this from an article about banning Wikipedia in a school district.

Of all the thousands of great legitimate tunes and songs out there in this extensive folkloric tradition, people still have their addiction to this sugared-up, over-sentimental Broadway-made-famous piece. It persists as being their personal vision of Ireland handed to them by American entertainers. They want so badly to believe that it’s Irish because they like it and god damn it, it proves they like Irish music…

Turning to any internet source as proof used to get students an immediate ‘F’ grade.

There are almost as many books as there are legends about the origins of the tune, with many opinions holding that the tune - yes, long before the Englishman Weatherley applied his Danny Boy lyrics - was not written in Ireland. Michael Robinson in the Standing Stones piece linked even considers a couple of possible English origins though ultimately he declares he thinks the song to be of Irish descent.

As it’s almost half-past 4 in the morning here now, I’ll post again on it in a while (I thought I had months ago, but that was a draft I never finished) but my simplistic point is that the tune’s fame and popularity, and with it its perceived Irishness, are due to the application of the “Danny Boy” lyrics and so the modern-day instrumental performance of it is but a rendering of that particular pretend-Irishness rather than a continuity of the traditional music from where it arguably came.

I’d certainly go easy on the Wikipedia especially with its simplistic absolutisms in this case not being much longer than my own.

Oh, and forgive my manners - I should’ve said thanks for bringing up what I lazily skipped over.