Song Information

Song Lyrics: As we wander through the universe, on this dark winter’s night.

The children are all dancing and the stars are shining bright.

One more word must now be spoken out or sung to an old tune,

Let’s be friends this New Year coming at the Rising of the Moon.

So we gaze unto the stars that shine with wonder in our eyes,

Will we just destroy the planet or is peace to be the prize.

Cos the wall of fighting nations dims the beauty of the tune.

Let’s all dance the dance of freedom at the Rising of the Moon

At the Rising of the Moon, at the Rising of the Moon,

Let’s be friends this New Year coming at the rising of the moon.

May the wisdom of the ancients with their messages and signs

Come to shine on our tomorrows with the magic of their time.

Like a star that shone on the wise men, like the dawn that’s coming soon,

Its the truth that guides us onwards at the Rising of the Moon.

We can live within God’s garden if we tend her with our care,

We can understand the meaning and the motives of the fair.

Tho’ we stumble through the darkness trying far too much too soon,

Let’s all stand up and be counted at the Rising of the Moon.

At the Rising of the Moon, at the Rising of the Moon,

Let’s all stand up and be counted at the Rising of the Moon.

Song First Line: As we wander through the universe, on this dark winter's night.

Comments: Songnotes

I first heard Seán Tyrrell from Clare sing this song at a concert in Slane, County Meath in 2007. It is an arrangement of an old tune, The Rising of the Moon, that commemorates the failed rebellion in Ireland in 1798 but I much prefer Seán’s version. The words were composed by Padraig Stevens and Siobhán O Higgins and, apparently, were in response to a proposal in the 1980’s to mine gold at Croagh Patrick, a sacred mountain overlooking Westport in County Mayo. Thankfully the mine did not go ahead.

When Seán’s daughter Áine Tyrrell passed through Sydney in 2015 I proposed the idea of performing the song in Hyde Park Barracks in Sydney and ‘singing to the spirits’ of the 4,000 Irish orphan girls who passed through that atmospheric building between the years of 1848 and 1852 in the wake of the Irish Famine. The video was shot in July 2016 and Áine is accompanied on uileann pipes by Nick Martin. As the last notes of Áine’s song rang through the Barracks the bells on the tower began to chime. This sound, which is on the soundtrack, seemed to us to be the spirits of the Orphan Girls answering our call back through the generations.

Enda Murray 15th December 2016

Irish Australian Song Library