sheet music / The Soldier's Song

Copy of The Soldier’s Song. Sheet music. Dedicated and signed by the author, Peadar Ó Cearnaigh (Kearney), on the front page, as follows: ‘Le deag-thoil an Ughdáir. / Peadar Ó Cearnaigh. / 22/3/18’. Published by Whelan & Son, 17 Upper Ormond Quay, c. 1918. In folio format (a sheet of paper folded once in the middle to make two leaves [four pages]). The front page bears the title, The Soldier’s Song, intertwined with a rifle and with neo-Celtic interlace. Beneath this, in Irish script, is the following: ‘Words by Peadar Ó Cearnaigh. / Music by Pádraig Ó hAonaigh. / Arranged by Cathal Mac Dubhghaill.’, as well as publication and pricing information. The remaining four pages give the score and words of the song. Note on the song, from ‘Facts Sheet 7/82’, issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs, Dublin: ‘The text of The Soldier’s Song (Amhrán na bhFiann), consisting of three stanzas and a chorus, was written in 1907 by Peadar Kearney, who together with Patrick Heeney also composed the music. It was first published in the newspaper, Irish Freedom, in 1912. The chorus…was formally adopted as the National Anthem in 1926, displacing the earlier Fenian anthem, God Save Ireland. A section of the National Anthem (consisting of the first four bars followed by the last five) is also the Presidential Salute’. Width: 25 cm. Length: 31.5 cm.;