A group I play with is doing a gig July 1st at a historical site for a "middling" (not rich) Maryland plantation on a tributary of the Cheaspeake Bay. The hosts want us to play some patriotic tunes along with our usual Irish and Old-time.
We don't know the usual patriotic tunes (Star-spangled Banner, America, etc.) so we're looking for tunes from traditional music that'll fit the bill.
Do you have any suggestions for tunes in the Celtic and Old-time traditions that meet *any* of these requirements:
sound patriotic?
are about patriotic themes?
actually were patriotic tunes back in history?
The few we've come up with include:
8th of January (Battle of New Orleans)
Liberty
Year of Jubilo
Ashokan Farewell (because of Ken Burn's Civil War series)
Tell us something.: Playing Scottish and Irish music in California for 45 years. These days many discussions are migrating to Facebook but I prefer the online chat forum format.
Yep all that fife and drum stuff works great on whistle. A favourite of mine is "Jefferson and Liberty" which is a terrific, ancient-sounding tune. It can be heard, played over and over again, on the soundtrack of "Glory".
pancelticpiper wrote: A favourite of mine is "Jefferson and Liberty" which is a terrific, ancient-sounding tune. It can be heard, played over and over again, on the soundtrack of "Glory".
Yes, it's an Irish-rooted tune, also called 'The Gobby-O'. You can find it in Ralph Sweet's 'Fifer's Delight' book.
Another good one that people will have heard before is 'The British Grenadiers'.
Charlie Gravel
“I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.”
― Oscar Wilde
America the Beautiful is a lovely tune. I know you'all say
you don't know it, but if I understand you're
just playing tunes, not singing. Anyway, just playing
patriotic tunes works fine. Surely you can learn it
in a few minutes. Call up the midi online.
Tell us something.: "Tell us something" hits me a bit like someone asking me to tell a joke. I can always think of a hundred of them until someone asks me for one. You know how it is. Right now, I can't think of "something" to tell you. But I have to use at least 100 characters to inform you of that.
Gary Owen and Rising of the Moon are both fun and have patriotic overtones.
I love the "subversive" verses of This Land. It's amazing how few people realize it's a protest song.
My favorite:
As I was walking, I saw a sign there
and on that sign it said no trespassing
but on the other side it didn't say nothing
Now that side was made for you and me
I DO teach my elementary kids those verses. Without them it's a fairly empty, brainless song.
So take your slogan
And kindly stow it.
It this is our land you'd never know it.
Let's join together and overthrow it.
This land's NOT made for you and me!
