Chords for Iarla Ó Lionáird at WOMAD Rivermead 2000

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ I'm a _ winter _ _ _ _ [Eb] sky
_ My _ _ _ _ [Cm] name is Earl [D] O'Leonard
and _ I'm an Irishman
[D] I come from Cork, [C] West Cork
[F] and _ _ _ _ [Bbm] I'm a person who sings
I'm [Bb] a winter _ _ sky
_ _ _ _ [A] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [Bb] _ _
_ I'm a winter [D] sky _ _ _
_ [F] _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [Eb] _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [D] _ _ _
[Dm] I'm a person who sings _ _
[Eb] I'm a person who sings
[C] _ _ _ _
_ _ [F] _ _ _ I'm a _ _ [Bb] person who _ sings
I _
_ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ remember [Bb]
my first day in school
[G] Mrs.
Mac Sweeney, Mrs.
Mac [F] was my teacher
I remember she lifted me up
and she [C] stood me on a desk
First day I was ever in school
I was about 5 [Fm] and she said sing _
_ _ _ _ _ [F] singing _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[Eb] _ _ _ _ _ _ [Eb] _ _
_ [Bb] _ It was almost as if there was
those kind of shoes there
waiting for me to put my feet [Dm] into _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [F] _ _
it
_ _ _ _ singing _ singing _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [Bb] All through his youth, Earless sang the old way
_ _ [Dm] _ _ _
But as he [F] came of age, his enthusiasm _ flagged
_ _ I felt a little bit like a museum piece [Eb] really
_ _ _ I had spent like 20 years of my life
perfecting as best I could this way of singing
to find out that nobody was interested
except the people I grew up with _
[D] and that was a horrible _ realization
_ That was like _ the coldest breakfast you ever had to eat _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Frustrated, despairing
_ Earle found himself on a dead end street
_ _ singing _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ singing
He quit singing entirely
until fortune revealed a [A] path _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
Without so much as an audition
he was invited [F] to work with the Afro-Celt sound system
_ [D] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _ _
_ _ I've been so [A] fortunate that I have the real experience
of being there with these people
and they sing and make [E] music
_ [Am] _ _ _ _ And in a way they're Irish to some extent
_ The brevity of everything they do
_ and the levity of everything they do
So there's a genuineness [A] and a [F]
largeness of heart
that I experienced _ in African music
_ _ I suppose _ it just shook me to the foundations, you know
I never [Eb] really experienced it before _ _ _ _
_ _ [Bb] Inspired by his encounter with the African artists,
[F] Earle reclaimed his [Dm] sound
and began bringing it [C] to audiences again
_ _ [F] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Thank you _ _ _
Thank you [Ab] very much for listening to me
Thank you _ _ _ _ very [F] _ _
much Thank _ you
[N] Thank you