Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Whatever his motives, it was a crowd-pleasing choice: the ballad was still popular two decades after its modern incarnation. With its enchanting melody and sublime, soaring chorus, it remains a folk-music fixture, with Melody Maker magazine once describing it as “the folk scene’s national anthem”.It is based on the traditional ballad “The Braes of Balquhither”, which was written around the turn of the 19th century by Scottish poet Robert Tannahill and composer Robert Archibald Smith. Tannahill’s lyrics concern a man persuading his lover to walk among the braes (hills) of a Perthshire village called Balquhither to enjoy their beauty, including the wild mountain thyme’s pink blooms which grow around the purple heather (the modern song is sometimes known as “Purple Heather”). Such ballads extolling the virtues of rural over urban life became popular during the industrial revolution.The song reached Ireland, and in the late 1940s was modified by Belfast musician Francis McPeake. His altered melody was more beautiful than its predecessor, and although he followed the spirit of Tannahill’s words, he adapted them to his own life. His lines: “If my true love she were gone/I will surely find another” reflected the death of his first wife, Mary, and his wonderment at finding love again with his second, Alice. He called the song “Will Ye Go, Lassie, Go?” from the chorus line — yet another alternative title.Let us know your memories of ‘Wild Mountain Thyme’ in the comments section belowThe paperback edition of ‘The Life of a Song: The stories behind 100 of the world’s best-loved songs’, edited by David Cheal and Jan Dalley, is published by ChambersMusic credits: Columbia; The Lost Noises Office; Smithsonian Folkways; Otey; Sony; Warner; Mercury; Exile; BMG; Renaissance; Parlophone; Lakeshore
