Best Irish Ballads

Recently, one of the bloggers on Irish Central.com posted 10 Irish Ballads that melt your heart. It's tough to argue with their list when they start with Mary Black's, Song for Ireland but as any list goes, it's open for others opinions. In this case mine. I would start my list with a song that I think is one of the most beautiful songs ever written. The Town I love so Well, Phil Coulter's love song for Derry. Although it has been recorded by many, when it is sung by Mr. Coulter himself you can really hear the emotion. A close second is Mike DeAngelis of Hair of the Dog. If you are at a pub or festival in the northeast and get a chance to hear Hair of the Dog and they sing this song, sit back and enjoy, you are about to hear something special.

The rest of the songs on my list are in no numeric order, they are just the songs I like and I hope you do too. Christy Moore's, City of Chicago. I like the live version best. The one where in the middle of the song he recites the manifest of a ship leaving Cork harbour during the great hunger. As millions of people were starving in Ireland, the British shipped out tons and tons of food to other parts of the empire.

Four Green Fields, Tommy Makem's ballad for Ireland. Tommy doesn't have the greatest voice in the world but again, when the person who writes the song sings it, there seems to be extra emotion and for a ballad that works.

Some of the songs on the list have been sung by so many people over the years that it is hard to settle on one version. Songs like Fields of Athenry, Isle of Innisfree and The Galway Shawl. Everyone one from The Dropkick Murphys to the Dubliners has recorded The Fields of Athenry, it's hard to find a bad version of this song (techno) so I have to go with what's on my ipod. Patty Reilly's version. I just heard Charlie Landsborourgh's Isle of Innisfree and it's pretty good but I still have to go with Tara Fox. Oh yeah you had to be at our Family St. Patrick's party to hear her so.....Bing Crosby, no, not after Who Threw the Overalls in Mrs. Murphy's Chowder. How about John McNicholl. Jimmy Kelly gets the nod for The Galway Shawl because he recorded the version his mother likes and that earns you points from this blogger.

Two Kevin MacKrell songs are next. Donegal sung by Mike DeAngelis and I Miss the Rain sung by Kevin himself. Both songs are in the style of Clare to Here and Spancill Hill ( both are great songs and should be on many list) longing for home.

The Wolfe Tones song Boston Rose is a little different from the rest. It's the story of an Irishman who falls in love with a tourist and misses her when she returns to Boston. If any of you know Martin Kelly ask him to sing this song. I first heard him as a young teenager get up in front of a large group of people and sing and I was really entertained and I know you will be too if you get the chance.

The last song on the list has special meaning for me. I had the album for years and had heard this song over and over but never really heard the words. One day on a long road trip the words hit me like a hammer. I had to play the song over and over. It is now a favorite of mine, Frances Black singing Wall of Tears.

I know I left off a lot of songs but that's where you come in, what are some of your favorite Irish ballads?