This is a collection of 350 +
traditional tunes. Types of tunes are the jig , slip
jig, slide, reel, slow air, pibroch, strathspey,
highland fling, planxty, hornpipe, march, wedding
march.
If you are looking for books of
tunes then any of the O'Neill books are a good start.
However there is no substitute for listening . There
are many ways to play a traditional tune, especially
in the Irish style. Scottish style is more formalised
due to the influence of competitions and classical
music. Cape Breton style is closer to Scottish than
Irish and the ornaments as used in Irish style are not
used . Cape Breton fiddlers use vibrato which is
avoided in Irish traditional music. Some of the
ornaments (especially for Uilleann pipes) cannot be
written down using conventional notation. The notes of
an 'Irish Roll' are the same as the 'Turn' in
classical music. The effect of the roll however is
different, and sounds nothing like a turn. These
ornaments can be difficult to learn, but are essential
to the sound and must be mastered. The main ornaments
are the ROLLS (various types) and the CRAN (piping) as
well as many GRACENOTE types. The effect of these is
sometimes the sound of notes being percussed by the
previous note, which demands great accuracy to achieve
the effect. As stated above, these ornaments cannot be
musically notated using classical notation and must be
learned from other players. So what you see written is
often only a rough guide as to how it actually sounds
and sometimes no guide at all! At first reading,the
tunes look simple enough, but acquiring the skill to
execute them in the traditional style is not so
simple. You can replace a roll or cran in several
ways. For example an A roll can be replaced with the
three quaver notes A,B,A or A,A,A or whatever sounds
good. Traditional Irish music was handed down orally
for centuries and the attempt to collect and notate
them is a fairly recent occurance (18th century). The
Slow Airs generally are not in any strict time , that
being up to the performer's discretion or mood at the
time. Hornpipes are written with even quavers but
played in a dotted rhythm . A similar convention is
also encountered in jazz music.
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