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The Blooming Bright Star of Belle Isle

Published Online February 7, 2006

Last Edited December 14, 2013

'The Blooming Bright Star of Belle Isle'. Newfoundland adaptation of an old Irish love song, 'Loch Erin's Sweet Riverside'. It tells the familiar story of a lover who returns after a long absence and tests his sweetheart's fidelity before revealing himself.

'The Blooming Bright Star of Belle Isle'

'The Blooming Bright Star of Belle Isle'. Newfoundland adaptation of an old Irish love song, 'Loch Erin's Sweet Riverside'. It tells the familiar story of a lover who returns after a long absence and tests his sweetheart's fidelity before revealing himself. The fine Mixolydian tune has been used as well for another Newfoundland love song, 'The Green Shores of Fogo'. First published in Greenleaf and Mansfield's Ballads and Sea Songs of Newfoundland (Cambridge, Mass 1933), 'The Blooming Bright Star of Belle Isle' is also included in The Penguin Book of Canadian Folk Songs (Harmondsworth, Eng 1973) by Edith Fowke and has been recorded by Charles Jordan with Joyce Sullivan (Folk Songs of Canada, Waterloo CS-3) and by harpist Judy Loman (CBC SM-167). A choral arrangement by Godfrey Ridout has also been published (Waterloo 1960).