Just had to share this video after watching it like three times because the playing is absolutely brilliant. I'm always really impressed with accomplished button accordion players 'cause to me it looks like a tricky instrument! And despite the bad rap that the bodhran has on this site, when the playing is good I just love it (and check out Johnny's 'stache and sweater vest; classic).
That's a interesting bodhran ...looks to be at least 20--22 inches (unless Johnny McDonagh is a very little person) and fairly shallow at what looks to be about 3 inches or so.
Single row button accordions like that (in D I believe) are generally known in Ireland as melodeons. Bobby Gardiner is of course better known as a great exponent of the 2-row BC box. As you know of course.
bodhran does not get a 'bad rap'. Our concern that the oft maligned insstrument got that way by being abused by players who don't understand its role in The Music.
GOOD bodhran is very tricky to do also. Having tried learning that instrument, I quickly realized I did not have the affinity for it. However, an acquaintence, John Devan, who is an occasional contributor here from our little Irishesque enclave on the South Side of Chicago is a very good/sensitive bodhran player. (he plays with a local Chicago group 'Dyed in the Wool') He played in with Liz Carroll at his World Folk Music Center a month or so ago. They were really tight.
Sadly there are more aspirants to the instrument who seem to be taking longer than I did in recognizing their lack of affinity, or not taking the time to learn the instrument properly.
Ah, Johnny's a master. Why? What Llig said. Not just plowing ahead with any old thumpety thump nonsense, but actually playing the drum WITH the tune, TO the tune. Great stuff.
It really does! It was exactly how you described it, headphones and all. I liked how they let the audience in on it after a while. I sent it on to my Dad so he could play along, he got a big charge out of it.
I now understand your aversion to the bodhran. You think a dummy keyboard and a bodhran sound the same?
If you really can't hear the difference then I'm at pains to understand your claims to be able to detect all those subtle nuances in music and music making.
Wrong, they don't sound the same, similar yes, within the grand scope of musical instruments, but not the same. But whether they sound the same or not, is not my point.
My point - and I've said this many times, and Joseph Cooper as an illustration - is that the bodhran when played well is merely a clatter that follows the twists and turns of the tune as closely as it can. Johnny Ringo's playing above is mighty fine bodhran playing. It matches the tune equally as well as Joseph Cooper matches the piano in his headphones.
Listen again the the Joseph Cooper clip. Listen hard to the clatter. Listen for music in the clatter. Then feel the enormous relief when they cross fade the actual music.
Whatever. The bodhran to my ears does not sound like a dummy keyboard so I would not take the latter to replace the drum simply because it does not sound as good, at least to my ears.
You evidently hear it otherwise ('merely a clatter') and are not able to enjoy the sound it makes nor enjoy it's subtle tonal variations etc. I think you've closed your mind and your ears to good bodhran playing and I don't hold out much hope of you being persuaded of it's value. Never mind.
"Whatever"? What the fecks that supposed to mean? You dismiss what I said without bloody reading it? I said they don't sound the same. And whether they sound the same or not, is not my point.
Whatever; the distinction between 'sounds like' and 'sounds the same', you said the the dummy keyboard sounds like a bodhran.
Your point, as I understand it, is to draw a similarity between the two. However, one has a musically satisfying sound and as such is played all over the world in Irish music sessions and on stage. The other is used only for exercising the fingers of a keyboard player. The d k was not designed to be listened to and therefore, because of it's lack of tone and timbre, it has not found it's way into the pubs, theatres and recording studios; unlike the bodhran.
Gran, get over what it sounds like. It's irrelevant to my argument.
Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard and Johnny McDonagh copy the melody very very well. Only without the notes. It's irrelevant what they sound like, they copy the tune, but without the notes.
What it sounds like is crucial both to making music and to this discussion.
It's obvious the drum isn't meant to play tunes, everyone knows it plays a subservient role to the tunes as an accompanying instrument. So what is your point?
I think Joseph Cooper had the dots in front of him on the dummy keyboard. Something he wouldn't dream of doing if he was giving a concert on a real piano of course, but in this instance he couldn't afford a single mistake because there was at least one very knowledgeable person on the panel watching what his fingers were doing and working out from that what the music was - successfully.
Llig, you stated quite clearly in your post of 11th March relating to the dummy keyboard;
'...and isn't it remarkable how much the thing sounds like a bodhran'.
I merely took you up on that point in order to refute it.
Your frustration in not understanding the role of percussion in music making could be down to your unwillingness to accept the musical virtues of percussion in general and the bodhran in particular. I can not accept your suggestion that the musical attributes of a dummy keyboard and those of the bodhran are alike; they do not do the same thing.
Contrary to your opinion, what they sounds like does matter. The bodhran compliments the tune with it's own rhythmic colouring, not just always playing the rhythm of the tune as it happens but using the same rhythmic elements in order to accompany the tune. It sounds good in that it adds to the texture of the music and to my ear is the appropriate percussion instrument for this style of music. ( For what it's worth I don't like the use of other percussion instruments other than bones).
I'm not talking about the musical attributes of the drum or the dummy keyboard. I'm talking about what you do with it. Yes, it's remarkable how similar they sound, but that was an aside. They don't sound the same. But that's irrelevant to what I'm trying to say ... again ... and again.
It's what you do with it.
Contrary to your opinion of me, I understand percussion well. I understand that all the percussion is in the tune, if played well of course. I understand that the bodhran in Irish diddley music does nothing rhythmically different or extra to what is already in the tune. It does not add rhythmic colouring. The drumming in GHB pipe bands adds rhythmic colouring. Listen to the drumming in Indian classical music - the phrase "rhythmic colouring" doesn't do it justice. You are wrong in assuming I I am unwilling to accept the musical virtues of percussion in general.
But listen to the bodhran in Irish music. All it does is repeat what's in the tune. And though it does add a different timbre, it is a timbre without melody.
The reason I ask is that I wonder sometimes if bodhran players realize how distracting it can be---one loud bodhran is enough to drown out the details of a tune, and sometimes to make it difficult to hear the tune altogether. That's not musical in my book. Even mediocre melody players don't have that kind of detrimental effect on the music.
I think one of the troubles with bodhran players in sessions (good bodhran players that is - I'm not interested in bad bodhran players) is that they bang away and what they hear is akin what Joseph Cooper has in his headphones. If they are playing well, they are listening hard to the tune. But no matter how quiet they are and no matter whether you actually like the sound of it or not, as Kennedy says, they are making it harder for everyone else to hear the tune
Just to fill out the YouTube link to Joseph Cooper (who may not be very well-known to the younger generation), here is a biographical link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Cooper
Morning llig,
I understand what you are saying and the point of your discussion about the instrument is, as ever, to denigrate it. As I hope you'd expect , I'll continue to oppose those views in the spirit of furthering a mutual musical understanding.
I can agree with you that the bodhran adds a different timbre to the music and no one is going to argue against the fact that it is a timbre without melody, but it adds its timbre, and thereby its colour, the only way it can ie rhythmically. Your comparison with the rhythmic contribution of pipe band drumming to reels and jigs is interesting. I'm a fan of that style of playing. They use amazingly complex patterns in a kind of rhythmical counterpoint to the tunes. If the bodhran was to try and imitate that rhythmic style (and good players can get very close to a passable imitation) I don't think it would be suitable. One of the reasons it isn't played that way or in the style of the tabla you mentioned, is that the crispness of those rhythms would not sound as clear on the relatively slacker skin of the bodhran and would probably sound as a muddy clutter. Please correct me if I'm wrong but am I right in thinking that although the marching pipes do use crans etc as part of the tune they do not use as many ornaments as say a fiddle or flute or uileann pipes do in an indoor session? That being the case then it's crucial that the bodhran stays out of the way to allow the tunes to breathe etc. whereas pipe band drumming, conversely, uses lots of rudiments because there's more 'space' in the tunes to allow for that ornamentation.
I suppose what I'm talking about is the appropriate use of percussion in Irish session music. The bodhran is an Irish drum. It's timbre adds to the texture of Irish music. Your oft repeated cry 'All it does is repeat what's in the tune' is not wholly correct. True, it keeps to the inherent rhythmical ingredients of the tune but you are mistaken in thinking that it keeps slavishly to the rhythmic contour of the tune without variation. It has its own rudiments and tonal possibilities that when applied judiciously compliment the music.
If you don't care for it then this becomes a question of aesthetics and personal taste. (Very interesting thread re Brendel by the way llig -thanks for that.)
To kennedy; I do understand that there are too many bad or non musicians who have turned up at a session and hit the drum rather than play it. (the distinction should be obvious) and this spoils it for everyone. But as llig often points out, the discussion is about good bodhran playing not bad.
For starters, no, you continue to misunderstand me. I don't wish to denigrate the instrument itself. I think it can be very effective in organised arranged music. Donal Lunny, for example is a master.
Next par:
For an instrument to add timbre it must be a different timbre to what is already there. The drum can do this. For an instrument to add rhythmic colour, as you call it, it has to add something new. You seem to agree here re the pipe bands' drumming counterpoint. Though you are wrong in thinking those pipes do not play as complex a set of articulations as the Irish fiddle, flute or uileann pipes. If anything, it is more complex. The big difference though is that they are not improvised. They have to be tightly arranged to avoid the mush. Just in the same way and for the same reason the drumming is tightly arranged.
But you say that for Irish music, "it's crucial that the bodhran stays out of the way to allow the tunes to breathe". Stay away from what? the tune? Stay away from the "rhythmic contour of the tune"? That's certainly not what Johnny McDonagh was doing in the clip at the top.
To sum up:
You say the bodhran should not keep slavishly to the rhythmic contour of the tune without variation. And it should not add rhythmic counterpoint.
So just what are these judiciously complimenting rudiments then? (And if you say they are tonal possibilities, then my case is rested)
Glad you cleared up my misunderstanding. I'm more than happy to know that you think the bodhran can be very effective in music making and of course I agree with your evaluation of its use by the likes of Donal Lunny. So if my attempts at describing what the bodhran offers are failing, maybe you could articulate just what it is the bodhran is doing in that situation that makes it so effective for you. If you are saying that the drum can only be used in organized and arranged music I strongly disagree. I'm failing to understand how you can add an instrument to a band, even in a session context, and not hear its tonal qualities which contributes to the overall sound and texture.
I thought I'd made it clear regarding the use of rudiments and other ornamental drumming features but I'll try again. If the bodhran was to play with a similar complex rhythmic accompaniment as the pipe band drum it could get in the way of the subtle ornamentations played by the flute/ fiddle etc. therefore it is appropriate to play a simpler accompaniment to allow that 'ornamentation' to be heard as they are performed at a quieter dynamic. It's just a way of being sensitive to the tunes, and not cram as many notes as possible in to a bar just because you can. Letting the tunes 'breathe' is another way of putting it. That does not mean the drum cannot offer subtle ornamentations of its own but they need to be added judiciously and nowhere near as many as used in the pipe band style. Furthermore playing that way would change the character of the music and give the accompaniment a martial feel which would be inappropriate.
Thanks for the explanation regarding pipe band ornaments and how tightly they are arranged I suspected that might be the case but I don't always hear them in the overall big sound of the massed band.
But you have misread the penultimate paragraph of my previous post regarding following the rhythmic pattern of the melody. Therefore your summing up is incorrect and your final sentence in parentheses is confusing. Your case is certainly not rested.
Tonal qualities. Feh. You're fooling yourself if you think variable pitches from a drum makes the music sound better. I've heard some bodhran players who like to do that---higher thumps in certain parts of the tune---they must think it adds to the excitement. It doesn't. It's annoying.
Well, the bodhran sounds a little bit better than the practice keyboard thing. Again, I revert to the player, not the instrument. The bodhran has the sad distinction of having a high eejit to decency player ratio.
When you add an instrument to a band it adds its timbral characteristics. That cannot be gainsaid. Subtle pressure shifts cause that fundamental timbral quality to vary but I agree with you kennedy, it is a nuisance when it's overdone with a continuous falling and rising pitch shift from high to low and back again I don't like it as it distracts the ear from the tonal centre of the music and it happens too much in modern playing for my taste.
That said the timbre of the instrument can be shifted with subtlety by varying degrees of damped sounds as well as playing on different parts of the skin and the use of finger pressure on the back of the skin etc. The use of dynamic shadings and delicate little accents marks out the better players from the 'whackers'. It's subtle but that's what this music is about a lot of the time.
If you listen also to Mr Mc Donagh he also shifts the pitch at the B part of tunes which works very well before returning to his starting pitch at the A sections.
The whole point of my joining this discussion in case we forget was to dispel the notion that the dummy keyboard is akin to the bodhran. I'm trying to point out how it differs in order to give lie to that somewhat insulting association.
When I play tunes with people, we shift the timbre of our instruments subtly, We use varying degrees of dampening and play on different parts of them, adjust the pressure of our bows and breath etc.
The use of dynamic shadings and delicate little accents marks out the better players.
And this is all done as part and parcel of the tunes themselves.
The drum does not add to this, or enhance it in any way. It merely confuses it. You may think your drumming is subtle, but compared to what happens in the tunes, if played well, it is a sledgehammer. Leaving aside the actual tune playing for the moment, do you really think that with your stick and stretched piece of animal skin you can impart as much subtlety as someone manipulating a vibrating column of air with their dancing fingers, lips and diaphragm? Do you really think that by hitting something you can be as subtle as someone who draws the sound by the speed and pressure of horse hair across a bunch of strings being constantly shortened and lengthened by the dexterity of human digits? Do you really have the arrogance that you can add to that?
Llig, if you'd taken the time to read my postings on this subject you will have read how I understand and acknowledge the subservient role the drum plays in relation to the melody instruments. I'm not advocating that it is equal in importance to the melody instruments nor am I suggesting it has anything like the musical possibilities or versatility of those instruments. I can't put that any plainer. However within its limitations the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. Admittedly, those skills are much more readily acquired than those required of a fiddler, fluter or piper etc. So fear not, there's no arrogance on that score from me, but then, any musician turning up at a session who plays badly isn't going to add much worthwhile no matter how relatively difficult or easy his instrument is to play.
Not everyone who trys to play the bodhran succeeds as well as those who have a natural affinity for it.
You've stated that you do not wish to denigrate the instrument and that it can be effective in musical arrangements. Therefore I'm assuming that you would agree that the bodhran does compliment the tunes. If that's not the case then please articulate just what the bodhran does in that context to give you such delight.
You always say that it 'merely' plays whats going on in the tune already but without the pitches. Of course that's what it plays, but there's plenty of rhythmic material there to create a 'part' for its accompanying purposes.
The bodhran obviously can't add the melodic shape so what it does is to underpin, punctuate, reinforce and emphasize the rhythmic nature of what the melody instruments are playing. This music after all is dance music, music to which the bodhran is well suited as evidenced by its inclusion in Irish bands at all levels of performance.
Good bodhran playing (the only sort worth discussing) is not a confusing sound for most players. If it's being played in time and with sensitivity why would it be confusing? There may be some people who are not used to polyphonic ensemble playing and are unable to hold a tune unless everyone is playing in unison but they are few and far between. Most people are happy playing in a band with different instruments which add their own distinctive voice to create a blend of sound that, well, sounds good.
