At the Fair

Program Notes

 

At the Fair is a work for SATB chorus and chamber orchestra that presents three time-honored folk songs—She Moved Through the Fair, Brigg Fair, and Scarborough Fair. Though drawn from different corners of the British Isles, these songs share themes of love, parting, and remembrance. In each, “the fair” becomes both a gathering place and a crossroads of human experience—where longing, joy, and grief converge.

 

The first movement, She Moved Through the Fair, of Irish origin, opens with a dreamlike melancholy. A young man watches his beloved move through the fair, radiant and ethereal, unaware that their promised wedding will never come to pass. The evocative lyrics, shaped by centuries of oral tradition and immortalized by Padraic Colum’s 1909 verses, blur the line between love and loss, life and death. Its haunting ambiguity—whether a tale of grief, ghostly return, or fleeting dream—has kept it a favorite for generations.

 

The second movement, Brigg Fair, shifts to the English countryside and stands apart from the other two in tone and outcome. Collected in 1905 from Lincolnshire singer Joseph Taylor, it celebrates reunion and enduring love at the annual Brigg Horse Fair. Unlike the tales of sorrow and longing in the surrounding movements, Brigg Fair ends in quiet joy. Its lilting rhythms and glowing melody capture the warmth of simple devotion and the beauty of love fulfilled.

 

The final movement, Scarborough Fair, remains one of England’s most familiar folk songs. The text unfolds as a wistful exchange between former lovers, framed by the refrain naming four herbs—parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme—each once a symbol of comfort, wisdom, remembrance, and courage. Its verses pose a series of impossible tasks, evoking yearning and the quiet recognition that some bonds can never be restored. The song’s hauntingly beautiful melody and poetic imagery have made it an enduring vision of bittersweet love.

 

Across the three movements, At the Fair explores life’s passage through the shifting seasons of longing, love, and loss. Reimagined here for chorus and chamber orchestra, these beloved folk songs continue to resonate with the same depth and humanity that first gave them life.

 

She Moved Through the Fair

 

My love said to me, “My mother won’t mind, and my father won’t slight you for your lack of kind.”

Then she stepped away from me, and this she did say, “It will not be long, love, till our wedding day.”

 

She stepped away from me, and she moved through the fair, and fondly I watched her move here and move there.

She went her way homeward with one star awake, as the swans in the evening move over the lake.

 

The people were saying no two were e’er wed. But one had a sorrow that never was said.

And I smiled as she passed with her goods and her gear, and that was the last that I saw of my dear.

 

I dreamt it last night that my true love came in. So softly she entered her feet made no din.

She came close beside me and this she did say, “It will not be long, love, till our wedding day.”

 

Brigg Fair

 

It was on the fifth of August, the weather fair and fine; unto Brigg Fair I did repair, for love I was inclined.

I got up with the lark in the morning, my heart so full of glee, expecting there to meet my dear, long time I’d wished to see.

 

I looked over my left shoulder to see whom I could see. And there I spied my own true love come drawing near to me.

He took me gently by the hand, all merrily was my heart. For now we’re met together and nevermore shall part.

 

For its meeting is a pleasure, and parting is a grief; and an inconstant lover is worse than any thief.

For the green leaves they will wither bare, and the branches they will dee if ever I should prove untrue to the one who loves me.

 

Scarborough Fair

 

Are you going to Scarborough Fair? Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.
Remember me to one who lives there. She once was a true love of mine,

Tell her to make me a cambric shirt, Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme,
without any seam nor needlework. Then she’ll be a true love of mine.

Ask her to do me this courtesy. Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.
And ask her for like favor from me. Then she’ll be a true love of mine.

Tell him to find me an acre of land, Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme,
between the salt water and the sea strand. Then he’ll be a true love of mine

When he has done and finished his work, Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme,
ask him to come for his cambric shirt. Then he’ll be a true love of mine.