Question - Slow Airs

[david_h]

Other examples ?

As a song "Johnny stays long at the Fair" (aka "Oh dear what can the matter be") is normally at a fairly steady 6/8, but becomes a waltz (? slow march) as "The Mist Covered Mountains" and on Mark Knopflers sound track to Local Hero was more of a slow air. Or back to 6/8 as adapted to be an irish jig.

[hoopy mike]

If you know the old music-hall song 'When Father papered the parlour', you'll know it has a brisk tempo. It also makes a haunting slow air.

I play the verses slowly and pick up tempo for the chorus for that one. Music-hall songs are great. My favourite is "She was only the stable-master's daughter, but all the horsemen knew her"

[Bothrops]

In spanish, the exact translation of the english word ''air'' is ''aire'', so yes, that word exist, but in another language.

[mcurtiss]

here's a question: is there such thing as a "fast air"?

[jemtheflute]

here's a question: is there such thing as a "fast air"?

Not as a jargon term in use in ITM or any other trad circles or musicologically that I have ever encountered. It would sound a little odd to use the phrase as we rarely use the word "air" in its basic musical sense any more in modern English, but there would be nothing "wrong" in describing, say, a reel-tune as "a fast air for dancing a reel to" or some such. Since "air" is in musical terms just another word for "tune", "melody" or perhaps "theme", there's no reason other than linguistic, subjective comfort why it could not be so used. As has been pointed out, the cognate word is still in current use in French and Spanish, (written "aire" but pronounced differently, of course, in each) neither of which languages has, so far as I know, a direct translation of the English "tune" either as a cognate word or with quite the same conceptual import. (I haven't researched this, so please correct me/shoot me down!)

[MTGuru]

To summarise the definitions so far: 'air' (or ayr/ayre/aire etc) simply means 'tune' or 'melody'. 'Slow' means 'slow'. So a 'slow air' is any tune played slowly.

No, that misses the critical element mentioned by Nano and Nico and s1m0n. Namely, sean nós.

As Jem said, tunes are plastic, and they morph fairly readily from one dance form to another. Slow reels, slow hornpipes, slow jigs are recognized as such. Play the melody of a song, and you're playing an air, at any speed. But an air played slowly is not necessarily a Slow Air.

In ITM parlance (which is what I think the OP here is referring to), the term "Slow Airs" or "Foinn Mhalla" usually refers to a style of performance that is informed by the traditions of sean nós singing. It's not only the speed, but the phrasing, free rhythm, unique ornamentation, and evocation of sean nós vocal expression that makes them what they are.

As a player of dance tunes, I find that what I know does not prepare me to to tackle the playing of slow airs with any justice. But I'll gladly whistle the melody of "Stairway to Heaven" or "The Mother's Lament" for you, as slow as you like. "Oh, yer baby has gone down the plug hole ..."

[MTGuru]

here's a question: is there such thing as a "fast air"?

Maybe mouth music - Irish lilting or Scottish puirt a beul. Reproduce this on an instrument, and you're playing a fast air, in effect. Except with the weird circularity of an instrumental performance of a vocal performance that is intended to imitate an instrumental performance in the first place.

[MTGuru]

(I haven't researched this, so please correct me/shoot me down!)

That seems more or less right, Jem. The OED cites a French definition of "air" from around 1600 as: suite de tons et des notes qui composent un chant. Larousse Unabridged still gives "air" as a translation of "tune" in a generic sense. English and French are presumably derived from Italian, where aria has both the generic and operatic meaning. In Spanish, "son" can also be a certain kind of tune in a Caribbean context.

Folk etymology would probably derive "air" from the breath of singing of blowing an instrument. But the OED speculates that the connection goes back to two senses of Latin "modus" - manner or mood, and mode in the sense of a musical scale. And that when aria took on the first meaning in Italian, it took on both and spread from there.

[pancelticpiper]

....."The Mist Covered Mountains" on Local Hero...

Funny that I should read this now, as just yesterday I played Chi Mi Na Morbheanna/The Mist-Covered Mountains on the Highland Pipes at a funeral.

The family was huddled under an awning barely large enough as there was a heavy steady driving mist- the ideal weather, in fact, in which to bury a grand old lady who had spent the first half of her 80-odd years in Scotland, up on a hillside or slope which on a clear day gives a magnificent view of the Pacific Ocean, and from which Catalina Island on such a day looms off the coast.

But on this day a heavy mist drizzled from the Heavens and the surrounding hills were indeed covered in mist.

I took it all in, and the proper tune to play could be nothing else.

But then I continued to play, in part because my pipes were going so well (they love this sort of weather!) and in part because the setting was so lovely. Flower of Scotland. Amazing Grace. Fields of Athenry (the family are Celtic supporters from Glasgow). Purple Heather.

Not till I got home did I realise how soaked I was! A bundle of wet smelly wool. Took quite a while to iron all the wrinkles out of the kilt's 30-odd pleats.

[hoopy mike]

how long did it take to iron the bagpipes?

[lesl]

here's a question: is there such thing as a "fast air"?

I've heard the term "lively" used.

My favourite latest pair of air/dance tune, is the air Anach Cuin which was originally a song, of which there is also a jig, sometimes called the Sheep in the Boat. I think it's on WFO no.1 also. Tragic story to go with it and all. The people from Anach Cuin (or maybe it was called Annadown) who went to the fair on the other side of Lough Corrib by boat, all drowned. I think the story is on the Fiddler's Companion.

[Nanohedron]

My favourite latest pair of air/dance tune, is the air Anach Cuin which was originally a song, of which there is also a jig, sometimes called the Sheep in the Boat.

I also know the jig as "Hole in the Boat". The lore I have on it was that a sheep kicked a hole in the side of the boat (currach, maybe? Can a currach hold 30 people plus some sheep?), and the drowning ensued. The jig's melody has a rather chillingly desperate aspect to it, I think. Appropriate indeed.

Checked Fiddler's Companion, and (oddly, I thought) I found nothing on the jig for either tune name, nor "hole" nor "sheep", and the entry for Anach Cuain/Cuan (as listed there) was cursory to say the least. Not even an ABC for it.

[DrPhill]

Its on the folk tune finder:
http://www.folktunefinder.com/tune.php?id=11718

[walrii]

...a grand old lady who had spent the first half of her 80-odd years in Scotland, up on a hillside or slope which on a clear day gives a magnificent view of the Pacific Ocean, and from which Catalina Island on such a day looms off the coast.

That's one heck of a hill if you can see the Pacific from Scotland!
<sound of chain being yanked>

[MTGuru]

Actually, Fiddler's Companion does give ABCs for Anach Cuain the air, and the jig is supposedly a reworking by Junior Crehan. Kevin Crehan plays them back to back on his album An Bhábóg sa Bhádóg (Track 8). Anach Cuain matches the FC transcription, played as a true slow air. And Sheep in the Boat matches the setting cited by Dr. Phill above. The liner notes give no information about these settings.

To me, Anach Cuain here bears a strong resemblance - by art or by chance - to the melody of Is Trua Nach Bhfuil Mé in Éirinn performed by Micheál Ó Domhnaill on Bothy Band 1975 (Track 6).