Lisdoonvarna in County Clare is a former spa town where Victorians went for the healing mineral waters. It is located inland from the Cliffs of Moher. This tune is also known as All the Way to Galway, which exists both as a jig identical to this one and the closely related reel of the same name.
This tune is generally associated with Coleraine in Northern Ireland and apparently also some of the prejudices between different groups on one side or the other of that particular divide. However, there is only one printed reference to the jig as being Irish, and its long association with New England contra dancing may indicate it originated there instead. The town of Coleraine in Massachusetts (also Colrain) was first settled by a colony from the north of Ireland, about the year 1736.
The title of this tune associates it with Cork in Ireland. However, its first publication was in 1789 in England, under the name Yorkshire Lasses. It is also known as The Rollicking Irishman and the melody was used for the song Father O’Flynn.