It's quite simple really.
I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. And I've never doubted that, if played well, with imagination and open ears, it can add interesting, even moving timbres to a performance.
But what it can't do is add anything to the tunes. The tunes, if played well, underpin themselves, They punctuate, reinforce and emphasise their own rhythmic natures.
Everything you say the bodhran can do for the tunes, is already in the tunes.
OK. A flutist plays a tune. Everything is there in the tune. A fiddle joins in, plays the tune in similar fashion but changes the texture of the sound, this adds interest. A pipes player joins in he plays everything that's in the tune but adds the instrument's distinctive voice and changes the overall texture. And so on and so on as instruments are added. A bodhran joins in, it can't play everything in the tune because he has no melodic options so he adds the inherent rhythmic ingredients of the tune but wuth due regard to the proirity of the tunesmiths. What he adds is is the sound of the drum. This contributes to the texture of the overall performance and adds another point of interest to the blend. Can you accept that?
A flutist plays a tune. (Where? this is important, but I'll come to that). Everything is there in the tune. A fiddle joins in. They listen to each other intently, affecting, effecting. Playing with and for each other. Enjoying the unison and enjoying the percussive and melodic strays from the unison. A set of pipes joins in and they all listen to each other intently. It's getting harder though, more to listen to. Another fiddle joins in. even harder to listen, it's confusing where the sounds are coming from, but if the concentration holds, it can still be creative.
A third fiddle joins in, but they are not a very good player, OK, but dragging a little. Then a tin whistle that's a bit out of tune, and though inaudible on the lower notes, it's horribly shrill on the higher ones. Then a really strong sounding flute player joins in. But their style is a little arrogant and though everything seems to hold together, this flute player actually shifts the pulse away towards how they want to play it.
You have to accept now that it's just a wall of sound and that nothing can be done about it. All semblance of beauty and control in the tune is gone. You can only really hear a fraction of the wall and concentrating on playing with the people close to you is all you can do. If you're in the pub, the background level of noise from the punters is rising with the volume of the session, so the volume of the session hopelessly tries to match it. The punters are enjoying it, but it's hard for them to define anything tangible in it. The whole timbre is just a wall of mush. The sound of a drum is added and this contributes to the texture of the overall PERFORMANCE and adds a point of interest to the punters.
That description is fair enough llig. Too many cooks spoiling ther broth etc. etc.
My St. Patrick's Night was lovely. Just a handful of us with no duplication of instruments. I'm sorry if yours turned out to be disappointing in any way.
You said, "... the texture of the overall performance ... "
You asked me further up to say where and why I sometimes do find the instrument acceptable. The answer is simple ... in a performance. A can appreciate the timbre, and the dynamics and the way it can add interest to an arrangement. A good example is the intro to the first set of jigs, the first track on Planxty's Words and Music. If you've not heard it, open your mind to the possibilities of not repeating what's in the tune.
However, though not averse to performance, I don't like a tune with my mates to be one. It's a tune with my mates.
I don't miss your point. I simply don't agree with you.
As you say the bodhran adds interest, it adds interest to the music.
I suspect the discussion regarding 'performance' has been done elsewhere, and this thread already has mutiple subjects so I might just leave that for now.
But throughout I maintain that the bodhran sounds good in a musical context and that's my point.
Llig, I still don't understand why the explanation in your "a flutist plays a tune..." post does not apply equally well to strummers. More so even, because they can interfere with the melody as well as the rhythm.
Not going to stick my head into the lions den and ask in the other current discussion though.
But you do agree with me, and the tell tail sign was you using the word performance, not me.
The bodhran adds an interesting timbre to the audience.
If there is no audience, the bodhran is at best redundant, but more usually, merely irritating. (And remember, I'm talking about good bodhran players)
The subject of whether a tune with your mates is a performance is of paramount importance. If you disagree with that then you simply don't understand what non performance music is.
The difference between the strummer and the thwacker is that the strummer adds something, the stacked harmony. The thwacker adds nothing except to make it more accessible to punters.
Llig, just to comment about your enjoyment of the bodhran playing in bands like planxty et al. Be assured I'm well aware of that approach to accompaniment but you seem to be saying that it can only be done in a premeditated fashion. Many players can offer that 'on the fly' once they have heard the tune through a couple of times (if they don't already know it). That's one good reason to just have one bodhran playing at a time.
another tune player can interfere with the melody and the rhythmn equally as easily as contribute, so there is no distinction on that count. But we are talking about good players
LligI don't agree with you. Youv'e already acknowledged the interest etc that the drum adds but then you contradict all of that by reverting to your dismissive comments about the bodhran's contribution to the music. The music with all the different instruments playing sounds good.
OK, you've drawn me into the debate (sorry about this poor thread!)
What is the difference of playing music in public and performing music in public?
Yes, I'd agree with that. That's why I like to just call it simply "the tune", referring to the inextricable nature of the melody and the rhythm. i.e., as the dictionary has it, they are incapable of being disentangled, undone, loosed, or solved. Trying to discuss rhythm and melody as separate entities (I shouldn't have mentioned the two separately above) belies a fundamental misunderstanding.
But what the really good strummer does is to present harmony that is the tune in a stacked way. It has its problems, not least in the way that it makes the music even more dense than it already is, and so harder to hear. But a good strummer can overcome this if they are aware of it.
So a strummer does something to the music itself. The thwacker does not, it merely repeats half of what the tune is, adding only timbre. The thwacker tries to break that inextricable link, and precisely because it is inextricable, it fails. It is as musical as Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard.
"What is the difference of playing music in public and performing music in public?"
It's very simple.
It's a performance if you care about the public. It's a performance if your function is that of making a "good sound".
It's not a performance if you don't care about the sound, you have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people you are playing with is listening, and the only function of what you are doing is to communicate your musical ideas with your fellow musicians. (thta's "musical" ideas, what it sounds like is not enough
Basically, is it a conversation, or an exhibition?
Llig, I could begin to think you are more interested in a wind up than investigating a musical point!
We've been around the houses on this subject and now you've gone backwards. You've just put;
'It (he bodhran) is as musical as Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard.'
Previously you have written in regard to the bodhran;
'A can appreciate the timbre, and the dynamics and the way it can add interest to an arrangement.'
And;
'I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. And I've never doubted that, if played well, with imagination and open ears, it can add interesting, even moving timbres to a performance.'
I can't help thinking there is an aspect here where differences of taste and musical experience make logical reasoning difficult.
These are not true parallels, but given the amount of foot tapping that goes on, I don't feel that a simple, on the beat, low drum beat of appropriate pitch interferes with the rhythm any more or less than a drone interferes with the melody. They both have an effect.
Add a bit more complexity, but still farly subtle, (Donal Lunny on Matt Molloy's Stoney Steps say), a drum or the chordal accompanyment will both "change the tune" a bit more.
Then we come to something like the Bothy Band, with prominant strumming, or De Dannan, with prominant drumming (along the lines of what we started off with above). the one having a strong affect on how we hear the notes in the tune, the other on the rhythm (and in both cases plenty else going on as well).
I don't understand why drummers get so much ire but strummers largely get away with it. As a listener I don't see strong distinction (some liked, some not liked). I'm not getting a convincing argument as to why a drummer can't be part of a conversation the way a strummer can, and in a duo situation (performance or otherwise) I'm sure they often are.
I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically in performance.
And
It is as useful in non-performance music as Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard.
There is no contradiction there.
It's analogy time:
You are in a conversation with your mates down the pub:
"Did anyone see that episode of Fr Ted when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse. It was totally brilliant?"
And someone else says right after it:
"Yeah, did anyone see it?, it was brilliant".
Annoying huh.
You are Giving a lecture on "defining the Sitcom" for a media course:
"Let's discuss the episode of Fr Ted when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse"
And you have behind you a power-point presentation with the words:
"Fr Ted. Episode IV . The one when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse."
Useful huh?
well, llig since you brought it up , i believe music falls into a category that is a little of both. I would say that playing music is a "soliloquy" perhaps it is not co-incidental that the best analogy i can think of is Samuel Beckett e.g. "I'm taking off my boot. Did that never happen to you?" furthermore, I would argue that no one in their right mind would play a fiddle/flute/pipes/ what have you- unless they really wanted to hear it .and so all musicianers ultimately (even alone in a dark room) are "performing"
even if it be only for themselves! if you live in some Dark holler where the sun don't ever shine , and you wake up in the middle of the night and grab your fiddle/flute pipes etc. and play a scale and go back to sleep-that is a "performance", and if you don't think of it as such you are a hack- or , at best , a dillettante who lacks the soul of a true Musician. There are people who collect CD's etc because they like to "listen" to music, then there are those of us who play music because we like to "hear" it.... we "play it for" ourselves...
Last was to lligs analogy. But come on llig, does it bother you that much if someone picks up on what you did on the previous time round, or last week ? Shows it was understood, appreciated maybe ?
Well you can define the word performance how ever you want, but if you say everything is a performance, what's the use in having the word in the first place?
I made a distinction between two types of playing music. I called them performance and non -performance but the labels are irrelevant. The distinction remains:
Do you care about the public? Is your function that of making a "good sound"?
Or
Do you not care about the sound? Do you have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people you are playing with is listening? And is communication of your musical ideas with your fellow musicians the ONLY function of what you are doing?
I disagree. There are lots of different kinds of playing music that require different approaches. Off the top of my haed I can think of four distinct ones concerning diddley music alone:
Playing a concert
Playing for a dance
Playing down the pub with your mates
Playing on your own in your kitchen
Some people try not to make the distincions and play the same wherever. If they sound great in their kitchen and play the same at a concert, they'll be lousy performers. Or even worse, they are great performers and they play like that down the pub, everybody will hate them, and quite right.
I'll quite happily play tunes just once through in my kitchen, or even start a tune and get bored with it before I finish. Or play a tune I'm not very familiar with ten or twenty times at wildly different speeds. I might even close my eyes. But I certainly wouldn't do any of that at a concert.
And at a concert I'd vary the dynamics and the tempos between sets, and might even allow myself the ossogance of playing almost too fast. But certainly wouldn't do any of that playing for a dance.
i see what you mean i think . for myself the term approach includes the fact that i always try to be as good at playing scales or whatever weird stuff in the kitchen as i would hope to be playing a slow air for a hundred people or a set of reels for a bunch of people at a dance
very much agree about the distinction in playing at sessions. it's really kind of a sticking point for me in fact. some of my favopurite people to play with refuse to go to session in general. always fun to play in their Kitchen though !
Llig, so now you're justifying your point of view by relating it to what you call non-performance music and performance music.
'It's not a performance if you don't care about the sound,......' .
This is another point of difference then. As a musician I always care about the sound I'm making and how it fits with the sound of my fellow musicians in making 'a joyful noise' whether or not there is an audience. It's not exhibitionism, it's musicianship and it's applied by musicians whenever and wherever they play.
'and the only function of what you are doing is to communicate your musical ideas with your fellow musicians. (thta's "musical" ideas, what it sounds like is not enough'.
Enough for what exactly? And in case you are wondering the sound of the bodhran and what is being played, even allowing for its limitations, constitutes a musical idea.
'I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically in performance.'
If it can be played musically in performance then it can be played musically in what you call non- performance. If you think that the dummy keyboard would not replace the bodhran in those planxty arrangements then neither could it replace the bodhran in your non performance sessions.
'It's analogy time:
You are in a conversation with your mates down the pub:
"Did anyone see that episode of Fr Ted when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse. It was totally brilliant?"
And someone else says right after it:
"Yeah, did anyone see it?, it was brilliant".
Annoying huh.'
Is that how you feel when all the tunesmiths are copying and imitating each other then?
But I liked david h's post and his assement into what's been written here as to personal likes and dislikes and his 'Maybe some people like different conversations.' sums this discussion up very well.
Yes, the sound of the bodhran and what is being played, even allowing for its limitations, does constitute a musical idea. But what you have to ask yourself is, is it enough of a musical idea to contribute?
We don't play in pubs for the sound. It's sounds bloody awful and it's hard to hear. We play in pubs because 'cause we like pubs and being with mates and meeting musicians. We play in pubs to play tunes, to swap tunes, to learn tunes. We don't play in pubs to sound good. If you always care about the sound, what the feck are doing playing in pubs in the first place?
Ask yourself, is the sound of your bodhran enough of a contribution to people who don't care what they sound like, but just want to learn, swap and play tunes?
Annoying huh? Damn right. People playing tunes are there for people to learn and play the tunes. Learn, swap, play, that's what it's about. Not the sound
Performance music vs. Non Performance music -.I simply don't accept this categorization.
The moment you 'get into' your music making you are performing. Otherwise if you are 'going through the motions' without adding 'spirit' then it's practising.
You've made this distinction of performance music and non performance music to suit your point of view because you don't like bodhrans at sessions which you regard as non performance music but I maintain there is no difference other than the level of performance as dictated by the abilities of the performers/players. I will grant you the performers can tone down their performance if they find themselves in the backroom of a bar rather than say Wembley stadium, but it's still performance if not always 'show time'!
We've chewed the fat on this subject and have at least come to an agreement about the effective use of the bodhran in its accompanying role in the music. Again because I don't accept your differentiations in music making, your reason for its exclusion in sessions doesn't wash with me either.
In not accepting the categorisation you are, as I said before, simply showing that you don't understand non-performance music. It's hardly surprising, as the drum has nothing to offer. Maybe it would help if you forget the word performance altogether, as I advised pipewatcher, and concentrate on the aspects of the two different approaches as set out above:
Do you care about the public? Is your function that of making a "good sound"?
Or
Do you not care about the sound? Do you have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people you are playing with is listening? And is communication of your musical ideas with your fellow musicians the ONLY function of what you are doing?
You have said that you can not help but care about the sound you are making. I'm afraid that until you get over this, you will never stop performing. Don't feel bad about it, I've never met a "good" bodhran player who could stop themselves from performing. It's understandable because, as you and I have already agreed, the drum is capable only off adding an interesting timbre.
So there is no problem, except when you try to join in with a group of people who do not care about their sound (how could they, they are playing in a pub). Who have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people they are playing with is listening? And whose only purpose is to learn, play and swap tunes. You unfortunately find yourself in a situation where the only contribution you can make is one that is at best, irrelevant to them, or at worst, not wanted.
And the epic discussion of whether or not sessions are performances continues. It is like the Indiana Jones movies, a new one crops up every now and again, and we are now up to Indiana Jones XVII, "Search for the Treasure of the Bodhran Thumpers."
Also, while I often could not care less about punters or pub customers or [insert synonym here], I often care about the sound I am making that the other musicians are listening to. I'd like them to do the same for me, and we all do, which makes for good times. That's a far cry though from pandering to any non-musicians in the pub listening to us though.
...and there's a difference between having simply having common musical decency for your session mates and being a show-off or pandering to them like they were punters. Or, even worse, which is what (I think) Llig is pointing out, is where you don't care about the other musicians and 'play some crowd' with your antics.
