Tunes you really don't like on certain instruments...

[Jayhawk]

The Butterfly generally ought not to be played.

I think the Butterfly is the gateway tune into Irish music...if played around a new, but shy player, they will be lured into the light...and then they are yours.

[synecdoche]

I think the Butterfly is the gateway tune into Irish music...if played around a new, but shy player, they will be lured into the light...and then they are yours.

This is what happened to me! Unbelievable. I was duped.

[Nanohedron]

If you're playing for step dancers at a competition, you almost have to play The Butterfly or they'll savage you. Like, it's all they know. It's not about the count; O'Farrell's Welcome into Limerick will confuse them almost each and every one. And you can point out that The Butterfly's not really a slip jig, but a slip slide, but will that butter your parsnips for you? Think again.

There is a certain well-known fluteplayer who was in town for the time and for some ungodly reason decided tp play at a local feis. We were outside having a smoke break and he said to me, "Christ. I hope I never have to play the fnckin' Butterfly ever again."

[pancelticpiper]

I really just don't like Morrison's on flute...not one bit...

That's ironic, as Morrison (Tom Morrison), was a flute player.

About playing O Farrell's for dancers, the dancers around here use that tune a lot. Several of the local dance schools dance to recordings of it, and if you play any other slip jig they might get confused.

[Nanohedron]

I really just don't like Morrison's on flute...not one bit...

That's ironic, as Morrison (Tom Morrison), was a flute player.

Interesting! I did not know that.

About playing O Farrell's for dancers, the dancers around here use that tune a lot. Several of the local dance schools dance to recordings of it, and if you play any other slip jig they might get confused.

Yeah, it seems that it's more about the tune they're imprinted with than what the tune IS. The only ones locally who have no trouble with other tunes tend almost overwhelmingly to be musicians, themselves.

Hmm...back to tunes as regards instruments...

The Morning Thrush must be played solely on the pipes. No exceptions. None.

[Jumper]

I really just don't like Morrison's on flute...not one bit...

That's ironic, as Morrison (Tom Morrison), was a flute player.

Hi Richard,

My understanding is that it is named for fiddler James "The Professor" Morrison, who recorded it on January 24, 1936 as the first tune in a set entitled "Maurice Carmody's Favourites (The Stick Across the Hob, Richard Brennan's)"

http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/356

Where did the Tom Morrison attribution come from?

[Nanohedron]

I really just don't like Morrison's on flute...not one bit...

That's ironic, as Morrison (Tom Morrison), was a flute player.

Hi Richard,

My understanding is that it is named for fiddler James "The Professor" Morrison, who recorded it on January 24, 1936 as the first tune in a set entitled "Maurice Carmody's Favourites (The Stick Across the Hob, Richard Brennan's)"

http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/356

Where did the Tom Morrison attribution come from?

Damn. That's right. I had forgotten it gets called "Carmody's" quite a bit hereabouts, too.

More coffee...

[Jumper]

Tom Carmody, who played accordion in Morrison's band, tells this story of its origin:

"Jim was up at my house the night before we were to go to the studio, and I played him this jig. Jim asked me where I had got it from and I told him it was my father's jig called 'The Stick Across the Hob'. Jim asked me to play it again and he wrote it down as I played, then he got the fiddle and played it off. "I will put that on record tomorrow", he said, and we'll call it Maurice Carmody's Favourite".

http://www.morrison.ie/Story.htm

[Nanohedron]

Great stuff, Jumper. I have a thing for the oldest tune names I can find, so "Carmody's" has been a common way for me to refer to Morrison's. So, "The Stick across the Hob" is a gem for me, and the story here that goes with it, too. "Maurice Carmody's Favourite" ain't bad, either. Thanks.

[pancelticpiper]

Maybe it was wrong, but the guy I learned "Morrison's" from said the tune was from an old Tom Morrison flute recording.
He might have got his Morrisons mixed up. Sorry if I'm helping to perpetuate an error!
But to me Morrison's is a great tune on the flute or low whistle. Lots of honking in the second part.

[Montana]

I don't know that it would be accurate to say that I don't like to hear a flute play the reel (or the jig, I guess) "Green Hills of Tyrol" aka "Tripping Down the Stairs". It's just that I prefer to hear a fiddle (or maybe a box) play it because a fiddle can play all the way down the two-octave descending steppy run in the B part.
If you play flute, you reach the point where you have to pop up an octave and it just doesn't sound the same.

[Nanohedron]

I don't know that it would be accurate to say that I don't like to hear a flute play the reel (or the jig, I guess) "Green Hills of Tyrol" aka "Tripping Down the Stairs". It's just that I prefer to hear a fiddle (or maybe a box) play it because a fiddle can play all the way down the two-octave descending steppy run in the B part.
If you play flute, you reach the point where you have to pop up an octave and it just doesn't sound the same.

For me, sometimes it's perfectly acceptable-sounding ("folding", I think some call it), but it entirely depends on the tune. I like Tommy Coen's (as I first knew it, and so long as we're drifting about with tune names, also known as Cottage in the Grove and Crosses of Annagh) played on flute or whistle, but that's how I first heard it, and was "imprinted" so. Far as I'm concerned, the fiddlers are just playing a variation.

[Anglorfin]

I've heard many a good and interesting Tam Lin (Glasgow Reel) played on fiddle that I haven't found the equal for on a whistle. IMO the whistle makes it sound awkward and almost too basic in comparison to what a fiddle does for the tune.

Haven't heard it attempted on anything else but I would live to hear a concertina version.

[Lightheaded Mike]

I think that "Music for a Found Harmonium" sounds dreadful on flute, but nice on fiddle.
Likewise some of those tunes with lots of pedal type passages. (e.g., Devils' Dream, The Golden Keyboard), or those tunes that have those ascending patterns like The Mason's Apron, sound nice on fiddle, but not so exciting on flute.
And I don't like the Concertina Reel on concertina or flute. But I like it on fiddle.
And I still try to play along with them all when they come around in session.
Cheers, Mike

[Nanohedron]

I think that "Music for a Found Harmonium" sounds dreadful on flute, but nice on fiddle.

It's dreadful on any instrument.