Greensleeves

[Feadoggie]

I was just thinking of getting one and playing along with my old Augustus Pablo LPs.

There you go. Or keeping up with Jon Batiste, playing the Hooters hits, etc., etc..

My son recently "borrowed" my old Hohner. So I won't be seeing it again for a long while. I'm looking for a deal on a Suzuki Pro 37 in its place. Cheaper than a refurbished Harmonium.

Feadoggie

[MTGuru]

Elizabethan? Nah. Or maybe this. I just can't figure out where you blow into it.

Actually, you may be able to reorient the keyboard and blow into the iPhone mic to play. The whistle app worked that way. I'm not sure in this case, but maybe Michael Eskin will chime in, since he wrote this Airboard app, too.

[Feadoggie]

but maybe Michael Eskin will chime in, since he wrote this Airboard app, too.

I thought Michael Eskin might have been the author. I kind of remember him having played a role in the Hohner button box apps.

I hope we have not scared the OP away with this thread drift. Greensleeves can be a nice motivation to learn some useful techniques on the whistle.

Feadoggie

[Christophe]

I like the idea of Greensleeves, and maybe other well-known tunes, as being pre-elisabethan and being carried along the time, while being adapted to every historical period musical standards. Some tales seem to be as old as humanity. Maybe the original version was played some millenaries ago on some kind of lithophone. In dorian mode, or in magdalenian mode, who knows....

[Nanohedron]

This from Wiki:

In Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor, written around 1602, the character Mistress Ford refers twice without any explanation to the tune of "Greensleeves" and Falstaff later exclaims:

Let the sky rain potatoes! Let it thunder to the tune of 'Greensleeves'!

These allusions indicate that the song was already well known at that time.

[MTGuru]

on some kind of lithophone ... in magdalenian mode

[pancelticpiper]

I chose my words carefully and said "the actual tune as normally played nowadays".

I made no claim that there exists any one and only 'correct' version, and I made no claim of historicity for the version normally encountered nowadays. The former is the domain of the pedant, the latter the domain of the historian. I'm coming from the perspective of a musician who has to play along with other musicians.

That alternating 7th is often heard in Elizabethan music and old folk tunes and gives a lovely distinctive character to Greensleeves. Something is lost when the tonality is altered, whatever the reason.

The sea shanty Old Maui also has an alternating 7th, though reversed, it being sharp on first appearance and flat on the cadence. To me that tune sounds quite old, partly for that reason. It would lose that feel if the 7ths were all played the same.

BTW I'm disappointed that Highland piper's insistence on playing a sharp 7th, rather than the correct flat one, on the final cadence of Flower Of Scotland has now spread to the entire stadium at Murrayfield, as I heard last weekend at the Six Nations match. That same weekend I was playing pipes for Scotland at the USA Sevens and I play that note properly. It's quite easy to do so on the pipes and it's inexcusable for the pipers at Murrayfield to ruin that song.

[chas]

Henry VIII is often credited with writing the lyrics to Greensleeves, presumably to an extant tune. Assuming that is correct, or at least that the song arose during Hank's reign, that's an argument for the air being pre-Elizabethan.

[benhall.1]

That alternating 7th is often heard in Elizabethan music

Is it? Can you give any references for this or other examples?

In the meantime, I'm with Peter and the Guru - I hear the tune as (based on a tonality of A) having F#s rather than Fnats. The natural Fs just sound wrong to me, and, I'm guessing, would to most here in the UK. It's not "normally played [that way] nowadays" as far as I'm concerned.

In contrast, the "Flower of Scotland" thing doesn't bother me at all. It's a very recent composition - 1965? - and, you know, these things change.

[Peter Duggan]

In the meantime, I'm with Peter and the Guru - I hear the tune as (based on a tonality of A) having F#s rather than Fnats. The natural Fs just sound wrong to me, and, I'm guessing, would to most here in the UK. It's not "normally played [that way] nowadays" as far as I'm concerned.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAuYkxhfc-I

See this? That's how it's played today for ABRSM Grade 3 Tuned Percussion (IMHO very soft at the grade!) and how I'm teaching it (on more sustaining metallophone rather than the videoed xylo) for National 5 Music right now. Same as Vaughan Williams, how I expect it to go and how I like it.

In contrast, the "Flower of Scotland" thing doesn't bother me at all. It's a very recent composition - 1965? - and, you know, these things change.

But agree with PCP on this one (Flower of Scotland requiring the flattened seventh).

I'm coming from the perspective of a musician who has to play along with other musicians.

So am I!

[benhall.1]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAuYkxhfc-I

See this? That's how it's played today for ABRSM Grade 3 Tuned Percussion (IMHO very soft at the grade!) and how I'm teaching it (on more sustaining metallophone rather than the videoed xylo) for National 5 Music right now. Same as Vaughan Williams, how I expect it to go and how I like it.

I agree with your basic point ... but man, for a percussionist, yon fella hasn't got very good rhythm, has he?

In contrast, the "Flower of Scotland" thing doesn't bother me at all. It's a very recent composition - 1965? - and, you know, these things change.

But agree with PCP on this one (Flower of Scotland requiring the flattened seventh).

Don't get me wrong, Peter, I prefer the flattened seventh on that last bit - it is how it was written after all - it's just that, being recent, it strikes me as being still pretty malleable, and who knows? I might like it another way one day. Greensleeves, however, has been the way it is (same way you hear it) for further back than I can remember, or even my long-dead parents would have remembered. And before ... and before ... so it hurts more when it's changed, especially when it's changed for no good reason.

[Peter Duggan]

I agree with your basic point ... but man, for a percussionist, yon fella hasn't got very good rhythm, has he?

Never heard that clip before forgetting to check the Grade 3 book at school today and Googling it when I got home... but, no, considering his reputation, I was surprised and still am on hearing it again!

Greensleeves, however, has been the way it is (same way you hear it) for further back than I can remember, or even my long-dead parents would have remembered. And before ... and before ... so it hurts more when it's changed, especially when it's changed for no good reason.

Quite! Although I'd still grit my teeth to play it another way if needs must accompanying someone who couldn't/wouldn't change...

[Nanohedron]

I agree with your basic point ... but man, for a percussionist, yon fella hasn't got very good rhythm, has he?

Never heard that clip before forgetting to check the Grade 3 book at school today and Googling it when I got home... but, no, considering his reputation, I was surprised and still am on hearing it again!

Isn't it fair to suggest that he was basically "getting through it" as an expedient to teaching the melody itself? He wasn't really performing in the standard sense, so I think he might be forgiven the impatience. That said, I'd prefer to be spot-on whatever the case, myself. Call me a pedant.

[benhall.1]

Call me

You're a pedant.

[Nanohedron]

And one more thing: I was laughing at myself because I couldn't understand a word he said in his intro, other than "quaver". The Scots tongue can be a real challenge for me.