Kitty of Coleraine

A comic Ulster song in 6/8 — beautiful Kitty drops her pitcher of buttermilk at the sight of Barney McCleary, and after his consoling kiss, no pitcher in Coleraine is safe. The words are generally attributed, though not proven, to the Clare barrister and wit Edward Lysaght (1763–1810), with publication around 1810; the air was in print by about that date in O’Farrell’s Pocket Companion and appears in O’Neill (1903), while Thomas Moore borrowed the melody for his song “Omens” in the Irish Melodies. The song reached its widest audience when Bing Crosby sang it in the 1949 film Top o’ the Morning.