So maybe that's the finer point of the old Indiana Jones quest. There's 'performing' as in drooling over and serving listeners and then there's just common musical decency to yourself and your session mates. Not truly caring about the sound you are making, not even for the other musicians, would be just as obnoxious as a goat whacker doing a horrible Keith Moon impression to the delight of the punters on every set.
I would be surprised if "is communication of your musical ideas with your fellow musicians the ONLY function of what you are doing" (llig) was not too restricting a definition of "what a session was for" for many people. Or is it a fancy way of saying "playing tunes together" ?
So, session music is supposed to sound bad? There are plenty of reasons why it can sound bad. I've always felt it was a lucky break if a session sounded good, when one considers all the many factors militating against such a precious miracle ever happening. Now we are to understand the miracles shouldn't be happening at all? OK Folks, from now on in, the uglier, the better!
Ha, I like that quiigley, that made me laugh. I think that yeah, it's a lucky break if a session sounds good. It's a kind of unexpected bonus. But if you strive to make it sound good, not only are you bashing your head against a brick wall, you will be taking your ear off the more straight forward goal of learning, playing and swapping tunes.
But just to clear up a specific thing, when I refer to "not caring about the sound", I'm referring specifically to not caring about the timbre beyond making the tune heard as clearly as possible. I'm talking about not caring whether the overall balance of the ensemble has a pleasing resonance. Not caring about that big round projecting sound that's not hard to get out of a violin, if you require it, Not caring about keeping it interesting with variations in dynamics. Et-cetera.
And I understand that there are many sessions where performance plays a part, for various reasons, and that's fine for them. But not where I like to play in.
Also, it's important to note that ALL my mates agree with me. I'm not a lone voice in this, even if I'm a lone voice here.
''it's a lucky break if a session sounds good'' !!! you poor feckers, is that really how it is your way,?Round here its completely the opposite, its a rare session that doesnt sound good. I cant think of any actually, though there could be the odd moment of discombubularity.
'' straight forward goal of learning, playing and swapping tunes.''
Ok I can see where you are coming from,but sessions round here are not to my knowledge at all like that. The main reason we play is to play some tunes and everyone, including the non players, to have fun. There is none of what you describe, that goes on in Kitchens and living rooms where there are also sessions of course, learning sessions, with no audience as such.
Its not about performance as such, though some will, some wont, its about doing justice to the tradition. We are obliged to make it sound good, otherwise we would be letting the 'side' down.
No there is no aim to be learning tunes, though most sessions I will leave with a few new tunes, but its not the goal, or even A goal, its a lucky bonus. There is no goal, its not a sport or competition, its not about getting more, about consumption, taking, its about giving, being at one with the music and people, the craic. There is no goal, there is just the music and the craic.
That's pretty much how it is here, in that good session music tends to happen accidentally. Not being able to predict how any evening might develop can be part of the fun. There's something for everyone. Depending on which group predominates on any given evening, we have scholarly trivia for the train-spotters; wide dissonance, for the folks who like their music sour -- or can't hear the difference anyway; and we can have killer rhythm problems. Sometimes, individuals will engage in the musical equivalent of public masturbation. Occasionally, we do the tradition proud too.
Llig, You are correct in thinking I don't understand your narrow classification of music making. I do understand that you are attempting to create a barrier against the bodhran in joining in a public session by trying to promote two distinct type of music making – performance and non performance. Thanks for your suggestion but I don't think it would be helpful to forget the word performance. If it is of help to you , I think the words performance/perform and playing/play are interchangeable.
If I was to accept your delimitations in music making would I have to say eg. 'you non played that really well' 'I liked that non performed duo'.?
As I said previously There are levels of performance according to the situation. Performance is not simply defined as to whether there is a non participatory (other than listening) audience or not. You play/ perform to create musical communication, ideas, spirit, etc in order to share with fellow musicians primarily, but if you are in a public space then secondarily albeit as a consequence you are sharing it with others. But the focus of your playing still remains with the other musicians and that is a priority. On that we can agree surely?
I go along entirely with SWFL Fiddler's abhorrence of pandering to pundits at the expense of spoiling the music and hacking off you fellow sessioneers in the process.
Your suggestion that I don't understand your definitions is because 'the drum has nothing to offer' (your words) contradicts your comment elsewhere that 'I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. And I've never doubted that, if played well, with imagination and open ears, it can add interesting, even moving timbres to a performance (your words also). Yes, I know you qualified that by adding performance to satisfy your requirement to maintain your distinctions but my point is this; that which you have described the bodhran capable of doing I believe can be applied to sessions.
Your last paragraph had a lot of things that you don't care about in music making and your only consideration is playing tunes. OK that's fine for you and may be fine for your Praetorian guard but here are others who like their sessions to combine more of the elements of music, including sounding good (as opposed to sounding like a dummy keyboard) without being in any way detrimental to the all important tune.
Well ... it's precisely because you think the words performance/perform and playing/play are interchangeable that, despite over a 100 posts, you still miss the point.
Educate yourself, learn the difference, and then we can have a conversation that doesn't just go round and round and round without either of us getting anything from it.
I dont follow that idea myself. I don't dissaprove of bodhrans either, most of the time. It's a great big world out there, with lots of variety too. Savonarola tells only the Florentines what to do. One wonders how much longer will they put up with it? The rest of us, outside of Florence, are free to go our own way.
Sessions are not meant to sound good, they are meant to sound amazing!
Llig do you mean to sound so condescending , arrogant, and so full of your self? or is it unintentional? Do you have to work at it? or is it natural? The Bodhran is the traditional drum of Ireland, one of the first instruments, the tunes come after the rhythm. It is quite possible and enjoyable to dance a set to a bodhran player alone. Your pet anti bodhran crusade is uncalled for and boring, the bodhran adds plenty to the session, bass and rhythm combined. Get over it.
I don't understand why anyone would say sessions are not supposed to sound good. They will never sound as acoustically balanced as anything you can get in a recording studio, of course, but I've heard some amazing music in pubs/bars, sometimes better than what you hear on stage because the participants are so relaxed. I certainly don't say to myself "well it doesn't matter how I sound because it's a noisy bar anyway"---it's quite the opposite---"I'm playing in public; therefore I want to sound as good as I possibly can". That's not a performance---it just means that other people will be listening to what I play. So I want it to sound good. Doesn't everyone think this way?
I guess not kennedy, though I certainly do, I consider it just politeness to make an effort. But I can understand sessions not sounding good, but not for want of trying! too many scratchy fiddlers, whistlers noodling, guitarists playing in the wrong key, drunken box players etc!
I am just fortunate to live in the heartlands of Trad, where these things just do not happen, possibly because there will be a player or two who are paid to make sure it doesnt degenerate.
The sessions I go to around here generally dont have this dichotomy between 'players' and 'punters', The session is a part of the whole social craic, there will likely as not be a few 'punters' who play but are just out socialising. There is generally respect for the music, musicians and we are all part of it together. Not to say the odd crowd of birthday celebrators dont come in and be rowdy, but a song normally brings them into the circle.
Are there no tone-deaf musicians in the heartlands of Trad? Is there some sort of agressive policing, or shaming taking place? Is it because, while there are clusters of tone-deafness in so many other places across the world, the heartland of Trad is not thus blessed?
Thank you llig for encouraging me to seek enlightenment and understanding. However I'm afraid we are going to remain at odds over the definition of performance because there is more than one meaning and the many definitions can merge and become blurred. So there's no need to proclaim one of us being right and the other wrong.
The reason I don't understand the notion of non performance is that, for me, as soon as you have a player (performer) and a listener (audience) the ingredients for performance are met. It's enough that the listener is a fellow musician; it doesn't need to be a public presentation nor does it require any 'showboating'.
Let's say you bring a new tune to your session. You do what you can to deliver that tune well, you'll put your expertise into it, play with spirit and you present your skill to those listening ie your fellow musicians. As I see it, they are your audience and you've just performed.
One of your mates throws out another tune. You are not familiar with it so you listen and you become the audience and then you could join in with his performance. You and your friends are the audience for each other.
Furthermore ' performance music' requires the music to be played to certain expected requirements so that it 'sounds good.' Otherwise I imagine a 'non performance session 'to go something as follows;
Somebody throws out a tune, no one is listening. Not the other musicians, nobody; there is no audience.
But they've got instruments in their hands. Somebody joins in out of time but no one is listening - it doesn't matter. Someone else joins in but he's not listening either so he's not in time either. He's just took his fiddle from out of its box and although its tuned a full semi-tone flat he carries on, after all he's still playing the tune! And so on. Eventually the non performance stumbles to its conclusion but nobody notices, no one is listening. What did it sound like? Dunno, but so what, it doesn't matter.
But whatever our differences in opinion regarding 'performance' or 'non performance', let's not get bogged down over this point.
My main point is to try and persuade you that the bodhran has a place in Irish music sessions.
I'm annoyed, Gran, that you are not even making an effort to understand.
And you others, where did I ever say a session was "supposed" to sound bad? All I suggested was that if your primary concern is that you sound good, why the feck would you want to play down the pub.
I play down the pub to play, learn and swap tunes (if it sounds good, it's a more than welcome bonus). And so do my mates. And a drum just gets in the way. It's as straight forward as that.
And what annoys me about bodhran players, especially good bodhran players, is that I've never met one who is open to realising that they can get in the way of people learning, playing and swapping tunes. They think they contribute. They don't.
Dunno about that -Sounds like you got a very focused high powered session on the go. In which case I can understand you views on Goats Arse Bangers. How exactly does good bodhran player get in the way for you though? In terms of cohesive musicianship? Its an opinion I would value.. Personally I welcome someone with an intuititave gift on the Bodhran. I find I can melt into the melody and improvise with more confidence and quality.
I would suggest that the Bodhran if sympathetic to the choons/other musicians can add real depth and another level of cohesion to the music. In a big session, Noisy Bar especially..Any thoughts?
I've an open mind, I'm not saying that it's not possible for a skin twonker to help in the learning, playing and swapping tunes. It's just that I've never experienced it. They just get in they way merely by clouding the sound, making it harder to hear the tune. But it's not a big session, 3, 4, maybe 5 or 6 tune players at the most.
I agree though, that in a big session, the grounding of the rhythm does make it easier and more fun to improvise away. And that is fun, (but a bit w a n k y)
If your Bodhran is made out of greyhounds does it make u play faster..It certainly means you are probably from West Belfast or South Armagh and enjoy a bit of Badger baiting
Aprapos of nothing to do with the topic, our local radio featured a story about Belfast's own Tina, the elephant that was quartered in someone's back garden during WW2. Great story.
Tina was not the only unusual exotic animal to before domesticated in Belfast in this period. A certain Bare Knuckle prize fighter from the New Lodge called Buck Alec had a tame lion which he used to walk the streets with.. It was either Buck Alec from the New lOdge or Stromy Weather from the Shankill..The Lion was aquired from a Zoo in England that had to get rid of its animals at the time. Local folklore would suggest it was very Old and had no teeth..Buck Alec was on occasion brought home in a wheelbarrow..As for the lion , it probably was happy to frolic with Belfasts many itinerant Dogs. A Belfast phenomenon, Dogs that have homes, and owners but can be found roaming the city. There was a couple that followed us around as kids. No one knew where they went to or came from.
Llig, there's no need to get annoyed. I understand you very well. Any annoyance you feel is simply because I don't agree with you. Maybe if you tried to understand me you'd be think more positively about the drum. I'm genuinely sorry if your sessions have been blighted by lousy bodhran playing but that is not what our discussion has been about.
How can you understand me "very well" if you have no concept of the differentiation between the words performance/perform and playing/play? That's not disagreeing, that's blatantly drawing a blank on the whole centre of the argument.
Where I play is never blighted by lousy bodhran playing, they never get through half a set without being asked to stop.
Simple. I've spelt out my reasons why the distinctions are at least blurred. Take the time to read what I've put regarding playing /performing and then offer some reasoning as to why you think there's no blurring.
You seem to be hanging on to the importance of your distinction to support your view that the bodhran has no place in a public session. That's the whole crux of this discussion over and above everything else.
You think the drum offers nothing worthwhile to the music in a session. I beg to differ and the peevishness of your recent responses is down to the fact you don't like to be challenged on this point. I understand very well your opinion and I will continue to oppose it.
No, you don't understand me (yet). But before, you said, "I think the words performance/perform and playing/play are interchangeable." Which is quite different from saying, "the distinctions are at least blurred."
This is progress, thank you.
Yes, often the distinctions are blurred, and for good reason. For example, for a performance to be a really good performance, there should be a good amount of actual playing within it.
Though the crux of your argument is that, because every public session is a performance, then the bodhran has a place. And yes, a lot of sessions are also performances and in these sessions, yes, the bodhran can have a place. Your problem came from discounting the possibility that a session could not be a performance. What if it's less of a performance? On a sliding scale, less less less and even more less of a performance, Would this make the bodhran less relevant?
But do I think the drum offers nothing worthwhile to the music in a session? That's a good question. Put it this way. If the musicians are just wanting to play for each other, to hear each other play, swap and learn tunes, then yes, the drum offers nothing worthwhile to the musicians in that session.
Maybe you can understand that distinction? The difference between being worthwhile to the music, or being worthwhile to the musicians.
think the problem here is your original definition of performance.viz' 'It's a performance if you care about the public. It's a performance if your function is that of making a good sound'. For me this is an over-simplification so we then digressed into a swamp of semantics. I tried to clarify my understanding of the words ' playing' and 'performance' in my post of 23rd. If you read it you may get a clearer idea of what I'm driving at.
In that post I also spoke of the distinctions being blurred. I'm glad we agree about this blurring and can move away from the the narrower definition. I said there are levels of performance. On the performance sliding scale of which you speak, the relative importance of one instrument to another remains the same. No instrument becomes less relevant.
I can understand that if you wish your music to be just tunes and nothing but tunes you will not wish to hear accompanying instruments will not be worthwhile to that particular parcel of musicians. OK That's up to you.
Conversely many musicians like the music with more of the other elements that make up good music not just the tunes. These musicians still relish the opportunity to play together and swap tunes. They also welcome other instruments which offer accompanying elements to the music and consider it all worthwhile.
I can understand the distinction for a preferred instrumental combination - simple or complex. But if a musician is worthwhile he's worthwhile to the music.
See there's the rub of it, the proverbial nail on the head as it were:
"many musicians like the music with more of the other elements that make up good music not just the tunes."
Isn't this such a splendid stark contrast to THE tunes being THE music.
It's not about preferred instrumental combinations, it's about the tunes. It's not about wishing my music to be just tunes and nothing but tunes. It's about THE music being THE tunes.
You say that, "if a musician is worthwhile he's worthwhile to the music." How can a musician, handicapped by an inability to play melody, be worthwhile to the music when the music is the tunes?
