Michael Finnegan Nursery Rhyme

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"Michael Finnegan" is normally sung as a lively polka but we sing it as a sentimental ballad here on Glasses Island. The lyrics tell us about "poor old Michael Finnegan" and his misadventures. He has plenty of bad luck and the words make us feel sorry for the poor fellow. We therefore try to create an atmosphere for the song that reflects the bad luck story outlined in the lyrics.

The gentle guitar picking throughout is the foundation of the song's sombre atmosphere. The fiddle, accordion and clarinet sound particularly mournful during the instrumentals. The harmony vocals in round two singing "Poor old Michael Finnegan" further emphasise how sorry we feel for Michael Finnegan.

If you don't have Spotify, Apple Music, etc, go to our Michael Finnegan page on Bandcamp where you can listen to the full version of our nursery rhyme set to Irish music for free, share it with your friends, and/or buy the MP3 download.

Download our colouring sheet for Michael Finnegan. It was created for us by Sheena from Me and the Moon and it contains the text and illustrations of Michael Finnegan that appear in our book of nursery rhymes.

Lyrics for Michael Finnegan

There was an old man named Michael Finnegan
He had whiskers on his chinnegan
The wind came along and blew them in again
Poor old Michael Finnegan

There was an old man named Michael Finnegan
He went fishing with a pin again
Caught a fish but it flopped back in again
Poor old Michael Finnegan

There was an old man named Michael Finnegan
He ran a race and tried to win again
He fell down and bumped his shin again
Poor old Michael Finnegan

Classroom Ideas for Michael Finnegan

Music: Explore how different emotions can be evoked through music. Music can sound happy, sad, scary, angry, etc. Classify different pieces of music or songs according to the emotions that are evoked in the listener, e.g. Jingle Bells is a happy song, Gustav Holst's Mars sounds angry and threatening, etc.