Ends of eras and new beginnings

As most of you will know, I’m handing over the class to Tom Newell next term and will link to Tom’s website once it’s up and running. BUT this website will remain active; I’ve already started an index of tunes, though it does need a good tidy up, and I’m going to be linking it to some other projects I’m doing such as https://thefiddleproject.org/ on learning fiddle style, and keeping it up to date with new posts about relevant and related various things.

There will be a Patreon starting up soon for anyone across the world who wants to have access to video tutorials with walk throughs of tunes and chord sequences, and full details on the ornaments, variations etc that I often refer to in the posts. Link to follow once it’s all set up!

It’s been an honour and privilege to work with the class over the last eight years, thank you to everyone who has attended, and thank you for the lovely card that Robert put together, what a great set of pictures! I will definitely be back to dep for Tom from time to time, so it’s bye for now but also see you soon,

Debx

Ville de Quebec

Our last tune of the term is Ville de Quebec by Chris Wood. I taught it as I learnt it in sessions, with a few different notes than his original version (specifically the figure in bar 5, wherever it comes) but have decided to go with Chris’ original version, sorry! We also looked at two different strumming patterns (see video 2), experiment with different combos of up and down strokes and see what works for you.

Ville de Quebec originalDownload
Ville de Quebec different chordsDownload

ECDC list

Possibly an extra one or two to be added for safety, but here is the list so far:

Le Poules Huppes https://newealingsessions.com/2021/04/04/the-crested-hens-les-poules-huppees/ No arrangement, maybe some dynamics tbc

Jenny Pluck Pears https://newealingsessions.com/2026/02/08/jenny-pluck-pears/ No arrangement, maybe some dynamics tbc

Mairi’s Wedding/Peat Fire Flame https://newealingsessions.com/2022/11/02/mairis-wedding/ and https://newealingsessions.com/2022/10/30/peat-fire-flame/ with arrangement as follows:

mairis-and-peat-fire-arrangementDownload

Reel de Gaspe

Reel de Gaspe link

Red House Reel

Red House Reel link

Hunt the Squirrel

Hunt the Squirrel link

Dashing White Sergeant – updated tune with reduced part and updated chords

DWS – reducedDownload

Jamaica/Remaica – two of each, and repeat ad nauseum

jamaicaDownload
remaicaDownload

Mount Hills

MOUNT HILLSDownload

Duke of Kent’s Waltz

Duke of Kent’s WaltzDownload

Out on the Ocean

Out on the OceanDownload

The Red House Reel

A classic dance tune The Red House Reel – I know this from a Jimmy Shand album (as per the video below), but it’s earliest collection appears to be in the 9th edition of the Playford Collection 1695. It was used in a range of theatrical productions in the 1700s, with more info available here on the invaluable tunearch.org website. It has various titles in English, Scots and Welsh and there are both major and minor versions, showing it to be a very popular tune that was absorbed into various different traditions.

The tune is often played in G minor, with F#s rather than F naturals, but E minor is also common, either with D#s or D naturals.

We are using the tune to accompany a 40-bar dance and so are playing AABBC – this is also a useful tune for the Eightsome Reel, the beginning and end sections of which are 40 bars long. The tune may be also be played as a 48 bar tune, as AABBCC.

The Red House ReelDownload

The White Cockade

Belated Happy Burns Night! Here is a tune from Scotland called the White Cockade. It doesn’t follow the predictable pattern of some of the tunes we learned, so we sang through the A part (verse) using the Robbie Burns poem The Jolly Beggar’s John Highwayman:

A Highland lad my love was born,
The Lalland laws he held in scorn;
But he still was faithfu’ to his clan,
My gallant, braw John Highlandman.

Sing hey my braw John Highlandman!
Sing ho my braw John Highlandman!
There’s not a lad in a’ the lan’
Was match for my John Highlandman.  etc etc
https://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/robertburns/works/the_jolly_beggars_john_highlandman/

Here are the Jacobite words, famously recorded in the 1970s by The Corries:

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Scottish_Song/The_White_Cockade

We also tried some upper and lower cuts (ornaments) and tried a slightly different set of chords,

The White CockadeDownload
The White Cockade chordsDownload

Grimstock

New term, new tune! From the 1651 Playford collection, this is Grimstock.

We will explore some more strumming/accompaniment patterns next week. And who can resist a little Pride and Prejudice? There are some lovely videos of this tune on Youtube, I’d recommend having a look, though most are from the historical performance perspective rather than from a folk perspetive!

Wolves a-Howlin’

Here is our tune from the end of the Autumn term, Wolves a-Howlin’, aka Poor Little Darling. It’s a tune that’s spread widely among Deep South and MidWestern fiddlers, with a various versions of the tune present in various different places. I’ve chucked an E chord in here and there for variety but you can here in the first video that the chords are fairly stable and unchanging – this is not uncommon in Old Time and Bluegrass music.

Here’s another version of the tune on mandolin – you can here where it’s the same and where it’s different. Many thanks to David for sending these videos over, both are excellent finds!

Accompaniment patterns for Mynnyd Yr Heliwr

We tried three different accompaniment patterns for our tune, with an alternative set of chords from week one – each player picked a note from each chord, linking them together to create their own personalised part.

Looking at the PDF below, A is the short stabs, B has the overlapping patterns used earlier in the term and C is the feature rhythm for the A section only. All are illustrated with the A section and the notes used are also illustrative, please use your own chosen notes:

mynnyd accompDownload

Tune with new chord sequence:

Mynnyd Yr Heliwr 2Download

Extra task: try playing the tune in a different key, specifically A minor. Why?

1. Many tunes have more than one ‘standard’ key that they tend to be played in, and so being able to switch into a different key is a very useful skill to have in any setting. Examples of this are Cock of the North (G/A/D), Jump at the Sun (Gm/Em) and Mrs McCloud’s (G/A mixolydian).

2. Thinking in terms of intervals rather than in terms of fingerings/notes will make you more flexible as a musician. It’s good for your brain! I don’t expect many of you to be able to get it perfect first time, that’s not how learning music works, but practising this skill will also help to get the tune firmly into your memory banks.