But there is much more to the music than the tunes, there are the different tones from different instruments, there is the ebb and flow between musicians, there is the manual dexterity involved in playing the tunes, there are the myriad variations and ornaments and articulations, there is the interpersonal relationships between the people playing, there are the rhythms and accents, the subtle dynamics, there are harmonies and the drones, If there is only the tunes then what is the Pipe drones about?! The fact is that the bodhran is a valid and valuable addition to many sessions, not yours fair enough but to suggest that therefore the bodhran is itself inappropriate in trad sessions displays enormous Hubris and conceit. IMO and countless other trad players a session is incomplete without a good drummer . So If our local bodhran player and a few of his mates turned up at your session he would be turned away ? because '' the bodhran is at best redundant''
Ahh , so what do you think they are doing differently [apart from using mics] that they would not be doing at a session? Like GC I dont recognise your distinction, I think it is artificial . So what, in that clip, are they doing that they wouldn't at a session that was not being recorded?
IMO this perform/play dichotomy is an artificial construct that you have created to justify your beliefs and behaviour.
There are few tunes these lads dont know, and they will most likely pick them up there and then whether they are on stage or not.
Its all about playing tunes and playing with the tunes.
I asked what the difference is in what you do, not what some fictional other person might do.
So there is no actual physical difference in your actions apart from your attitude? or...
For example these lads, you think they care more about their sound on stage than they do in the pub? If so, which I dispute, what is it that they do that is different on that stage compared to a pub session ? | They introduce the tunes... there's one for a start. but its hardly a major difference, is it? What else?
One's attitude dictates the actions. You project your tone, you look at the audience, you engage them, you communicate with them. You don't play a set of reels for 20 mins all in the same key. You have arrangements, intros, codas.
Llig, If you are still running with the idea that it's a performance if you have an audience. Why have you not considered my earlier suggestion that your fellow musicians are your audience; you engage them, you communicate with them etc. This is performance criteria as is the requirement to to fulfill certain expectations such as playing in time and in the same key as each other. Otherwise it's a collection of instrumentalists sitting down in the same room and practising their own thing. They would not be in concert with each other.
But to get to the other main point, the nail as you put it and it hinges around our differences regarding the definition of THE MUSIC.
For you THE tunes are THE music. If you can't play the tunes you are no use to the music. Your idea of a perfect session (as you've given me to conclude) consists of two or more players knocking out tunes in unison each and every time you have your session.(which may well consist of 20 mins of reels in the same key). The musicians are worthwhile because they are playing the tune.
Whereas for me, the TUNES are the most important PART of the MUSIC. But the music has other parts which make it 'more whole' to my ears. I think the music is better served with accompaniment, the musicians are worthwhile to the music both those playing the tune and those playing the accompaniment.
So there we have two different types of session you might come across. The first a tunes only session which excludes accompaniment. The second a tunes plus accompaniment session. Take your pick, enjoy your choice but just know someone somewhere will disapprove!
"I think the music is better served with accompaniment."
Gran Cassa, that's Michael's point in a nutshell. THIS music has been played for tens of generations without accompaniment. It developed as a music based ***entirely*** on the melody line, with no harmonic (and exceedingly little rhythmic) accompaniment. When you add such accompaniment, you are no longer playing THIS music. You've changed it.
The point is, all you need to play this music is a melody instrument. No single rhythm or backing player can produce THIS music alone. Only a melody player can do that. And while you may hear accompaniment as fleshing out the sound of the tunes, some of us--accustomed to the old unaccompanied sound--hear it as diluting the tradition.
Also, playing ***with*** other musicians isn't performing for them, it's communion. That's precisely the difference between playing "for" someone vs. playing "with" them.
So llig, by your definition, sessions are not performances , right? but yet there are sessions where some of this stuff happens, but not all. So where is the dividing line between play/perform?
Yet at our sessions we welcome bodhran players. So what has play/perform dichotomy got to do with the drum being welcome of being part of the music?
The lads on stage in that clip, did none of what you define as performance , apart from naming a set of tunes, which also can happen at sessions. So they were playing not performing by your criteria. right?
Will,CPT have you any proof of your statement?It sounds completely at odds with my understanding. For example some of the oldest clips we have of trad include the bodhran, and thats just this century. What about Coleman? Vesey? Paddy Killoran They all recorded accompanied. Your not trying to say they were diluting the tradition are you?
Pre turn of the century what records are you referring to to support your contention? The guitar has been in Ireland for hundreds of years, what makes you think it was not played as well?
Yes Will and llig.I'm not disagreeing with you.I understand there are two types of sessions as I stated in my previous post. In case it came across otherwise please be assured that I wasn't being disparaging to one type over another even though I have an obvious preference. liig and I were never going to agree because we were arguing for different causes. The issue of defining the word 'perform' became a red herring. Whatever the accompanist musician does - perform or commune, he isn't going to be welcome where the tunes are wanting to be played in a session devoted entirely to melody. Fair enough.
Isn't the point about 'diluting' the tradition subjective? Some might argue that the tunes are strengthened by the accompaniment. Of course the music is changed but I suppose it depends on your own aesthetic judgment as to whether this is improvement or not. But isn't this another discussion on what 'trad' means?
Ion, the 1920s and 1930s are hardly the roots of this tradition. And yes, Coleman's uninformed pianist certainly did dilute, if not completely annihilate, the traditional aspects of Coleman's music. You'd have to have a tin ear not to hear that.
But Coleman was innovative for his time--that he even recorded, using the new technology, speaks to that. You can also hear it in his approach to the music, so flashy compared to his contemporaries, Killoran and Morrison. Coleman is not who I would hold up as the standard bearer for this old, old music. In fact, any recorded example is a later comer to this tradition.
Most of the historians and musicologists who've studied this music (including the likes of Hammy Hamilton, Seamus Ennis, and Mick Moloney) agree that the bodhran was a relative newcomer to the music and certainly gained widespread use only after Sean O'Riada (who was never a strict traditionalist) introduced it into his ensembles.
Eric Cunningham, who has researched the history of the bodhran at University of Limerick, writes (in Fintan Vallely's "Companion to Irish Traditional Music") that the bodhran has become an " Irish music icon since the 1960s. Folklore information is scarce; turn-of-the-century literature on Irish music does not mention it at all, and historic pictorial and written records point to the music tradition in Ireland being primarily melodic."
Precisely Michael's point.
Cunningham goes on to cite Michael O'Suilleabhain from his address at the 1996 Crossroads Conference: "If you just go back a small bit, the bodhran was played one day a year [new year's wren]. All the old lads I talked to around 1970/71 told me, 'you take out the bodhran any day of the year other than 26 December and you're mad. It's like wearing a shamrock on the first of June."
But back to the salient point: bodhran provides a beat. Melody instruments already do that. Bodhran's cannot genuinely play the melodies. Melody instruments, obviously can play the melodies. To play *the tunes,* a drum is extraneous.
I happen to enjoy playing with a well-played bodhran. But let's not pretend it's "traditional" or a vital part of this music.
Gran Cassa, the music that first drew me into this tradition was solo playing--fiddlers like Junior Crehan, Paddy Canny, John Kelly, and Martin Rochford, and fluters like Paddy Carty and Packie Duignan. When I first met living traditional players, it was again hearing them in a solo context: John Vesey, Mick Moloney, later Kevin Burke (after his days with the Bothy Band).
I didn't know it at the time, but this solo playing was in direct line with the old, old days of a fiddler or a piper playing for kitchen and crossroad dances. The whole business of ceili bands (which first appeared in the 19teens), sessions (which are an invention of Irish emigres in London and America mid-1900s), and full-fledged bands playing to listening (non-dancing) audiences (1950s) is a modern adjunct to music 300 or more years old.
Sure, to modern ears, percussion and harmonic accompaniment may seem to augment the music. But I'd hazard a guess that those ears just haven't listened to what the music can be without such froo fraw. For me, the music comes alive when the melody player is free to interpret and improvise with the rhythm and timing, wallow in modal ambiguity, and make each melody note sound like the most important thing in the world at that moment.
Such fierce focus on the melody is a large part of what sets this music apart from the chord-laden, drum-machined, polyphonic music that is most of the rest of Western music. I'm glad a few people are still willing to celebrate that uniqueness.
Guitarist Paul de Grae writes "It's modern form...dates from the nineteenth century. Although long established in Iberian traditional music, the guitar is a relative newcomer to Irish music, and has yet to be completely accepted. It was first used to accompany traditional music on recordings made in America in the 1920s. On these, the guitar playing is clearly influenced by the swing band jazz style of the era."
Its fine to express an opinion, as Paul does, but without historical records his opinion is merely that. The fact is that the guitar was being made in Ireland at least 200 yrs ago. What supporting evidence does Paul offer for his opinion ?
Will, you quote opinions, unsupported by facts.
A painting by Daniel Maclise exhibited at the Royal Academy London in 1833 records a Halloween house party at the house of Father Mathew Horgan in County Cork.A couple dance close to the middle of the floor. Music is being provided by a small group playing pipes, fiddle, flute and bodhrán .
The facts here are clear, How can you argue with them?
We can say, with a very high degree of certainty that the word bodhrán was used with reference to some sort of drum in 16thcentury Ireland. This is backed up by Historical records.
Where are the facts to support your assertion? Not opinions, however Illustrious the names might be.
Ion, you just like to argue. Paul de Grae and Eric Cunningham have done years of research to back their findings. No, I can't upload an Irishman from 200 years ago and ask him to testify here--you're endless mongering for "proof" is silly and non-productive. Ho hum.
Sorry Will, but your quotes from Eric Cunningham don't actually contain any *evidence* to counter the 1842 picture shown here: http://www.bfs.org.uk/pan/historyoftheirishflute.pdf
and the recordings referred to above.
You say they have done years of research, so where is it? What is it your are disputing? the Etymology and historical records that identify the Bodhran as being an Irish drum early 15th C
or the painting that depicts the bodhran pipes etc in 1833? What? I dont understand . It appears to me that it is you who are just interested in arguing even though the facts are clear. All you do is repeat a couple of names, Where is their research published? What are the findings? What are you disputing? The Dating of the 1772 Guitar made in Ireland? as held in the Edinburgh collection? What?
The evidence is clear. The Bodhran has been a part of traditional music making for at the very least 180yrs. It has been mentioned in documents dated 1435.
It has been present on some of the earliest recordings of Irish music , 1926.-30.
So let us move on from spurious arguments that it is a modern addition. It is not. The facts are there . There are no supporting facts to support the argument that it is a modern addition. None, merely ill informed opinions.
Whether it is accepted in the odd session in Scotland or USA does not detract from the fact that it is a traditional Irish Instrument as old if not older than any. It is accepted by the best Irish Musicians today as demonstrated on the above you tube clips and numerous commercial recordings.
It is accepted in traditional Irish sessions the length and breadth of ireland.If not warmly welcomed by all!
I've not been bothered to read more than a quarter of this, but I have one question. Who, that plays either the fiddle, flute or pipes, couldn't play the bodhran? I don't mean ethically or morally, just... rhythmically. Fair question, fairly asked.
p.s. or any other decent instrument I forgot in the heat of the moment. Boxes, whistles (so long as they're not the nasty low ones which sound like a pot of turds being slopped around).
p.p.s. Have to just remark on Michael's plaudits for Lunny: he sounds like a fart in a spacesuit. Hate his playing. Ffftputty fuffity bong fuffffff....
p.p.p.s. But I imagine that is one of the perks of being the PRODUCER. You get to ruin the record with your own vanity recording that heck! isn't even your own vanity recording!
p.p.p.p.s. (I'm thinking all of Matt Molloy's records apart from the first one here... among many many many others).
And Arty is just as bad. Lovely bloke. But fed up with his guitar sound. Give it a rest!
And all the wouldbes.... just shut up. Bored. Give me album upon album of unaccompanied stuff. I'll be happy. PLEASE! I hate the sh*te sound of decent music ruined by bad accompaniment - or any accompaniment.
To Will. I can appreciate your attachment to the music in the way you describe. The freedom to interpret a tune in such an aleatoric manner does have charm. And I can see how that style would suit the 'tunes only session'. But is it not just a bit fanciful to suggest that this is the only way the music was played? Can it be played or is it played in that fashion by two or more players?
There does seem to be a strong argument for accepting accompaniment as being part of the tradition. Ionannas has put forward several relevant points and david h's invitation to go the history of the flute pdf makes interesting reading which includes a remark relating to a confusion between traditional and old.
But I still respect your right to play the music as you see fit. Is it not possible for the two approaches to co-exist somehow?
Lack of evidence is not evidence.
The commonplace is often not recorded.
How do we know that a dance in a house did not sometimes lead to a raid on the cutlery drawer ?
Did an old lady never say "don't tap you feet like that when grandads playing, you know he doesn't like it" ?
Oh, I completely accept that people have been "accompanying" this music in various ways, no doubt from the beginning. Bones, spoons, clapping in time, etc. The drum beat of feet seems to happen whenever this music is played well.
And I didn't mean to suggest that the music was played ONLY by one instrument at a time--there's plenty of evidence for players pairing up (a la the fiddling Byrne brothers) to play for dancers. Obviously, the tradition of "doubling" (playing an octave apart) can develop only where people play together, and where some modicum of such "accompaniment" is welcome.
But none of that makes the following type of hysterical claims tenable. As Ion wrote:
"It is accepted by the best Irish Musicians today as demonstrated on the above you tube clips and numerous commercial recordings. It is accepted in traditional Irish sessions the length and breadth of ireland.If not warmly welcomed by all."
That's just bombast and hyperbole. I don't care if Ion himself believes it, but there should be room for another point of view--that many traditional Irish musicians would rather just hear the tunes without all the clatter. Who knows--if the bodhran really has been played to the tunes for hundreds of years, maybe there have been generations of melody players gritting their teeth and just leaning a little harder into their instruments to hear the tune itself.....
David-h, Lack of evidence is also not a disproof of something. It's near impossible to find evidence that something did NOT exist or was not commonplace.
All this bawling for "proof" about a folk music history is rather silly on an internet board, eh? One painting doesn't prove a wholesale endorsement for anything, nor does citing "experts" who've done years of research. (If you want their research, go talk to Hammy, Eric, or Mick. I'm sure at least some of it is available through the universities of Limerick, Cork, and Dublin, and perhaps the Traditional Irish Music archives.)
It's also spurious to cite 20th century and later recording artists as standards of the tradition. Besides, there is no shortage of great players who've recorded over and over again without a drum.
And just to be clear, I personally enjoy playing with a well-played bodhran. I'm very fortunate to get to do that at my local sessions. But these drummers also know the tunes and understand when to sit out. (And they are each learning to play the tunes on melody instruments.) And I savor the times where just the melody players play, without any accompaniment.
"maybe there have been generations of melody players gritting their teeth " Well I do wonder why no-one has picked up on the expression on that guys face in the 1842 painting.
I only commented because I read over and over again here and elsewhere about the bodhran being a late (1960 ish) entrant into the music, and then I see that picture (in an article by one of the experts you mention) and hear the 1920s recordings. Somewhere there is an archive B&W video clip of a guy who had been making them since early 1950's.
