Is Seamus Egan the best flutist of all time?

[colomon]

My musical mentor (Dublin Fiddler James Kelly) has a great yardstick by which he likes to measure his music...one that I now use too. If Peter Horan, Eddie Maloney, Jim McGowan or any of the heads were sitting in the same room you were playing in... and they were listening to YOU ALONE; would they say "lovely?" after you finished..or, would they get up to go get a pint in the middle of your tune?

Perhaps that "lovely" isn't quite as good as one might hope. Just listening to a tape of a Peter Horan fiddle masterclass from a few years ago. Snippet of dialogue immediately after one of the students plays a tune for him:

Horan: Lovely. What do you call that?
Student: The Humours of Whiskey
Horan: It's a lovely tune. Where would that have originated from? Is it a Canadian tune?

And yes, it was the standard Irish slipjig "The Humours of Whiskey" AKA "Dever the Dancer", played cleanly but in such a fashion that he couldn't recognize it.

[leremarkable]

Ok.
Uh, take it where? There have been some posts written about this subject already, you could consult those, various players were recommended.
The thing I find interesting about older players is their style. Most weren't fiery virtuosos like Egan, but they might have at a tune in a really unique, special way. They were very often very colorful and interesting people as well. Like that note Micho Russell hit in the Fermoy Lasses, about halfway through the first part. What is that, a C#? And then there's this big pause. You'll remember that all your life! It creates an impression. These are rather more subtle types of things than the usual crans rolls triplets hard Ds.
Or Eddie Moloney. Very "chunky" playing, many older players sound like they had a lot of what pipers call "tight" or "close" playing in them, which was described best as "non-legato," using little pauses for phrasing. Eddie is on the "Flute Geezers" website. I could listen to him all day.
Often you hear very breathy tone, a sort of birdsongish effect. Harry Bradley has this going on, it's a marvelous sound that you don't hear much now.
I guess! I only know what I've gotten in the mail, really. Mostly. The world's full of great musicians who don't make CDs, either. There was a post on the Trad Music forum about Regional styles, Peter Laban wrote all this great stuff about all the different players in Clare. You have to be there! The bit on Clare concertina playing in the Fintan Valley book was like that, a real travelogue. Or Caoimhín MacAoidh's book on Donegal fiddle. How many of these players have made records?

Kevin has great words to describe things. It's about style. Any notes played in the fashion of Irish music, on any instrument, which doesn't have a little bit of style is about as useful as a bucket of fish-heads - Abhorrent, I think. And the average Joe Soap is led to believe he is supposed to like it, all the while a little voice inside his head says "I don't like it, I don't like it"

David P.

[Henke]

Glinjack. I have to say now that you would probably call me a damn young upstart if you knew what I was about. I don't think we could agree on this. I'm all for creating your own music, fusion or whatever, based on a tradition. Who say's there isn't room for this anywhere? The purists will always play the purely trad stuff anyway so no one is ruining any tradition. Besides, I think people has done this all the time during the years, I don't think this is something new. Who knows what the music might have sounded like just 300 years ago, who knows if it sounded just like the early recordings of trad musicians. The tradition, just as the term good music, is all about personal preference as well. What might come out as traditional to one person, or even a player, might sound awfully progressive to another. Who decides what's trad and not?
And besides, I think that "good fusion" is a great thing for the traditional music. I enjoy the pure drop trad myself, but I probably wouldn't even have given it a chance without being introduced to it via fusion folk in the first place, the same goes for a lot of people today.
Without development, there can be no survival. That's just my opinion.

[Wormdiet]

And before we say good night, who gives anyone the right to change the great traditional music that our forefathers bestowed on us.

:roll:
Umm. . . whoever wants to play something different? I wasn't aware one needed permission from some higher authority to play whatever the hell one wanted.

After all, maybe some people don't understand what the word 'tradition' means.

Or understand it, but also understand the distinction between respecting it and worshipping it?

Heck, I'm all for historical forms of Irish music being played at sessions. I find the "fusion" guys irritating too - but here's the important point only within the typical session, because it violates the conventions of the environment and is socially obnoxious. NOT in general-ie, at concerts or on albums.

[Cathy Wilde]

... and they were listening to YOU ALONE; would they say "lovely?" after you finished..or, would they get up to go get a pint in the middle of your tune?

it's a heavy idea to consider, but one that for me, for the way I'd like to approach the tradition...is an important one.<snip>

That's exactly what I live for .... one simple "lovely." And what I dread most .... the drift to the bar for the pint. Or, just as bad, the glazed thousand-yard stares of other players simply waiting 'til the wank is finished.

But, like Brad said (so very neatly, I might add -- wish I could organize my thoughts that well!), the thing that makes me go "lovely!" anymore isn't speed or ornamentation or pyrotechnics (although, like I said, I am nonetheless impressed by them).... it's the lift, the setting, the arc of the tune, and the melodic variation ===> ultimately, I guess, it's the creativity with which the player approaches a tune and makes the tune shine.

And as creativity takes many forms, I'm definitely not against people "evolving" The Music. I'm also not against people staunchly defending The Tradition. There's room for all of us; there always has been room in every form of music because music is SO WONDERFULLY FLEXIBLE! It's the pushing of the envelope that creates new music, it's the keeping of the faith that gives us a point of reference.

There's value in both.

And to me, the truly greatest players in every genre can do both.

I still go back to one thing John Skelton said that makes more and more sense to me .... A truly great player isn't the one who makes you say "What a great player!" The truly great player is the one who makes you say "What a great tune!"

But that's only me. And thank God there's room for all of us in this wonderful music we love so much.

Yay.

[AaronMalcomb]

To each his/her own... fusion vs pure drop or what have you.

But some questions bear reflection. If a player finds that just playing a tune isn't quite as interesting as changing the tune, is it the tune or the player? The question is just as valid vice versa.

Another question would be if you aren't able to play a tune with all of the fundamentals, is it really your place to change it? Egan and the like have the fundamentals down, I don't think many here would disagree. So if they want to play "The Green Mountain" like a mariachi, then that's their prerogative.

The tradition is big enough for each of us whether its playing a tune like Josie McDermott at your kitchen table or playing it like Jimmy Page in leather trousers with a laser show going on behind you.

Cheers,
Aaron

[Henke]

To each his/her own... fusion vs pure drop or what have you.

But some questions bear reflection. If a player finds that just playing a tune isn't quite as interesting as changing the tune, is it the tune or the player? The question is just as valid vice versa.

Another question would be if you aren't able to play a tune with all of the fundamentals, is it really your place to change it? Egan and the like have the fundamentals down, I don't think many here would disagree. So if they want to play "The Green Mountain" like a mariachi, then that's their prerogative.

The tradition is big enough for each of us whether its playing a tune like Josie McDermott at your kitchen table or playing it like Jimmy Page in leather trousers with a laser show going on behind you.

Cheers,
Aaron

First of all, for me it's not mainly about changing the tunes but putting them in different contexts and in different settings. If I'd have a trad tune in a set in a progressive or fusion band I don't think I'd mess with the tune as such.

Secondly, I think most of the good fusion bands has all the fundamentals down. Otherwise it wouldn't sound good at all. I've heard a few bands that didn't know the fundamentals, and they probably wouldn't appeal to anyone.