This Week: The Realz about Reels? And Slow Session....weather permitting!

IN THE CASE OF BAD WEATHER, I WILL DECIDE TO CANCEL BY 6:00 PM WEDNESDAY: CHECK HERE ON THE BLOG, CHECK YOUR EMAIL IF YOU'RE ON THE EMAIL LIST, AND LOOK ON THE OLD SONGS FACEBOOK PAGE FOR CANCELLATION ANNOUNCEMENT.

Getting Ready for the February Session?

Hey there! Here's a a firehose of musing about reels just in time for the Old Songs Irish Slow Session this Wednesday, Feb. 15 at 7:30 p.m. 

Hey, Tune-Buddies! 

What a crazy weather week - 50 degree weather followed by tons of snow...followed by tons more snow. Of course we only get winter AFTER Punxatawny Phil popped his head out of the ground to tell us "six more weeks of winter." I guess what he meant to say was, "Six weeks of winter starting....NOW!"

What's with the Obsession with Reels? 

Of all the types of Irish "chunes" there are to play, the reel is the one people tell me they have the most trouble with. And I get it. I do. Some reels just make sense and others...well... If I could avoid ever playing The Salamanca, I would. In fact, if you asked me to play it right now, whatever came out of the fiddle would be a hot mess and not sound anything like the tune is supposed to sound. 

A friend of mine has played Irish concertina for a few years. She loves jigs. They make sense to her. "I don't ever get lost playing a jig." But reels? "Well, it's like you're going upstairs to get something. You get halfway upstairs and forget why you were going up there. So you stop for a second in the middle and then forget what you were doing altogether."

Playing a reel is like going halfway upstairs and forgetting why you were going up there in the first place.

Her trick? She tries learning the tune as if it were played in twos instead of fours: one and two and one and two and....  Like I mentioned last week, there are words that perfectly illustrate the reel rhythm: rutabaga rutabaga, for instance, or as a piper friend says "animated alligator animated alligator." We are not alone in our confusion around reels. Seems like everyone has this question at some point. Listen to what fiddler Natalie MacMaster has to say about it.  

Natalie MacMaster explains the difference between a jig and a reel:

Jump to 3:03 to hear Natalie's answer 

Where do Reels come from?

Brilliant Donegal fiddle player Liz Doherty, in Fintan Vallely's "The Companion to Irish Traditional Music," explains the reel as "...2. The most popular tune-type within the Irish tradition. In 4/4 time it consists largely of quaver movement with an accent on the first and third beats of the bar. ...It is likely that the reel originated in France in the early 1500s as the haye. It was being played as 'reill' in Scotland in 1590 and its modern form was brought to Ireland from there in the late 1700s. Many of the older reels in the tradition are borrowings from the Scottish tradition and the tunes are often found in more than one variant in different parts of the country...."

How do I love to play a reel? Let me count the ways...

There are quite a few ways to play a reel: smooth, rolling, jaunty - some of it is personal style, and some is regional tradition. Here, Slaibh Luachra musicians Matt Cranitch, Jackie Daly and Conal O'Grada play a set of reels with a slight bit of a bounce. Lovely stuff:

Can you play it straight?

My first teacher was (still is) a huge fan of The Bothy Band. He didn't give me the philosophy of playing reels, he just taught me the reels. Speed notwithstanding, listen to the flow of the music. The reels flow like rushing water - onetwothreefour onetwothreefour - there's a drive to this approach, right? 

Punch It, Willie!

Johnny Doherty is a brilliant Donegal fiddler who plays reels with a more single-bow style associated with the north: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEdM2jHbxUc and  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DL_9r0kSGYA.  

And finally....my favorite...

French-born Irish fiddler Patrick Ourceau has won the hearts of fiddle players and music lovers the world over. Can you tell why? His music just floats, and is full of magic and lift (and Laura and Josh ain't half bad either!). 

What's Your Favorite/Least Favorite Reel?

Thanks for checking all this out! I hope you found something to love in here. If you are so inclined, share why you love or hate reels in the comments below! Could you tell us which reel is your favorite or least favorite? 

Hope to see you on Wednesday!

Happy Monday,

Hilary

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February's Reel of the Month - Man of the House sheet music w/chords (PDF)

Man of the House mp3 with chords (NOTE: the chords should fairly closely match what's on the PDF)

Thinking about tunes...

Hiya, gang! What a great session last night! Sorry for any confusion - I forgot that the Blogger posts take a day to go out, so please nobody show up at Old Songs tonight looking for tunes! :-)


We had a great old chat about bands to listen to when you're first starting out playing the music (this is a post for another day), and we also talked about a tune that was on our list from last month: The Old Bush. I have a CD of uilleann piper Willie Clancy's music, and on the first CD in the set, there's a lovely rendition of The Old Bush. In contrast, I have a lovely CD by my friend Pat O'Connor, The Humours of Derrybeha, that features a gorgeous track of Sporting Moll and The Old Bush. Pat's version is the closest to what I hear played around this area these days. I encourage you to buy the CDs, but if you want to hear the contrast between the two versions, you can listen here:

Willie Clancy  - The Old Bush is listed as the third track, and if you roll your cursor just to the left of the number, a little play arrow icon will show up. Click it and you can hear a sample.   