So I think, ha, something doesn't add up here. Mental to note to pay attention in future. Are people using history or lack of it to back up a personal preference (or combat someone else stubborness).
Michael made his point succinctly above - he and his mates don't like it and he explained clearly the reason why. And I can't see how anyone can't understand his distinctions about performance etc.
FWIW anything fancier and 'more modern' than the clip in the OP and I usually dislike hearing it even in performance.
There's probably a distinction to make also between the old days and how ubiquitous bodhran's have become after Sean O'Riada's careful arrangements of the music and featuring the drum in the 1960s. Certainly there's been something of a bodhran craze in the last 50 years, but that doesn't mean the drum was anywhere near so popular 100 or 200 years ago. Was it around and sometimes played? No doubt. But we can have no idea about how well it was accepted by musicians back then. And the modern day anecdotes about foreigners thrashing a goat at sessions in Ireland are legion to the point of cliche (codified well in Boys and Girl from County Clare). Surely that makes some tradition-steeped musicians wince.
Will, your session seems to give you the best of both worlds then. Tunes alone and tunes with accompaniment. You savour tunes without 'clatter' as you put it yet still enjoy playing with your bodhran players. This is because the drummers know the tunes, know when to sit out and play melody instruments also. Well that's the session I like to go to as well. So why do we find ourselves so at odds? If the session is enjoyable do all the labels and definitions we've thrashed out matter so much?
LOL, Gran, that was you and llig who were thrashing out labels and definitions.
I don't think we really are "so at odds." I'm pretty flexible when it comes to enjoying any chance to get to play this music with friends.
But what makes a session "enjoyable" varies widely from one person to the next, and some people are less tolerant of certain nodes along the spectrum of possible session behavior. And some people, it seems, value consistency above all else. Some want accompaniment at their session every time, while others prefer no accompaniment ever.
Me, I like variety. Sure, I have a preference for sessions where we can hear the tunes themselves, the nuances of melodic variation and all the twiddly bits, without being buried under layers of thumping and chords. But I also enjoy well-played backing. I'm glad both types of sessions are available.
That said, it would be nice if more backers understood that the tunes are central, and backing is, well, backing.
I provided evidence to support my assertion. Why is then so difficult to provide some yourself? if there is any. I was not , as you rather insultingly put , bawling, simply making a point and asking for some evidence to support your statement, as I provide some to support mine.
This statement;>>It is accepted by the best Irish Musicians today as demonstrated on the above you tube clips and numerous commercial recordings. It is accepted in traditional Irish sessions the length and breadth of ireland.If not warmly welcomed by all.">>
Is not , as you put it, bombast and hyperbole. It is a mere fact as I said, demonstrated . I make the point that the bodhran is not always welcomed but it is accepted as a traditional instrument, because quite simply, it is and I provide evidence to support this . Few musicians are really going to welcome any instrument played really badly, no matter how traditional it is, that includes pipes, whistles flutes banjos, etc . So my statement does not say that it is welcomed, but accepted, same with the spoons, they may be very unwelcome, but I doubt here are musicians who is going to say they are not a traditional instrument. Perhaps you misunderstood my meaning., maybe I wasnt clear.
I was surprised and delighted to find the supporting evidence for what appeared to me obvious, and extend my thanks to Liam Ó Bharáin for his work and Comhaltas for publishing it. I am glad they have finally put to rest the myth that the bodhran is a relatively new addition, that the name is a modern derivative.
Some of the longest threads on this site have resulted from the mistaken notion that arguments, especially on the internet, can be won or lost.
I can imagine it now, "Oh, I am so sorry, here I was mistaken all along, and all I needed was your wisdom, and your examples, to set me straight. You have my humble apologies, and I will never, ever disagree with you again."
Yeah, that'll happen........
Sigh. No one said the bodhran didn't exist way back when. Wren boys have been playing them (once a year) for hundreds of years.
The point is that pub sessions and bands and the iconic status and ubiquity of the bodhran are all inventions of the 20th century. I mean, Irish coins didn't have a bodhran on them, they had a harp, right? And it's bleeding obvious that the tradition predates 1900 or 1842 or 1833. And it's no secret that many traditional musicians dislike the drum and harmonic backing because these can so easily detract from the melodies.
Besides, the tunes sure as hell didn't get passed along, generation to generation for the last 300-400 years, by goat thumpers....
That was precisely my point Al. All the "evidence" or "proof" in the world isn't going to resolve this or, as Ion says, put it "to rest." That's just silly.
On the other hand, it's good to see some motion toward common ground with Gran Cassa, eh?
I see internet threads like this as a chance to talk about shared interests, discuss differing views ("two minds are better than one only if they hold different ideas"), and perhaps even learn something. But people who are intent on winning an argument or converting others to their world view are like those pesky evangelists knocking at the door with their apocalypse-is-tomorrow brochures. Only here, our watch dog doesn't run them off as readily.
I don't give a shinola whether something is traditional or not. A lot of traditional stuff is rubbish, and a lot of contemporary stuff is good. You should be making choices on a quality basis, not some abstract concept of tradition.
(having said that, often, tradition is a reasonable bench mark, not least because you are not just trusting your own judgement, but those of previous generations also. The difficulty comes where people use tradition as en excuse to carry on with something. The continued existence of the bodhran, and in particular, Ionannas's defence of it, is a good example.)
Ok, so we play traditional Irish Music, we play it using traditionally accepted ornaments and articulations, on traditionally accepted instruments, and now your saying that some aspects of this tradition are ' deleterious', . So how does one judge which aspects of the tradition are 'good' and which deleterious? Which parts do we jettison then and which parts do we keep? and who is to judge and using what criteria?
We already know that some of the best , universally acclaimed , players of ITM are happy to play accompanied by the bodhran. are they wrong and you right? or is there some middle ground?
The fact is, you are entitled to your dislike of the drum, as we are entitled to enjoy playing with a drummer. There is no more than that. But please dont attempt to justify your dislike under the cover of it not being traditional.
If you cant feel to enjoy playing trad with a bodhran player, IMO, that is your loss, but I couldn't give a toss. I do object to the slagging that goes on and all I do is stand to defend the tradition against those that would knock it.
Typical, not reading/understanding what I wrote. So you "stand to defend the tradition against those that would knock it." .... Rather than making choices on a quality basis, not some abstract concept of tradition.
Of course you are entitled to enjoy playing with a drummer. Just don't attempt to justify it under the cover of it being traditional.
But we dont need to justify it? Its just something we do because we always have, and we enjoy it. That is enough.
I might also say in response that you skip over the questions I ask, that might call for some thought and reflection, in favour of a knee jerk somewhat aggressive reply. I read and understood everything you have said here, I simply disagree. If you would like to ask a few questions then go ahead.
>> You should be making choices on a quality basis,<< Well I will skip over you telling me what i should and should not to to say that I do in fact judge on a quality basis. We are specifically talking about good bodhran playing as demonstrated in th OP link.
I Enjoy playing with a good bodhran player because we are able to communicate rhythmically, so there is plenty of too and from of musical ideas. I enjoy it because there is space for me to express my self musically with out getting in the way of another similarly pitched instrument.
This is why I like playing with a good accompanist ,I am free to take musical risks with the assurance that the beat will continue, that there is another musician there supporting me, backing me up so to speak! I dont do it because it is traditional, but because I enjoy that aspect of the tradition.
So, you: "don't need to justify it" (not sure about your question mark, I'm assuming it was a mistake). And you: "don't do it because it is traditional."
So why have you posted so many posts explaining why you think it's traditional?
And I'm confused as to where "there is plenty of too and fro of musical ideas when you are "free to take musical risks" with someone who is merely "supporting you, backing you up".
yep, my mistake. ?
My posts were in response to will CPT
>>Gran Cassa, that's Michael's point in a nutshell. THIS music has been played for tens of generations without accompaniment. It developed as a music based ***entirely*** on the melody line, with no harmonic (and exceedingly little rhythmic) accompaniment. When you add such accompaniment, you are no longer playing THIS music. You've changed it.
The point is, all you need to play this music is a melody instrument. No single rhythm or backing player can produce THIS music alone. Only a melody player can do that. And while you may hear accompaniment as fleshing out the sound of the tunes, some of us--accustomed to the old unaccompanied sound--hear it as diluting the tradition.>>
The word ''merely.' is yours llig, I dont consider support to be anything but highly valuable, I offer my support to my friends and people in need where I can. There is no 'mere' involved. It is a precious thing not to be taken for granted and to be respected. I appreciate it greatly when a friend offers their support in a project, which then becomes a joint project, shared.
Thanks for reiterating my point, Ion. It still stands.
The old tunes survive today because they were passed down by melody players, not by drummers. I'm happy to be part of that community of people who can pass them on to the next generation.
Ok, but you are not passing it on as we got it, but changing it , you are subtracting an age old part of the tradition. The accompaniment . You have absolutely no proof to support your other contentions. and I have provided plenty to counter them. As I pointed out, the oldest recordings we have contain accompaniment;guitar, Piano, and bodhran. The Bodhran is a thread in the weave, if you pull a thread from the weave it can all fall apart.
The reality of it is that YOU are 'diluting the tradition',
LOL, piano as an age-old part of the tradition, just because the record label stuck some jazz interloper on the Coleman recordings in 1920.
I apologize. See, I thought we were talking about the ***tunes,*** which are passed on from one ***melody player*** to the next. Whack (slapping hand to forehead)! Wow. I completely forgot that the drummers and piano players and guitarists are the gatekeepers of this 300+ years old tradition.
Ion, it would educafy all of us deeply if you would please dig up and graciously present here the evidence, which is surely out there (no doubt on the CCE site) that it was, after all, Padraig O'Tubiddiddiddiddelly, famous bodhran player from Co. Offaly, who penned the first Irish tune back in 1247, a slip jig, rumor has it, eh?
LOL, seriously, thanks for the laugh! I needed that.
Okay, I know shouldn't, but I'm stuck in the house with a late winter ice storm shuddering away outside. I honestly don't mean to disparage you, Ion (jig, tradpiper, etc.), but I'm really having a hard time taking you seriously at all when you hold up as traditional hallmarks these 1920 AMERICAN recordings that are marred by AMERICAN jazz influenced guitar and piano backing, much of which doesn't even manage chords or rhythms to match the tunes.
Besides, as has been pointed out over and over and over, and no one has ever in good faith disputed, the rhythm and pulse is integral to the melodies, not something separate from them. So any competent melody player playing the tunes necessary also provides the rhythm and pulse. Melody players can pass along the tunes *and* the very pulse of the music without any other assistance. No drummer can do that.
In this music, drums are extraneous.
It's kinda like medieval medicine. Back then, if they wanted to bleed someone, they stuck a few leeches on. Today, we do therapeutic phlebotomies for certain conditions. But we've learned not to bleed a patient dry, and we've also discovered that bleeding doesn't help many conditions--we reserve it only for things like iron overload, where it actually helps.
Are leeches still medicinally used? Yes. The anticoagulant qualities of their saliva is useful in certain circumstances. But leeches are applied with far more understanding and discretion than they were 400 years ago.
A shame that the same can't be said about bodhrans....
The thing about these long discussions is that it can take a long debate to come up with morsels like Will's "Besides, the tunes sure as hell didn't get passed along, generation to generation for the last 300-400 years, by goat thumpers...." There are others who take a while before they resort to throwing pearls before swine.
But. I am going through a bloody-minded phase of playing my little repertoire of irish tunes in a sort of bouncy 'english barn dance band' style. And it occurs that we don't really know whether the melody players *have* passed on the rhythms for generations. Do we ?
Will and llig. (this is before david h's problem came up! ;) Come on lads. The common ground we are looking for is in danger of being flooded with foul invective. This is my view from the flood bank; For my part I've acknowldeged that there are are at least two different approaches to the music.
One being that the music is all in the tunes; melody instruments are welcome and accompanying instruments are not. In this approach backing instruments are considered to be extraneous.
Another approach is to have the tunes accompanied by non-melodic instruments, not all tunesmiths like this but some do, but there are degrees of acceptance. These range from non acceptance to embracing via toleration even through gritted teeth! It's a matter of preference.
Mixing the two aims or puposes of these different approaches is difficult if not impossible to achieve but Will's session seems to be able to accommodate them both.
The discussion regarding tradition has produced interesting texts and histories and you can fit the testimonies to suit your viewpoint. But llig's urging of us to make choices according to quality rather than tradition resonates happily with me but, again, the different approaches require a different quality control.
If I've missed any point you'd like me to address let me know. Otherwise I'd be interested how you would find the middle ground or are we doomed to squabble till page 500+?!
Excellent middle ground there Gran, thanks for that. I can agree with all of that. With one slight proviso:
I don't think there's been any foul invective, mere gentle ribbing I'd say.
(plus, it's worth pointing out that the actual tunes played in both camps are the same tunes, it's just that in one camp, you can't hear them as clearly. And choosing your camp depends on how much this matters to you.)
Funnily enough, as it happens it was the writing down of the music that saved some of it as some tunes were lost to the tradition until resurrected from the dots from 'The Book' .
Will cpt, You say that the Bodhran is' Extraneous' definition: >> introduced or coming from without; not belonging or proper to a thing; external; foreign:>> Yet we know that it is an Irish drum identified as such from the early 15thC. So what exactly makes you say that the drum is Extraneous?
Will you seem to be setting up a strawman to tilt at. If that is the best you can muster then I see no reason to carry on this discussion. The facts are clear to anyone who can read.
If you are suggesting that the bodhran is NOT an integral part of the tradition, then surely you have some reasons to justify that? I offer the oldest recordings extant to demonstrate that it has been a part of Trad for at least 100yrs. We know that the bodhran was being played as part of the traditional music making scene in the early 19th C. as evidenced by a painting by Daniel Maclise exhibited at the Royal Academy London in 1833 recording a Halloween house party at the house of Father Mathew Horgan in County Cork.;
A couple dance close to the middle of the floor. Music is being provided by a small group playing pipes, fiddle, flute and bodhrán .
Has the level of discussion descended to likening the bodhran to leaches and fleas? Oh dear, perhaps there is little chance of a serious intelligent discussion then?
GC ;>>you can fit the testimonies to suit your viewpoint>>.
Really? is that so? so how do you suggest this evidence supports this statement?
>>THIS music has been played for tens of generations without accompaniment. It developed as a music based ***entirely*** on the melody line, with no harmonic (and exceedingly little rhythmic) accompaniment. When you add such accompaniment, you are no longer playing THIS music. You've changed it.>>
Seriously.I disagree. The evidence can not be twisted or used to support the contention that the bodhran is a new development. It can not be used to suggest that it was only used in the wren. It can not be used to say that the bodhran has not been a part of the traditional music making scene for the last , nearly 200yrs.
So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
Hot air for a cool breeze?
We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have you found? The same old bears.
Wish you were here.
Is sure is a lovely jar of pickled tradition you have there? Does it smell as bad as pickled eggs?
I would like to thank David also for the copy of one of the paintings he found.
