Johnny Lovely Johnny
Track 11
Notes on the Track (11)
Recorded: 1952Notes on the Song
This song takes the form of a conversation between ‘faithful Annie and fickle Johnny’, and the pair are said to have first courted ‘in my father’s garden in the County Tyrone’. Another version, which I have heard in Derry, makes reference to ‘the high walls of Derry’, and there is an eight-verse version in Sam Henry's Songs of the People (1990) which mentions the ‘mountains of Derry’. The lady’s name in that version is Nancy and the song title is given as Lovely Nancy. To complicate matters still further the young man’s name is Jamie.
Paddy Tunney and myself are both agreed that this is one of the very best of his early recordings.
The Singers
Paddy Tunney
Rec. 1952
The Song Texts
The Tunney Song Tradition Trust’s Archive of Song Texts preserves the words of traditional songs, offering a valuable resource for singers and anyone interested in the living song tradition.
Where the Linnets Sing 2026, developed by the Tunney Song Tradition Trust with Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann, celebrates 75 Bliain ag Fás by bringing the original collection to a new online audience, enriched with fifteen additional tracks, eleven more voices and two further generations of the tradition.
