> Shirley Collins > Songs > I Sing of a Maiden That Is Makeless
> Steeleye Span > Songs > Sing We the Virgin Mary

I Sing of a Maiden That Is Makeless / Sing We the Virgin Mary

[ Roud - ; Ballad Index MSISOAMa ; Mudcat 27932 , 147458 ; trad.]

Shirley Collins sang the fifteenth-century English carol I Sing of a Maiden That Is Makeless in 1974 on her Topic album, Adieu to Old England. This was also included in 1992 on her anthology Fountain of Snow and in 2006 on the Free Reed anthology Midwinter. She recorded it again in 1969 with the Young Tradition for their album The Holly Bears the Crown that was finally released on Fledg’ling in 1995. This recording was also included in 2000 on her Fledg’ling anthology Within Sound. A.L. Lloyd noted on the first album:

The text of what The Oxford Book of Carols calls “this famous little classic” comes from the Sloane Manuscript of the first half of the fifteenth century. The Oxford Book goes on: “If ever there was a tune, it has been lost.” Many composers have had a go at setting it. This tune and arrangement is by Dolly Collins.

According to the New Oxford Book of Carols, John Jacob Niles claimed to have collected the carol Sing We the Virgin Mary in Mayfield, Kentucky, in 1933 and published it in 1948 in The Anglo-American Carol Study Book. This would appear to be a near-miraculous survival of the fifteenth-century English carol text I Sing of a Maiden That Is Makeless/Matchless/Mateless.

Maddy Prior sang Sing We the Virgin Mary in 2004 on Steeleye Span’s CD Winter. She noted:

What a beautiful medieval carol this is. Every word and every note perfectly written.

Charlotte Greig sang Makeless on her 2005 album Quite Silent.

Diana Collier sang I Sing of a Maiden That Is Makeless unaccompanied on her 2015 album All Mortals ar Rest.

Lyrics

Shirley Collins sings I Sing of a Maiden That Is Makeless

I sing of a maiden that is makeless,
King of all kings, to her son she chose.

He came all so still where his mother was,
As dew in April that falleth on the grass.

He came all so still to his mother’s bower,
As dew in April that falleth on the flower.

He came all so still where his mother lay,
As dew in April that falleth on the spray.

Mother and maiden was never none but she.
Well may such a lady God’s mother be.

Maddy Prior sings Sing We the Virgin Mary

Sing we the Virgin Mary,
Sing we that matchless one;
See how the angels attended her
𝄆 When she birthed God’s own sun. 𝄇

So silently came our Jesus
Unto his sweet Mary,
As dew in April falleth
𝄆 On flower so tenderly. 𝄇

When Jesus was a-borning
To earth came heaven down,
To lie upon a manger
𝄆 Away in Bethlem town. 𝄇

Ah, blessed maiden mother,
Beknown to prophecy:
Now Jesus is a-borning
𝄆 And all men honour thee. 𝄇