Llig There are more than two camps ; there is the camp that likes sessions with, the camp that likes sessions without and the camp that likes solo accompanied by bodhran and the camp that likes solo, unaccompanied, and probably many more.
Personally I dont care for sessions particularly. I much prefer solo unaccompanied playing, followed by solo, accompanied by bodhran. Then duos accompanied by bodhran. etc
We have, as the OP posted, a tune accompanied by Bodhran, I think we can hear it well and the bodhran does not diminish it in any way, infact adds to it. and IMO that opinion is shared by the man himself.
We have evidence that prehistoric man played wind instruments because some were made of bone and survived to this day. Other instruments, like drums, were probably played before those bone instruments were made, but being made of more perishable materials, disappeared from the earth. Without a "Wayback" machine, like in the cartoons, will we ever REALLY know which came first, the chicken or the egg?
Using the argument of 'tradition' gets slippery, because beyond a certain point, the evidence gets sketchy--as illustrated by the danger of using early recordings to justify one's definition of what is traditional.
Fair enough All, but how then do we justify our definitions of tradition? if we cant use what evidence we have? If the earliest recordings are not acceptable, which I dispute, then what DO we use? I also pointed out painting dated early 19th C, you are surely not saying that these are not acceptable as well? What about the 14th C mentions of Bodhrans? your not saying that perhaps someone used a time machine to put this evidence there are you
Whoaa there Ionannas! I should have been clearer. I meant you can fit the different testimonies to argue the different viewpoints. I'm not betraying my personal belief (FWIW) that the bodhran has been used to accompany the music for a lot longer than 1950. But I am acknowledging that there are at least two different approaches to the music as described previously. It's pretty obvious by now that one camp's 'musical ingredients' should not be imposed on the other so I suppose any comments need to be directed to /at either of the particular camps if they are to have any relevance. We need to find a way that allows both camps to co exist somehow otherwise we'll forever stay glaring at each other from opposite sides of the playground! But how?
Im sorry GC but i think its a lost cause, there are clearly a few people who feel that the bodhran is not welcome at their session, But it appears to be only a small minority of sessions , so we can live with that eh? I really dont think there is hope of 'converting 'llig, he has strongly defined views that he is entitled to.
As regarding your belief, well its not a belief, its a Proven fact.
Gran Cassa, it's a pleasure having a reasonable, reasoned discussion with you.
Other points? Well, I think it's safe to say that the skin drum predates human inhabitation of Ireland. Ion, even the CCE article makes that clear. The frame skin drum is not an Irish invention. It was brought in from outside. But that's beside my main point--(another formal definition of 'extraneous' that you'll find in any good dictionary), that a drum is *non-essential* for playing these tunes. That's all.
But it's damn unpleasant trying to discuss such things with someone who keeps trotting out the same "proof" even though it's irrelevant to the points being made. You can't move a conversation forward if you don't bother to try comprehending what the conversants are saying. Borders on incivility....
You still here?!
Here's another can of worms! Yes I know this must be regarded as a novelty item, a bit of fun and I have no wish to be diparaging to the girls' drumming. It's their show. But if this sort of top heavy percussion was to become accepted into public sessions ................!!!!
What other instrument has such history, asks so little and gives so much? No strings to break and land you in A&E/ER, no slobber to run down your toga, no hernia when you strap it on, and a Price/Yield quotient to die for. Not to mention all those tunes it has held platonically to its chest down the centuries. Every loft should have one- or a painting of one at least.
"every loft should have one". Exactly. And thats why there are so few in the archeological record. They get put in lofts, and garden sheds. And the mice get them. Then they get a bit of mesh nailed onto them. I know, first hand (well, not the mesh bit, yet)
Mice with bits of mesh nailed onto them?- you'll have the animal rights people onto you. Bodhrans, on the other hand, are good (and originally intended) for winnowing.
GOOD bodhran / button accordion
GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Just had to share this video after watching it like three times because the playing is absolutely brilliant. I'm always really impressed with accomplished button accordion players 'cause to me it looks like a tricky instrument! And despite the bad rap that the bodhran has on this site, when the playing is good I just love it (and check out Johnny's 'stache and sweater vest; classic).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoeG2-ZKLBQ&feature=related
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by Glass of Beer
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
That's a interesting bodhran ...looks to be at least 20--22 inches (unless Johnny McDonagh is a very little person) and fairly shallow at what looks to be about 3 inches or so.
Thanks for the link.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by JTC111
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Great playing - makes me think I need to spend some time in the woodshed.
Looks like a perfectly standard bodhran to me. Sounds great, too, none of this manic pounding stuff you get now.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by Jon Kiparsky
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Single row button accordions like that (in D I believe) are generally known in Ireland as melodeons. Bobby Gardiner is of course better known as a great exponent of the 2-row BC box. As you know of course.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by Rudall the time
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Yes, Johnny McDonagh does an excelent job of matching the rhythm of the tune perfectly.
http://www.thesession.org/discussions/display/9423
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Saw Bobby Gardiner in the Bru Boru show in Cashel last summer. Great playing still, though that kind of show isn't really my cup o' tae.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by Here Lyeth
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
More Bobby Gardiner on melodeon, a bit more recent, here
http://comhaltas.ie/music/detail/comhaltaslive_237_5_the_legendary_bobby_gardineron_melodeon/
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by TomB-R
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Oops, melodeon, my mistake; I was never one for getting the names of all the different boxes correct...
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by Glass of Beer
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I kind of like this one of Will Starr
http://www.willstarr.com/Movies/will4.wmv
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by Rudall the time
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
More lovely playing from Bobby Gardiner. (shame about the guitar at the end)
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
bodhran does not get a 'bad rap'. Our concern that the oft maligned insstrument got that way by being abused by players who don't understand its role in The Music.
GOOD bodhran is very tricky to do also. Having tried learning that instrument, I quickly realized I did not have the affinity for it. However, an acquaintence, John Devan, who is an occasional contributor here from our little Irishesque enclave on the South Side of Chicago is a very good/sensitive bodhran player. (he plays with a local Chicago group 'Dyed in the Wool') He played in with Liz Carroll at his World Folk Music Center a month or so ago. They were really tight.
Sadly there are more aspirants to the instrument who seem to be taking longer than I did in recognizing their lack of affinity, or not taking the time to learn the instrument properly.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by zippydw
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I LOVE good bodhran playing. At my core I will always be a drummer... who's learning melody and backing instruments.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by Fishmonger
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I love percussion. That's why I love diddley music. It's the most percussive music I've ever heard.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ah, Johnny's a master. Why? What Llig said. Not just plowing ahead with any old thumpety thump nonsense, but actually playing the drum WITH the tune, TO the tune. Great stuff.
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Yeah, but what do you think of Joseph Cooper?
# Posted on March 10th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Very clever!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GR7Zq2MhWAk
# Posted on March 11th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Wow, I've not seen that since I was a kid. And isn't it remarkable how much the thing sounds like a bodhran?
# Posted on March 11th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
It really does! It was exactly how you described it, headphones and all. I liked how they let the audience in on it after a while. I sent it on to my Dad so he could play along, he got a big charge out of it.
# Posted on March 11th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
But would you think Joseph Cooper, with his dummy keyboard, would make a valuable addition to a music ensemble?
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I now understand your aversion to the bodhran. You think a dummy keyboard and a bodhran sound the same?
If you really can't hear the difference then I'm at pains to understand your claims to be able to detect all those subtle nuances in music and music making.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Wrong, they don't sound the same, similar yes, within the grand scope of musical instruments, but not the same. But whether they sound the same or not, is not my point.
My point - and I've said this many times, and Joseph Cooper as an illustration - is that the bodhran when played well is merely a clatter that follows the twists and turns of the tune as closely as it can. Johnny Ringo's playing above is mighty fine bodhran playing. It matches the tune equally as well as Joseph Cooper matches the piano in his headphones.
Listen again the the Joseph Cooper clip. Listen hard to the clatter. Listen for music in the clatter. Then feel the enormous relief when they cross fade the actual music.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Whatever. The bodhran to my ears does not sound like a dummy keyboard so I would not take the latter to replace the drum simply because it does not sound as good, at least to my ears.
You evidently hear it otherwise ('merely a clatter') and are not able to enjoy the sound it makes nor enjoy it's subtle tonal variations etc. I think you've closed your mind and your ears to good bodhran playing and I don't hold out much hope of you being persuaded of it's value. Never mind.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"Whatever"? What the fecks that supposed to mean? You dismiss what I said without bloody reading it? I said they don't sound the same. And whether they sound the same or not, is not my point.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Whatever; the distinction between 'sounds like' and 'sounds the same', you said the the dummy keyboard sounds like a bodhran.
Your point, as I understand it, is to draw a similarity between the two. However, one has a musically satisfying sound and as such is played all over the world in Irish music sessions and on stage. The other is used only for exercising the fingers of a keyboard player. The d k was not designed to be listened to and therefore, because of it's lack of tone and timbre, it has not found it's way into the pubs, theatres and recording studios; unlike the bodhran.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"one has a musically satisfying sound"
Not really.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by kennedy
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Gran, get over what it sounds like. It's irrelevant to my argument.
Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard and Johnny McDonagh copy the melody very very well. Only without the notes. It's irrelevant what they sound like, they copy the tune, but without the notes.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
What it sounds like is crucial both to making music and to this discussion.
It's obvious the drum isn't meant to play tunes, everyone knows it plays a subservient role to the tunes as an accompanying instrument. So what is your point?
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
How many times and in how many ways do I have to put it? It's very frustrating.
The thing copies the tune very accurately, but without the notes.
I draw the similarity to what the bodhran does and what Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard does. It's what they DO, not what they sound like.
The comparison is to illustrate the worth of it. Can I state it any plainer?
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Gran Cassa, do you play an instrument that can play melody?
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by kennedy
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I think Joseph Cooper had the dots in front of him on the dummy keyboard. Something he wouldn't dream of doing if he was giving a concert on a real piano of course, but in this instance he couldn't afford a single mistake because there was at least one very knowledgeable person on the panel watching what his fingers were doing and working out from that what the music was - successfully.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by Trevor Jennings
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, you stated quite clearly in your post of 11th March relating to the dummy keyboard;
'...and isn't it remarkable how much the thing sounds like a bodhran'.
I merely took you up on that point in order to refute it.
Your frustration in not understanding the role of percussion in music making could be down to your unwillingness to accept the musical virtues of percussion in general and the bodhran in particular. I can not accept your suggestion that the musical attributes of a dummy keyboard and those of the bodhran are alike; they do not do the same thing.
Contrary to your opinion, what they sounds like does matter. The bodhran compliments the tune with it's own rhythmic colouring, not just always playing the rhythm of the tune as it happens but using the same rhythmic elements in order to accompany the tune. It sounds good in that it adds to the texture of the music and to my ear is the appropriate percussion instrument for this style of music. ( For what it's worth I don't like the use of other percussion instruments other than bones).
In reply to kennedy's question; yes.
# Posted on March 12th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I'm not talking about the musical attributes of the drum or the dummy keyboard. I'm talking about what you do with it. Yes, it's remarkable how similar they sound, but that was an aside. They don't sound the same. But that's irrelevant to what I'm trying to say ... again ... and again.
It's what you do with it.
Contrary to your opinion of me, I understand percussion well. I understand that all the percussion is in the tune, if played well of course. I understand that the bodhran in Irish diddley music does nothing rhythmically different or extra to what is already in the tune. It does not add rhythmic colouring. The drumming in GHB pipe bands adds rhythmic colouring. Listen to the drumming in Indian classical music - the phrase "rhythmic colouring" doesn't do it justice. You are wrong in assuming I I am unwilling to accept the musical virtues of percussion in general.
But listen to the bodhran in Irish music. All it does is repeat what's in the tune. And though it does add a different timbre, it is a timbre without melody.
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Well, which one? Do you play it out in public?
The reason I ask is that I wonder sometimes if bodhran players realize how distracting it can be---one loud bodhran is enough to drown out the details of a tune, and sometimes to make it difficult to hear the tune altogether. That's not musical in my book. Even mediocre melody players don't have that kind of detrimental effect on the music.
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by kennedy
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I think one of the troubles with bodhran players in sessions (good bodhran players that is - I'm not interested in bad bodhran players) is that they bang away and what they hear is akin what Joseph Cooper has in his headphones. If they are playing well, they are listening hard to the tune. But no matter how quiet they are and no matter whether you actually like the sound of it or not, as Kennedy says, they are making it harder for everyone else to hear the tune
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Just to fill out the YouTube link to Joseph Cooper (who may not be very well-known to the younger generation), here is a biographical link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Cooper
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by Trevor Jennings
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Morning llig,
I understand what you are saying and the point of your discussion about the instrument is, as ever, to denigrate it. As I hope you'd expect , I'll continue to oppose those views in the spirit of furthering a mutual musical understanding.
I can agree with you that the bodhran adds a different timbre to the music and no one is going to argue against the fact that it is a timbre without melody, but it adds its timbre, and thereby its colour, the only way it can ie rhythmically. Your comparison with the rhythmic contribution of pipe band drumming to reels and jigs is interesting. I'm a fan of that style of playing. They use amazingly complex patterns in a kind of rhythmical counterpoint to the tunes. If the bodhran was to try and imitate that rhythmic style (and good players can get very close to a passable imitation) I don't think it would be suitable. One of the reasons it isn't played that way or in the style of the tabla you mentioned, is that the crispness of those rhythms would not sound as clear on the relatively slacker skin of the bodhran and would probably sound as a muddy clutter. Please correct me if I'm wrong but am I right in thinking that although the marching pipes do use crans etc as part of the tune they do not use as many ornaments as say a fiddle or flute or uileann pipes do in an indoor session? That being the case then it's crucial that the bodhran stays out of the way to allow the tunes to breathe etc. whereas pipe band drumming, conversely, uses lots of rudiments because there's more 'space' in the tunes to allow for that ornamentation.
I suppose what I'm talking about is the appropriate use of percussion in Irish session music. The bodhran is an Irish drum. It's timbre adds to the texture of Irish music. Your oft repeated cry 'All it does is repeat what's in the tune' is not wholly correct. True, it keeps to the inherent rhythmical ingredients of the tune but you are mistaken in thinking that it keeps slavishly to the rhythmic contour of the tune without variation. It has its own rudiments and tonal possibilities that when applied judiciously compliment the music.
If you don't care for it then this becomes a question of aesthetics and personal taste. (Very interesting thread re Brendel by the way llig -thanks for that.)
To kennedy; I do understand that there are too many bad or non musicians who have turned up at a session and hit the drum rather than play it. (the distinction should be obvious) and this spoils it for everyone. But as llig often points out, the discussion is about good bodhran playing not bad.
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
For starters, no, you continue to misunderstand me. I don't wish to denigrate the instrument itself. I think it can be very effective in organised arranged music. Donal Lunny, for example is a master.
