Category: Tunes in 6/8

Here are the videos from guest tutor Beth’s class, where she taught Epping Forest, a tune from the 4th edition of Playford’s ‘Dancing Master’ manuscript (1670).  Huge thanks to Beth for covering the session!  Here’s the tune:

 

And here’s the riff:

And here’s the riff for Lord Frog, the tune for which can be found on the old Ealing Session website here:

 

Here are the PDFs for the tune, the tune with bowing, the the tune with bowing and riff and the Riff, with the regular dots below.

Not to be confused with any of the Shetland tunes of the same name!  I know this tune from playing in sessions and in trying track down it’s origins I’ve found it listed as ‘The New Rigged Ship no 2’ or ‘The Rigged Ship’ in England where its played as a jig, as ‘The Hills of Glenorchy’ in Scotland where it’s played as a march or quickstep, and as ‘The Wild Hills of Wannie’ in Northumberland where it’s played slowly as an air.  There are numerous other titles for it, and variations of it, and it seems well travelled!  Often a sign of a good tune….

The PDF of the tune, chords and bowing/ornaments variations is here, and the dots are below.  We improvised in the B section by making up our own rhythms for alternating between Es and Bs in bars 9-10 and then between Ds and As in bars 11-12, and then back to to Es and Bs for bars 13-14 before picking up the tune again in the last two bars (aka at the ‘tail’).   ‘Stab’ chords played every two bars helped punctuate the changes here.