Every session ends. That's the sad bit nobody tells you when you fall in love with all this. The fire dies down, somebody's already pulling on their coat, the barman's started stacking chairs with that look. And right at that exact moment — when the room has gone soft and a bit melancholy and nobody actually wants to be the first to say goodnight — that's when somebody starts The Parting Glass.
It is the most beautiful way to end a night that I know of. Soft. Unhurried. Everybody in.
This is not a rowdy one. Put it away if you're three songs deep and the place is roaring — it has its moment, and its moment is the END. The last song. The lights coming up. You sing it gentle, almost a whisper to start, and you let it grow only as much as the room wants. There's no clap, no speeding up, none of the joyful chaos of the Rattlin' Bog. The Parting Glass is the opposite of all that, and that's the point. You need both.
A Bit of History
Here's where I have to be honest with you, because I won't make up dates I can't stand over.
The Parting Glass is OLD. Older, in its Scottish form, than Auld Lang Syne — and most people are gobsmacked to hear that, because Auld Lang Syne is the one the whole world reaches for at the turn of the year. But the farewell sentiment in The Parting Glass, the "good night and joy be with you all", was being sung in Scotland well before Burns set Auld Lang Syne down in the late 1700s. A version of the words turns up printed on a broadside in the early 1700s, and there's a copy of related verses preserved even earlier than that. So we're talking a very, very old farewell song.
Now — and this is the murky bit, the bit folk people argue about over pints — is it Scottish or is it Irish? The honest answer is BOTH, and arguing about it misses the point of how folk songs actually travel. The earliest written traces lean Scottish. But it crossed to Ireland generations ago, got sung and reshaped and adopted so completely that most people now think of it as an Irish song first, and Irish singers have carried it round the world. A song this old doesn't really belong to a country. It belongs to whoever's singing it at closing time.
I'll not pretend to know the name of the man or woman who first put these words together. Nobody does. That's how it goes with the truly old ones — they come up out of the ground like the song says, with no author, just generations of voices. Which I find lovely, not frustrating.
Lyrics
Of all the money that e'er I had, I spent it in good company. And all the harm that ever I've done, Alas it was to none but me. And all I've done for want of wit To memory now I can't recall. So fill to me the parting glass, Good night and joy be with you all.
Of all the comrades that e'er I had, They're sorry for my going away. And all the sweethearts that e'er I had, They'd wish me one more day to stay. But since it falls unto my lot That I should rise and you should not, I'll gently rise and softly call, Good night and joy be with you all.
A man may drink and not be drunk, A man may fight and not be slain. A man may court a pretty girl And perhaps be welcomed back again. But since it has so ordered been By a time to rise and a time to fall, Come fill to me the parting glass, Good night and joy be with you all.
How to Sing It
Pitch it low and start it nearly to yourself. Honestly. Don't announce it, don't call for quiet — just begin, soft, and watch what happens. People stop talking on their own. By the second line a couple of voices will have found you, by the third verse the whole room is on it, and the harmonies sort themselves out the way they only do when nobody's trying too hard.
Let it be slow. Slower than feels comfortable. The pauses are part of the song. There's no rush — it's a goodbye, and you don't rush a goodbye.
It's traditionally sung unaccompanied, or with the barest touch of guitar or fiddle underneath. If in doubt, leave the instruments out and let it be voices in a room. That's where it lives.
A grand pairing for a long night: roar your way through the rowdy stuff, get the whole place daft on the Rattlin' Bog, sing the rebellion and the heartbreak — Carrickfergus is a fierce one for the wistful turn near the end — and THEN, when you can feel the night winding down, drop into The Parting Glass and send everyone home full. Want the full words and the singing notes for the Bog itself? They're on the lyrics page, where most nights here begin.
Mind yourself going home. And good night and joy be with you all — I mean that.
Slán go fóill, BogLord2002
P.S. — Rattlin the cat will not tolerate a single verse of this song. The moment I start it he gets up and leaves the room, every time, like he's heard quite enough goodbyes for one lifetime. Gas creature.