Next par:
For an instrument to add timbre it must be a different timbre to what is already there. The drum can do this. For an instrument to add rhythmic colour, as you call it, it has to add something new. You seem to agree here re the pipe bands' drumming counterpoint. Though you are wrong in thinking those pipes do not play as complex a set of articulations as the Irish fiddle, flute or uileann pipes. If anything, it is more complex. The big difference though is that they are not improvised. They have to be tightly arranged to avoid the mush. Just in the same way and for the same reason the drumming is tightly arranged.
But you say that for Irish music, "it's crucial that the bodhran stays out of the way to allow the tunes to breathe". Stay away from what? the tune? Stay away from the "rhythmic contour of the tune"? That's certainly not what Johnny McDonagh was doing in the clip at the top.
To sum up:
You say the bodhran should not keep slavishly to the rhythmic contour of the tune without variation. And it should not add rhythmic counterpoint.
So just what are these judiciously complimenting rudiments then? (And if you say they are tonal possibilities, then my case is rested)
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Glad you cleared up my misunderstanding. I'm more than happy to know that you think the bodhran can be very effective in music making and of course I agree with your evaluation of its use by the likes of Donal Lunny. So if my attempts at describing what the bodhran offers are failing, maybe you could articulate just what it is the bodhran is doing in that situation that makes it so effective for you. If you are saying that the drum can only be used in organized and arranged music I strongly disagree. I'm failing to understand how you can add an instrument to a band, even in a session context, and not hear its tonal qualities which contributes to the overall sound and texture.
I thought I'd made it clear regarding the use of rudiments and other ornamental drumming features but I'll try again. If the bodhran was to play with a similar complex rhythmic accompaniment as the pipe band drum it could get in the way of the subtle ornamentations played by the flute/ fiddle etc. therefore it is appropriate to play a simpler accompaniment to allow that 'ornamentation' to be heard as they are performed at a quieter dynamic. It's just a way of being sensitive to the tunes, and not cram as many notes as possible in to a bar just because you can. Letting the tunes 'breathe' is another way of putting it. That does not mean the drum cannot offer subtle ornamentations of its own but they need to be added judiciously and nowhere near as many as used in the pipe band style. Furthermore playing that way would change the character of the music and give the accompaniment a martial feel which would be inappropriate.
Thanks for the explanation regarding pipe band ornaments and how tightly they are arranged I suspected that might be the case but I don't always hear them in the overall big sound of the massed band.
But you have misread the penultimate paragraph of my previous post regarding following the rhythmic pattern of the melody. Therefore your summing up is incorrect and your final sentence in parentheses is confusing. Your case is certainly not rested.
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"not hear its tonal qualities which contributes to the overall sound and texture"
Tonal qualities? Like a lower-pitched thump as compared to a higher-pitched thump?
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by kennedy
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
If you like. And don't forget all the other pitched thumps in between!
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Tonal qualities. Feh. You're fooling yourself if you think variable pitches from a drum makes the music sound better. I've heard some bodhran players who like to do that---higher thumps in certain parts of the tune---they must think it adds to the excitement. It doesn't. It's annoying.
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by kennedy
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Hee hee! What fun. Sorry I missed it.
Well, the bodhran sounds a little bit better than the practice keyboard thing. Again, I revert to the player, not the instrument. The bodhran has the sad distinction of having a high eejit to decency player ratio.
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
When you add an instrument to a band it adds its timbral characteristics. That cannot be gainsaid. Subtle pressure shifts cause that fundamental timbral quality to vary but I agree with you kennedy, it is a nuisance when it's overdone with a continuous falling and rising pitch shift from high to low and back again I don't like it as it distracts the ear from the tonal centre of the music and it happens too much in modern playing for my taste.
That said the timbre of the instrument can be shifted with subtlety by varying degrees of damped sounds as well as playing on different parts of the skin and the use of finger pressure on the back of the skin etc. The use of dynamic shadings and delicate little accents marks out the better players from the 'whackers'. It's subtle but that's what this music is about a lot of the time.
If you listen also to Mr Mc Donagh he also shifts the pitch at the B part of tunes which works very well before returning to his starting pitch at the A sections.
The whole point of my joining this discussion in case we forget was to dispel the notion that the dummy keyboard is akin to the bodhran. I'm trying to point out how it differs in order to give lie to that somewhat insulting association.
# Posted on March 13th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
When I play tunes with people, we shift the timbre of our instruments subtly, We use varying degrees of dampening and play on different parts of them, adjust the pressure of our bows and breath etc.
The use of dynamic shadings and delicate little accents marks out the better players.
And this is all done as part and parcel of the tunes themselves.
The drum does not add to this, or enhance it in any way. It merely confuses it. You may think your drumming is subtle, but compared to what happens in the tunes, if played well, it is a sledgehammer. Leaving aside the actual tune playing for the moment, do you really think that with your stick and stretched piece of animal skin you can impart as much subtlety as someone manipulating a vibrating column of air with their dancing fingers, lips and diaphragm? Do you really think that by hitting something you can be as subtle as someone who draws the sound by the speed and pressure of horse hair across a bunch of strings being constantly shortened and lengthened by the dexterity of human digits? Do you really have the arrogance that you can add to that?
# Posted on March 16th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, if you'd taken the time to read my postings on this subject you will have read how I understand and acknowledge the subservient role the drum plays in relation to the melody instruments. I'm not advocating that it is equal in importance to the melody instruments nor am I suggesting it has anything like the musical possibilities or versatility of those instruments. I can't put that any plainer. However within its limitations the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. Admittedly, those skills are much more readily acquired than those required of a fiddler, fluter or piper etc. So fear not, there's no arrogance on that score from me, but then, any musician turning up at a session who plays badly isn't going to add much worthwhile no matter how relatively difficult or easy his instrument is to play.
Not everyone who trys to play the bodhran succeeds as well as those who have a natural affinity for it.
You've stated that you do not wish to denigrate the instrument and that it can be effective in musical arrangements. Therefore I'm assuming that you would agree that the bodhran does compliment the tunes. If that's not the case then please articulate just what the bodhran does in that context to give you such delight.
You always say that it 'merely' plays whats going on in the tune already but without the pitches. Of course that's what it plays, but there's plenty of rhythmic material there to create a 'part' for its accompanying purposes.
The bodhran obviously can't add the melodic shape so what it does is to underpin, punctuate, reinforce and emphasize the rhythmic nature of what the melody instruments are playing. This music after all is dance music, music to which the bodhran is well suited as evidenced by its inclusion in Irish bands at all levels of performance.
Good bodhran playing (the only sort worth discussing) is not a confusing sound for most players. If it's being played in time and with sensitivity why would it be confusing? There may be some people who are not used to polyphonic ensemble playing and are unable to hold a tune unless everyone is playing in unison but they are few and far between. Most people are happy playing in a band with different instruments which add their own distinctive voice to create a blend of sound that, well, sounds good.
It's quite simple really.
# Posted on March 17th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Absolutely, couldn't agree more with you GC, well said.
# Posted on March 17th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. And I've never doubted that, if played well, with imagination and open ears, it can add interesting, even moving timbres to a performance.
But what it can't do is add anything to the tunes. The tunes, if played well, underpin themselves, They punctuate, reinforce and emphasise their own rhythmic natures.
Everything you say the bodhran can do for the tunes, is already in the tunes.
# Posted on March 17th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
OK. A flutist plays a tune. Everything is there in the tune. A fiddle joins in, plays the tune in similar fashion but changes the texture of the sound, this adds interest. A pipes player joins in he plays everything that's in the tune but adds the instrument's distinctive voice and changes the overall texture. And so on and so on as instruments are added. A bodhran joins in, it can't play everything in the tune because he has no melodic options so he adds the inherent rhythmic ingredients of the tune but wuth due regard to the proirity of the tunesmiths. What he adds is is the sound of the drum. This contributes to the texture of the overall performance and adds another point of interest to the blend. Can you accept that?
# Posted on March 17th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Oops! Sorry llig, I meant to say it to begin with.
May I wish you a happy St. Patrick's Day and that you enjoy yourself wherever you find yourself playing tonight.
# Posted on March 17th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
A flutist plays a tune. (Where? this is important, but I'll come to that). Everything is there in the tune. A fiddle joins in. They listen to each other intently, affecting, effecting. Playing with and for each other. Enjoying the unison and enjoying the percussive and melodic strays from the unison. A set of pipes joins in and they all listen to each other intently. It's getting harder though, more to listen to. Another fiddle joins in. even harder to listen, it's confusing where the sounds are coming from, but if the concentration holds, it can still be creative.
A third fiddle joins in, but they are not a very good player, OK, but dragging a little. Then a tin whistle that's a bit out of tune, and though inaudible on the lower notes, it's horribly shrill on the higher ones. Then a really strong sounding flute player joins in. But their style is a little arrogant and though everything seems to hold together, this flute player actually shifts the pulse away towards how they want to play it.
You have to accept now that it's just a wall of sound and that nothing can be done about it. All semblance of beauty and control in the tune is gone. You can only really hear a fraction of the wall and concentrating on playing with the people close to you is all you can do. If you're in the pub, the background level of noise from the punters is rising with the volume of the session, so the volume of the session hopelessly tries to match it. The punters are enjoying it, but it's hard for them to define anything tangible in it. The whole timbre is just a wall of mush. The sound of a drum is added and this contributes to the texture of the overall PERFORMANCE and adds a point of interest to the punters.
I can accept that.
(That sound like St Patrick's day to anyone?)
# Posted on March 17th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
That description is fair enough llig. Too many cooks spoiling ther broth etc. etc.
My St. Patrick's Night was lovely. Just a handful of us with no duplication of instruments. I'm sorry if yours turned out to be disappointing in any way.
# Posted on March 19th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I wrote that on monday
# Posted on March 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
But you miss my point - again.
You said, "... the texture of the overall performance ... "
You asked me further up to say where and why I sometimes do find the instrument acceptable. The answer is simple ... in a performance. A can appreciate the timbre, and the dynamics and the way it can add interest to an arrangement. A good example is the intro to the first set of jigs, the first track on Planxty's Words and Music. If you've not heard it, open your mind to the possibilities of not repeating what's in the tune.
However, though not averse to performance, I don't like a tune with my mates to be one. It's a tune with my mates.
# Posted on March 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I don't miss your point. I simply don't agree with you.
As you say the bodhran adds interest, it adds interest to the music.
I suspect the discussion regarding 'performance' has been done elsewhere, and this thread already has mutiple subjects so I might just leave that for now.
But throughout I maintain that the bodhran sounds good in a musical context and that's my point.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, I still don't understand why the explanation in your "a flutist plays a tune..." post does not apply equally well to strummers. More so even, because they can interfere with the melody as well as the rhythm.
Not going to stick my head into the lions den and ask in the other current discussion though.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
But you do agree with me, and the tell tail sign was you using the word performance, not me.
The bodhran adds an interesting timbre to the audience.
If there is no audience, the bodhran is at best redundant, but more usually, merely irritating. (And remember, I'm talking about good bodhran players)
The subject of whether a tune with your mates is a performance is of paramount importance. If you disagree with that then you simply don't understand what non performance music is.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
The difference between the strummer and the thwacker is that the strummer adds something, the stacked harmony. The thwacker adds nothing except to make it more accessible to punters.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, just to comment about your enjoyment of the bodhran playing in bands like planxty et al. Be assured I'm well aware of that approach to accompaniment but you seem to be saying that it can only be done in a premeditated fashion. Many players can offer that 'on the fly' once they have heard the tune through a couple of times (if they don't already know it). That's one good reason to just have one bodhran playing at a time.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
another tune player can interfere with the melody and the rhythmn equally as easily as contribute, so there is no distinction on that count. But we are talking about good players
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Yes, of course it doesn't have to be premeditated, it can be done on the fly. But it still turns it into a performance.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
But isn't the harmony already present in the tune in the same way that you say the rhythm is present in the tune.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
LligI don't agree with you. Youv'e already acknowledged the interest etc that the drum adds but then you contradict all of that by reverting to your dismissive comments about the bodhran's contribution to the music. The music with all the different instruments playing sounds good.
OK, you've drawn me into the debate (sorry about this poor thread!)
What is the difference of playing music in public and performing music in public?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Yes, I'd agree with that. That's why I like to just call it simply "the tune", referring to the inextricable nature of the melody and the rhythm. i.e., as the dictionary has it, they are incapable of being disentangled, undone, loosed, or solved. Trying to discuss rhythm and melody as separate entities (I shouldn't have mentioned the two separately above) belies a fundamental misunderstanding.
But what the really good strummer does is to present harmony that is the tune in a stacked way. It has its problems, not least in the way that it makes the music even more dense than it already is, and so harder to hear. But a good strummer can overcome this if they are aware of it.
So a strummer does something to the music itself. The thwacker does not, it merely repeats half of what the tune is, adding only timbre. The thwacker tries to break that inextricable link, and precisely because it is inextricable, it fails. It is as musical as Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
The last post was to david
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"What is the difference of playing music in public and performing music in public?"
It's very simple.
It's a performance if you care about the public. It's a performance if your function is that of making a "good sound".
It's not a performance if you don't care about the sound, you have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people you are playing with is listening, and the only function of what you are doing is to communicate your musical ideas with your fellow musicians. (thta's "musical" ideas, what it sounds like is not enough
Basically, is it a conversation, or an exhibition?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, I could begin to think you are more interested in a wind up than investigating a musical point!
We've been around the houses on this subject and now you've gone backwards. You've just put;
'It (he bodhran) is as musical as Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard.'
Previously you have written in regard to the bodhran;
'A can appreciate the timbre, and the dynamics and the way it can add interest to an arrangement.'
And;
'I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. And I've never doubted that, if played well, with imagination and open ears, it can add interesting, even moving timbres to a performance.'
Are they the same then?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ok then 'similar'. Don't want to go back to that either!
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I can't help thinking there is an aspect here where differences of taste and musical experience make logical reasoning difficult.
These are not true parallels, but given the amount of foot tapping that goes on, I don't feel that a simple, on the beat, low drum beat of appropriate pitch interferes with the rhythm any more or less than a drone interferes with the melody. They both have an effect.
Add a bit more complexity, but still farly subtle, (Donal Lunny on Matt Molloy's Stoney Steps say), a drum or the chordal accompanyment will both "change the tune" a bit more.
Then we come to something like the Bothy Band, with prominant strumming, or De Dannan, with prominant drumming (along the lines of what we started off with above). the one having a strong affect on how we hear the notes in the tune, the other on the rhythm (and in both cases plenty else going on as well).
I don't understand why drummers get so much ire but strummers largely get away with it. As a listener I don't see strong distinction (some liked, some not liked). I'm not getting a convincing argument as to why a drummer can't be part of a conversation the way a strummer can, and in a duo situation (performance or otherwise) I'm sure they often are.
Maybe some people like different conversations.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I stick by it all.
I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically in performance.
And
It is as useful in non-performance music as Joseph Cooper's dummy keyboard.
There is no contradiction there.
It's analogy time:
You are in a conversation with your mates down the pub:
"Did anyone see that episode of Fr Ted when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse. It was totally brilliant?"
And someone else says right after it:
"Yeah, did anyone see it?, it was brilliant".
