the end of the eighteenth century. G. F. Graham, who knew Fraser personally, confirmed Burns s opinion of him as a musician. He died in 1825.

Burns, in the Interleaved Museum, says: 'This song for genuine humour in the verses, and lively originality in the air is unparalleled. I take it to be very old.' The verses of Fee him, father, fee him are in The Charmer, Edinburgh, 1752; the last stanza is:—

'O, fee him, father, fee him, quo' she,

Fee him, fee him, fee him,

He'll had the pleugh, thrash in the barn,

And crack wi' me at e'en, qno' she,

And crack wi' me at e'en.'

The song is also in Herd's Scots Songs, 1769, 78, and with music in Bremner's Scots Songs, 1757, 6. With different words in Clio and Euterpe, 1762, ii. lyi, entitled A new Scotch song; and Scots Musical Museum, 1787, No. 9. The tune alone is in McGibbon's Scots Tunes, 1768, iv. t)&. The earliest publication of verses and music in a corrupted form is in Walsh's Original Scotch Songs, c. 1740.

Source: «traditionalmusic.co.uk»