good tunes to play either slow or fast

cowtime · Post by **cowtime** » Sat May 04, 2002 8:58 am

You know, I'd forgotten about Star of the County Down!, thanks for the reminder.
The first time I ever heard this tune, on the radio, it was played very slow, just fiddle and what sounded like a cello? and it was absolutely beautiful. I remember stopping beside the road to try to write down who did the recording, but reception was not good and I must have heard wrong. I thought they said it was by Jenny Allendar(spelling?), an irish fiddling champion. I've never been able to find anysuch recording so I assume I heard wrong. Do any of ya'll know what recording this might be?

mike.r · Post by **mike.r** » Sat May 04, 2002 9:18 am

On 2002-05-04 09:57, Eldarion wrote:
On 2002-05-04 09:37, raindog1970 wrote:
On 2002-05-04 07:55, brewerpaul wrote:
Star of the County Down works well either way. In fact, I like to play it as a slow air, then cut into a fast bouncy version.
I'll second that... it's surprising how good it sounds as a slow air.

Wait a minute.. wasn't "Star of the County Down" a slow song/air originally?

It was written by Cathal Mac Garvey(1866-1927). The air is `My love Nell´. Mike

SteveK · Post by **SteveK** » Sat May 04, 2002 9:38 am

Just to refresh your memories there was a discussion of this tune previously where it was pointed out that it is similar to a very old tune for Gilderoy.

http://www.contemplator.com/scotland/gilderoy.html

Steve

PhilO · Post by **PhilO** » Sat May 04, 2002 10:59 am

I agree re Dunmoor Lasses (a favorite) and the Butterfly. How about Battle of Aughrim? Philo

Bloomfield · Post by **Bloomfield** » Sat May 04, 2002 11:36 am

I want to mention Cooley's Reel. I heard it first (consciously) played as a slow reel on a solo fiddle at a session and was in love with it. It get's played quite a bit around here, and is great played fast. It's nice a set eg. Scollay's/Cooley's/Star of Munster.

Blackbird · Post by **Blackbird** » Sat May 04, 2002 4:43 pm

When you slow down a reel, do you give it a bouncy feel, like a dotted rhythm, or a hornpipe rhythm? When I first tried to play along with a fiddler, any time he slowed down a reel in order to help me out, I was confused by the rhythm he played and couldn't follow him. I know, I know, this is a music reader's mistake, but it took another music reader to explain to me what I was doing wrong. I wonder if that's how everyone plays reels slowly.

When I think of how you sing Star of the County Down, I think that bouncy rhythm is correct, but I want to see if that is the consensus.

colomon · Post by **colomon** » Sat May 04, 2002 6:31 pm

The reel "Broken Pledge" is great played slow (see, for instance, Old Blind Dogs <cite>Close to the Bome</cite>) and is popular at sessions played at normal reel tempo.

Otter · Post by **Otter** » Sun May 05, 2002 7:51 am

In our group we play the Musical Priest very slow at first, like a hornpipe, and go into a very the fast version.
The slow part is fun because we can add all kinds of ornementations.

Otter

tomandceil · Post by **tomandceil** » Mon May 06, 2002 9:48 am

I was told many years ago by a fellow folk musician (not sure who at this late date -- Walt Michael, perhaps) that "Star of the County Down" was originally a march. He then proceeded to play it that way, and it makes a very convincing march of the ancient clan variety. I used to sing "My Love Nell" with Waxies' Dargle, and it is indeed a bouncy tune. But my preference is for "Star of the County Down" sung as a beautiful balladic song and played as a slow air. John Kirk sings it beautifully on a Walt Michael & Company LP (don't know if it's on CD). So whether or not the march is indeed the original, it works all three ways.
Tom Bingham
tomandceil@bigsplat.net

LeeMarsh · Post by **LeeMarsh** » Mon May 06, 2002 12:09 pm

You might also try,
The Minstrel Boy,
Morrisons Jig,
Star of Munster,
Red Haired Boy.

Jens_Hoppe · Post by **Jens_Hoppe** » Tue May 07, 2002 1:44 am

On 2002-05-04 18:43, Blackbird wrote:
When you slow down a reel, do you give it a bouncy feel, like a dotted rhythm, or a hornpipe rhythm?

When I play reels fast, I usually play them a with bouncy rhythm, which is merely another way of saying that I like to play reels with "swing"!

Conversely, while you can certainly play slow reels with swing also, I often hear them played very straight, with a march-like quality to them. Takes a bit of getting used to.

So, that's my way of playing 'em: Fast reels are played with swing, slow reels are played straight (most of the time, sometimes with swing).

Jens

Roger O'Keeffe · Post by **Roger O'Keeffe** » Tue May 07, 2002 3:04 am

You can play any dance tune slow. The problem with the fact that many of us now learn tunes from CDs rather than by person-to-person tradition is that people tend to play the tunes as recorded. Thus only some tunes are perceived as ones that you're "allowed" to play slow.

Pipers especially had a practice of playing jigs both "the jig way" (i.e. at normal dancing tempo) and "the piece way" (i.e. slowed down and generally greatly ornamented). But even modern pipers tend to reserve this treatment to a few tunes which were recorded by older pipers this way, e.g. Nora Chríona.

So I suggest that you experiment with any tune which you like and just see how it comes out, and do your bit to restore the living tradition.

Just for the record, one well-known pair is "the Blackbird" which I think is on Paddy Keenan's first solo album which has been re-realeased as a CD. He plays it the piece way and then as a set dance. Another is "Fainne Geal an Lae" which kids in Ireland learn as a rather dreary march tune on tin whistle in primary school, but which was a goose-flesh-provoking revelation when I first heard it sung by Al O'Donnell as the melody for Patrick Kavanagh's poem "Raglan Road". The Irish title means "the bright dawn", and "the Dawning of the Day" occurs in the refrain, so presumabley Kavanagh had the tune in mind when he wrote the poem. There may well be traditional Irish words to the song, but I don't know of any.

mike.r · Post by **mike.r** » Tue May 07, 2002 4:03 am

On 2002-05-07 03:44, Jens_Hoppe wrote:
On 2002-05-04 18:43, Blackbird wrote:
When you slow down a reel, do you give it a bouncy feel, like a dotted rhythm, or a hornpipe rhythm?
When I play reels fast, I usually play them a with bouncy rhythm, which is merely another way of saying that I like to play reels with "swing"!

Conversely, while you can certainly play slow reels with swing also, I often hear them played very straight, with a march-like quality to them. Takes a bit of getting used to.

So, that's my way of playing 'em: Fast reels are played with swing, slow reels are played straight (most of the time, sometimes with swing).

Jens

I tend toward the exact opposite i.e. I swing 'em slow and square 'em up fast.The bounce comes from heavily accenting beats 2 & 4.Some reels such as Drowsy Maggie I prefer not to swing at any tempo.Listen to the way Martin Hayes plays The reel on the Burl which has a similar A part to drowsy M.,lots of bounce,hardly any swing and a very slow tempo for a reel of this type.Any hornpipe can be a reel but the dotted note is dificult to maintain and less effective at fast tempo to a point where bounce eventually must prevail over swing e.g. Fishers hornpipe.

Peace, Mike

[ This Message was edited by: mike.r on 2002-05-07 07:39 ]