Pat O'Connor  - This version is a bit smoother and less piper-y (for obvious reasons). It's very obviously the same tune, but the pacing and the phrasing is a little different.


I want to give a shout out to Colleen O'Sullivan's Comhaltas Slow Session! Clayton mentioned that you guys had played Eddie Kelly's #2 on Sunday. Joe and Amy remembered it and played it along with Eddie Kelly's #1 for us. Then Clayton dug out the sheet music for #2 and we played that a bunch of times. What a great tune! We're going to work on Eddie Kelly's #1 for next month.

After a bit of a delay (the photocopier was being cranky), we finally got around to playing Tonra's jig (dmix)/Anthony Frawley's (gmaj)/Kerfunten (dmaj); Shoe the Donkey (thank you Gary Mehlum for straightening me out on how to play the b part!), and Fermoy Lasses/Sporting Paddy. We had some nice discussion about tunes and a few variations, and made plans for next month.


Regarding The Kerfunten, I understand from notes on TheSession.org that the tune was composed by flute player Hammy Hamilton, who apparently wrote the tune in G, not D. Anyway, I originally learned it in D, and it just fit the set well in that key, so....we're just gonna do it that way for now. You can access both versions on the Tunes page. It just seemed right to mention the composer and the proper key, out of respect for the man and his wonderful music.

On the list for April 17*
Jigs: Eddie Kelly's #1 and #2
Polkas: As I Went Out on the Ice and Forde's Polka
Reels: Crooked Road to Dublin and Man of the House
Gary Mehlum will be giving us a Scandinavian Schottische, and I'll be digging up an Irish one to share.

*I'll post these tunes as soon as I have them.

Thanks again for a lovely evening! Hope everyone had a great St. Patrick's Day weekend...

Best,

Hilary

February/March Slow Session Tunes Up

Howdy, folks! We are finally ready to go with the February/March list of tunes for playing/learning.

It's a lot of work to get all these tunes ready, and I'm sure you'll find a mistake here or there, so please bring a pencil this Wednesday so we can mark stuff up.

The tunes are linked to PDFs which will open in a separate browser screen. You can download, print, or otherwise admire our handiwork as much as you like.

CLICK HERE for the February/March Tune List. 

I'm still working on allowing posts on the "Tunes I Wanna Learn" page, as well as putting together older lists and creating zip files for you to download. Also, hopefully we'll have mp3s and/or videos linked to the page so you can hear what the tunes are supposed to sound like.

I'm looking forward to seeing anyone and everyone at:
The Old Songs Traditional Irish Slow Session
37 South Main Ave., Voorheesville, NY 12186
Wednesday, February 8 from 7:30-9:00 PM!

$3 per person for heat/lights/photocopying if necessary.

Thanks, lads,

Hilary 

p.s. Thank you so much to Lisa and John for reviewing the spots for me (and checking alternate sources for comparison's sake). Also to everyone who sent me feedback on links, access, PR, etc. for the blog. My heartfelt gratitude goes out to all of you!

Under Construction

Hi, gang,

I wish you guys would subscribe to this blog so I don't have to continually send you email updates...

The latest is that I'm working on the PDFs and sound files for the February/March tunes. The first tune (Limerick Lasses) is up there. It is a pretty close approximation of Paddy O'Brien's version, but mainly I used what I remember as Mike McHale's version. This pretty well matches up with the Mally books as well the version on the session, with a few minor edits.

Keep checking back for more updates!

Hilary

p.s. tonight is the Broken String Band with Claudine Langille at the Ale House in Lansingburgh. Claudine will do a set at 8 PM and we'll join her with a few special guests at 9 PM and play until around 11 PM. Come on out and have dinner with us while we listen to Claudine and hang out to hear the whole gang play!

Welcome to my new blog!

Hi, folks. It's the new year, and while I don't usually make resolutions, this year I resolved to make it easier to share and enjoy the music we all love. This blog will be the home (hopefully) of the .pdfs of sheet music for the Old Songs Irish Slow Session, and a place to find the mp3s of the tunes. This will also be home of tunes for my students and for my melody class. I hope to start a page here for "Tunes I Want to Learn" and maybe we'll even publish that "secret hidden tune list" that everyone keeps talking about...

We had a brilliant visit to Ireland this year, and that's inspired me in all kinds of ways, so look for offshoot posts about various projects that I'm hoping will grow out of this year's trip.

Stay tuned for fun, music, and inspiration. I wish you all the best in 2012!

Hilary