The story of 'Home to Donegal' and how the song has come to be loved worldwide

“My feet may wander a thousand places; But my heart will lead me back home to my Donegal.”

The songs of Patsy Cavanagh have endured for more than forty years, and are still recorded and enjoyed around the world.

His seminal hit ‘Home to Donegal’ has become an anthem for the county, sung in bars from Malin Head to Melbourne; Ballybofey to Boston. In 2018 Patsy was presented with a special IMRO award for writing it.

Home to Donegal has become one of Daniel O’Donnell’s most beloved songs and the Kincasslagh country legend once said of it: “If the postman and milkman are whistling it, it’s a hit.”

Patsy agrees that Home to Donegal “towers over” all his other tunes. It has become a phenomenon, having been officially recorded by artists more than one hundred times, including versions in Irish, Dutch and even in Danish.

“I had the privilege of doing a concert in the Irish Centre in Philadelphia recently. It was a lovely night and the audience all sang Home to Donegal. At the end of the evening, three different people came up with CDs with Home to Donegal on them. These were acts that I had never heard of,” Patsy says.

“The centre manager told me that [Irish folk group] Onoir had been there a few weeks before me, and sang Home to Donegal to over 400 people.”

“I saw a video of groups singing it at the Greencastle Regatta a few years ago, and the whole village was singing along, the phones all out and the lights on. That was a nice moment.”

The Greencastle songwriter, who’s now aged in his 70s, recalls how Home to Donegal was written over a few nights in the late 1980s.

“I wanted to do a homecoming song rather than an emigration song. During the summer a lot of festivals take place around Donegal. It's a time when people return for their holidays and it's a nice time to do music in hotels and lounges; the returned exiles out with their parents for a meal and then a singalong.”

“Handshakes with neighbours and maybe share a song. Then on Sunday morning you'd meet some of them visiting their family grave after Mass. The song nearly wrote itself when these things were all put together,” he says modestly.

Patsy remembers the first recording being “very basic” and how Daniel sent the song stratospheric.

“It started with a guitar and small keyboard on a 4-track recorder, and now it's produced by some of the finest musicians in the land. Mick Flavin recorded it after me, and then there were several covers, from John Kerr and others.”

“But it was when Daniel O’Donnell recorded it that it went so far afield. We were at a few of his concerts and the whole theatre was singing the chorus. So I can say it's gone from my front room to theatres around the world.”

“There are even a couple of rap versions but I probably won't be trying those!” he smiles.

Sadly, Patsy lost his wife and lifelong love Margaret to illness in August 2024. The grief of her death is still raw.

“Over the years, I have sung at funerals, like many other singers. I can honestly say though, that I never fully appreciated the grief that the people were going through until it came to our house.”

“We knew it was coming for a year or more, but still, when the time came, it tore the heart out of the house.”

“People often refer to their better half and that's so true. All the ‘together things’ of a lifetime are gone and it's a dark feeling. I am lucky in that I have great family support and also the goodness and kindness of neighbours.”

As ever, music has helped him emerge from the darkness too.

“I hadn't done any music since Margaret passed and one dark evening I thought: ‘I wish it was the springtime’. I wrote down some words on that theme and it slowly became a song.”

“I sent it to Daniel O’Donnell and he recorded it for release in the autumn. He has performed it at some of his shows and a lot of people have identified with it.”

“It's good to be able to say what other people are feeling – and hopefully I’ll have the ability to continue writing for some years yet,” Patsy smiled.

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