Lyrics Loch Tay Boat Song - Kurt Elling

Loch Tay Boat Song

Traditional, Composed by Annie C. MacLeod

Lyric by Sir Harold Boulton

When I've done my work of day / And I row my boat away
Down the waters o' Loch Tay / As the evening light is fading

And I look upon Ben Lawers / Where the after-glory glows
And I think on two bright eyes / And the merry mouth below

She's my beauteous nighean ruadh* / She's my joy and sorrow too
And although she is untrue / Well, I cannot live without her

For my heart's a boat in tow / And I'd give the world to know
Why she means to let me go / As I sing horee horo

Nighean ruadh*, your lovely hair / Has more glamour I declare
Than all the tresses rare / 'tween Killin and Aberfeldy

Be they lint white, brown or gold / Be they blacker than the sloe
They are worth no more to me / Than the melting flake of snow

Her eyes are like the gleam / O' the sunlight on the stream
And the songs the fairies sing / Seem like songs she sings at milking

But my heart is full of woe / For last night she bade me go
And the tears begin to flow / As I sing horee, horo

(* "Nighean ruadh" is Scottish Gaelic for "red-haired girl".)