Annoying huh.
You are Giving a lecture on "defining the Sitcom" for a media course:
"Let's discuss the episode of Fr Ted when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse"
And you have behind you a power-point presentation with the words:
"Fr Ted. Episode IV . The one when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse."
Useful huh?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Michael your crusade is often falling on deaf ears...literally
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by Rudall the time
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
tell me about it
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
well, llig since you brought it up , i believe music falls into a category that is a little of both. I would say that playing music is a "soliloquy" perhaps it is not co-incidental that the best analogy i can think of is Samuel Beckett e.g. "I'm taking off my boot. Did that never happen to you?" furthermore, I would argue that no one in their right mind would play a fiddle/flute/pipes/ what have you- unless they really wanted to hear it .and so all musicianers ultimately (even alone in a dark room) are "performing"
even if it be only for themselves! if you live in some Dark holler where the sun don't ever shine , and you wake up in the middle of the night and grab your fiddle/flute pipes etc. and play a scale and go back to sleep-that is a "performance", and if you don't think of it as such you are a hack- or , at best , a dillettante who lacks the soul of a true Musician. There are people who collect CD's etc because they like to "listen" to music, then there are those of us who play music because we like to "hear" it.... we "play it for" ourselves...
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ha, so you don't like people agreeing with you then ? But seriously, there is a lot of it about. Doesn't bother me too much, yet.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Last was to lligs analogy. But come on llig, does it bother you that much if someone picks up on what you did on the previous time round, or last week ? Shows it was understood, appreciated maybe ?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
yes don't mind me . to me , this is all "writing"-whether Iget a response or not... cheers
pipewatcher
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Well you can define the word performance how ever you want, but if you say everything is a performance, what's the use in having the word in the first place?
I made a distinction between two types of playing music. I called them performance and non -performance but the labels are irrelevant. The distinction remains:
Do you care about the public? Is your function that of making a "good sound"?
Or
Do you not care about the sound? Do you have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people you are playing with is listening? And is communication of your musical ideas with your fellow musicians the ONLY function of what you are doing?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
cross posted
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
You mean you never play/played when no-one else is there ?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
yes that's where the distinction becomes blaringly irrelevant.
there is no distinction between playing music and "playing music"
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I disagree. There are lots of different kinds of playing music that require different approaches. Off the top of my haed I can think of four distinct ones concerning diddley music alone:
Playing a concert
Playing for a dance
Playing down the pub with your mates
Playing on your own in your kitchen
All require widely different approaches
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Some people try not to make the distincions and play the same wherever. If they sound great in their kitchen and play the same at a concert, they'll be lousy performers. Or even worse, they are great performers and they play like that down the pub, everybody will hate them, and quite right.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
what do You mean by approach? To me. 1,2 and 4 are the same- i agree with you that the session requires a different "approach"
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
do the great performers then by that logic sound awful in their kitchen but no one hates them?hehhheh
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I'll quite happily play tunes just once through in my kitchen, or even start a tune and get bored with it before I finish. Or play a tune I'm not very familiar with ten or twenty times at wildly different speeds. I might even close my eyes. But I certainly wouldn't do any of that at a concert.
And at a concert I'd vary the dynamics and the tempos between sets, and might even allow myself the ossogance of playing almost too fast. But certainly wouldn't do any of that playing for a dance.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Mike McGoldrick is a good example. He's a great performer, and a totally different player in a session. Completely different style.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
i see what you mean i think . for myself the term approach includes the fact that i always try to be as good at playing scales or whatever weird stuff in the kitchen as i would hope to be playing a slow air for a hundred people or a set of reels for a bunch of people at a dance
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
very much agree about the distinction in playing at sessions. it's really kind of a sticking point for me in fact. some of my favopurite people to play with refuse to go to session in general. always fun to play in their Kitchen though !
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by pipewatcher
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, so now you're justifying your point of view by relating it to what you call non-performance music and performance music.
'It's not a performance if you don't care about the sound,......' .
This is another point of difference then. As a musician I always care about the sound I'm making and how it fits with the sound of my fellow musicians in making 'a joyful noise' whether or not there is an audience. It's not exhibitionism, it's musicianship and it's applied by musicians whenever and wherever they play.
'and the only function of what you are doing is to communicate your musical ideas with your fellow musicians. (thta's "musical" ideas, what it sounds like is not enough'.
Enough for what exactly? And in case you are wondering the sound of the bodhran and what is being played, even allowing for its limitations, constitutes a musical idea.
'I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically in performance.'
If it can be played musically in performance then it can be played musically in what you call non- performance. If you think that the dummy keyboard would not replace the bodhran in those planxty arrangements then neither could it replace the bodhran in your non performance sessions.
'It's analogy time:
You are in a conversation with your mates down the pub:
"Did anyone see that episode of Fr Ted when he kicked Bishop Brennan up the arse. It was totally brilliant?"
And someone else says right after it:
"Yeah, did anyone see it?, it was brilliant".
Annoying huh.'
Is that how you feel when all the tunesmiths are copying and imitating each other then?
But I liked david h's post and his assement into what's been written here as to personal likes and dislikes and his 'Maybe some people like different conversations.' sums this discussion up very well.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"Enough for what exactly?"
Yes, the sound of the bodhran and what is being played, even allowing for its limitations, does constitute a musical idea. But what you have to ask yourself is, is it enough of a musical idea to contribute?
We don't play in pubs for the sound. It's sounds bloody awful and it's hard to hear. We play in pubs because 'cause we like pubs and being with mates and meeting musicians. We play in pubs to play tunes, to swap tunes, to learn tunes. We don't play in pubs to sound good. If you always care about the sound, what the feck are doing playing in pubs in the first place?
Ask yourself, is the sound of your bodhran enough of a contribution to people who don't care what they sound like, but just want to learn, swap and play tunes?
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Annoying huh? Damn right. People playing tunes are there for people to learn and play the tunes. Learn, swap, play, that's what it's about. Not the sound
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"People playing tunes are there for people to learn and play the tunes. Learn, swap, play, that's what it's about."
OK, yes, that line of reasoning works for a range of session types and skill levels and is inclusive of strummers who know the tunes.
# Posted on March 20th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Performance music vs. Non Performance music -.I simply don't accept this categorization.
The moment you 'get into' your music making you are performing. Otherwise if you are 'going through the motions' without adding 'spirit' then it's practising.
You've made this distinction of performance music and non performance music to suit your point of view because you don't like bodhrans at sessions which you regard as non performance music but I maintain there is no difference other than the level of performance as dictated by the abilities of the performers/players. I will grant you the performers can tone down their performance if they find themselves in the backroom of a bar rather than say Wembley stadium, but it's still performance if not always 'show time'!
We've chewed the fat on this subject and have at least come to an agreement about the effective use of the bodhran in its accompanying role in the music. Again because I don't accept your differentiations in music making, your reason for its exclusion in sessions doesn't wash with me either.
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
In not accepting the categorisation you are, as I said before, simply showing that you don't understand non-performance music. It's hardly surprising, as the drum has nothing to offer. Maybe it would help if you forget the word performance altogether, as I advised pipewatcher, and concentrate on the aspects of the two different approaches as set out above:
Do you care about the public? Is your function that of making a "good sound"?
Or
Do you not care about the sound? Do you have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people you are playing with is listening? And is communication of your musical ideas with your fellow musicians the ONLY function of what you are doing?
You have said that you can not help but care about the sound you are making. I'm afraid that until you get over this, you will never stop performing. Don't feel bad about it, I've never met a "good" bodhran player who could stop themselves from performing. It's understandable because, as you and I have already agreed, the drum is capable only off adding an interesting timbre.
So there is no problem, except when you try to join in with a group of people who do not care about their sound (how could they, they are playing in a pub). Who have zero interest whether anyone else other than the people they are playing with is listening? And whose only purpose is to learn, play and swap tunes. You unfortunately find yourself in a situation where the only contribution you can make is one that is at best, irrelevant to them, or at worst, not wanted.
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
And the epic discussion of whether or not sessions are performances continues. It is like the Indiana Jones movies, a new one crops up every now and again, and we are now up to Indiana Jones XVII, "Search for the Treasure of the Bodhran Thumpers."
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by AlBrown
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Nice Al, think I'll go play the Indiana Jones theme on my fiddle.
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Also, while I often could not care less about punters or pub customers or [insert synonym here], I often care about the sound I am making that the other musicians are listening to. I'd like them to do the same for me, and we all do, which makes for good times. That's a far cry though from pandering to any non-musicians in the pub listening to us though.
...and there's a difference between having simply having common musical decency for your session mates and being a show-off or pandering to them like they were punters. Or, even worse, which is what (I think) Llig is pointing out, is where you don't care about the other musicians and 'play some crowd' with your antics.
So maybe that's the finer point of the old Indiana Jones quest. There's 'performing' as in drooling over and serving listeners and then there's just common musical decency to yourself and your session mates. Not truly caring about the sound you are making, not even for the other musicians, would be just as obnoxious as a goat whacker doing a horrible Keith Moon impression to the delight of the punters on every set.
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Whoops, double having, 2nd paragraph. You can never have too much.
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I would be surprised if "is communication of your musical ideas with your fellow musicians the ONLY function of what you are doing" (llig) was not too restricting a definition of "what a session was for" for many people. Or is it a fancy way of saying "playing tunes together" ?
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
So, session music is supposed to sound bad? There are plenty of reasons why it can sound bad. I've always felt it was a lucky break if a session sounded good, when one considers all the many factors militating against such a precious miracle ever happening. Now we are to understand the miracles shouldn't be happening at all? OK Folks, from now on in, the uglier, the better!
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ha, I like that quiigley, that made me laugh. I think that yeah, it's a lucky break if a session sounds good. It's a kind of unexpected bonus. But if you strive to make it sound good, not only are you bashing your head against a brick wall, you will be taking your ear off the more straight forward goal of learning, playing and swapping tunes.
But just to clear up a specific thing, when I refer to "not caring about the sound", I'm referring specifically to not caring about the timbre beyond making the tune heard as clearly as possible. I'm talking about not caring whether the overall balance of the ensemble has a pleasing resonance. Not caring about that big round projecting sound that's not hard to get out of a violin, if you require it, Not caring about keeping it interesting with variations in dynamics. Et-cetera.
And I understand that there are many sessions where performance plays a part, for various reasons, and that's fine for them. But not where I like to play in.
Also, it's important to note that ALL my mates agree with me. I'm not a lone voice in this, even if I'm a lone voice here.
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
''it's a lucky break if a session sounds good'' !!! you poor feckers, is that really how it is your way,?Round here its completely the opposite, its a rare session that doesnt sound good. I cant think of any actually, though there could be the odd moment of discombubularity.
'' straight forward goal of learning, playing and swapping tunes.''
Ok I can see where you are coming from,but sessions round here are not to my knowledge at all like that. The main reason we play is to play some tunes and everyone, including the non players, to have fun. There is none of what you describe, that goes on in Kitchens and living rooms where there are also sessions of course, learning sessions, with no audience as such.
Its not about performance as such, though some will, some wont, its about doing justice to the tradition. We are obliged to make it sound good, otherwise we would be letting the 'side' down.
No there is no aim to be learning tunes, though most sessions I will leave with a few new tunes, but its not the goal, or even A goal, its a lucky bonus. There is no goal, its not a sport or competition, its not about getting more, about consumption, taking, its about giving, being at one with the music and people, the craic. There is no goal, there is just the music and the craic.
# Posted on March 21st 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
That's pretty much how it is here, in that good session music tends to happen accidentally. Not being able to predict how any evening might develop can be part of the fun. There's something for everyone. Depending on which group predominates on any given evening, we have scholarly trivia for the train-spotters; wide dissonance, for the folks who like their music sour -- or can't hear the difference anyway; and we can have killer rhythm problems. Sometimes, individuals will engage in the musical equivalent of public masturbation. Occasionally, we do the tradition proud too.
# Posted on March 22nd 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, You are correct in thinking I don't understand your narrow classification of music making. I do understand that you are attempting to create a barrier against the bodhran in joining in a public session by trying to promote two distinct type of music making – performance and non performance. Thanks for your suggestion but I don't think it would be helpful to forget the word performance. If it is of help to you , I think the words performance/perform and playing/play are interchangeable.
If I was to accept your delimitations in music making would I have to say eg. 'you non played that really well' 'I liked that non performed duo'.?
As I said previously There are levels of performance according to the situation. Performance is not simply defined as to whether there is a non participatory (other than listening) audience or not. You play/ perform to create musical communication, ideas, spirit, etc in order to share with fellow musicians primarily, but if you are in a public space then secondarily albeit as a consequence you are sharing it with others. But the focus of your playing still remains with the other musicians and that is a priority. On that we can agree surely?
I go along entirely with SWFL Fiddler's abhorrence of pandering to pundits at the expense of spoiling the music and hacking off you fellow sessioneers in the process.
Your suggestion that I don't understand your definitions is because 'the drum has nothing to offer' (your words) contradicts your comment elsewhere that 'I've never doubted that the bodhran can be played musically with varying degrees of subtlety using whatever skills the player has learnt. And I've never doubted that, if played well, with imagination and open ears, it can add interesting, even moving timbres to a performance (your words also). Yes, I know you qualified that by adding performance to satisfy your requirement to maintain your distinctions but my point is this; that which you have described the bodhran capable of doing I believe can be applied to sessions.
Your last paragraph had a lot of things that you don't care about in music making and your only consideration is playing tunes. OK that's fine for you and may be fine for your Praetorian guard but here are others who like their sessions to combine more of the elements of music, including sounding good (as opposed to sounding like a dummy keyboard) without being in any way detrimental to the all important tune.
# Posted on March 22nd 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Well ... it's precisely because you think the words performance/perform and playing/play are interchangeable that, despite over a 100 posts, you still miss the point.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Educate yourself, learn the difference, and then we can have a conversation that doesn't just go round and round and round without either of us getting anything from it.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
If bodhrans only detract from a session, which isn't supposed to sound good anyway, what difference does it make?
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ha! Good question!
It only applies if you follow the idea that sessions aren't supposed to sound good, though.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by kennedy
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I dont follow that idea myself. I don't dissaprove of bodhrans either, most of the time. It's a great big world out there, with lots of variety too. Savonarola tells only the Florentines what to do. One wonders how much longer will they put up with it? The rest of us, outside of Florence, are free to go our own way.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
DISAPPROVE
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Apparently, the trouble with bodhrans is that with one thrashing away, you can't hear how terrible you sound....
)
(y'know, I've been to sessions like that. I quit going.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Sessions are not meant to sound good, they are meant to sound amazing!
Llig do you mean to sound so condescending , arrogant, and so full of your self? or is it unintentional? Do you have to work at it? or is it natural? The Bodhran is the traditional drum of Ireland, one of the first instruments, the tunes come after the rhythm. It is quite possible and enjoyable to dance a set to a bodhran player alone. Your pet anti bodhran crusade is uncalled for and boring, the bodhran adds plenty to the session, bass and rhythm combined. Get over it.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I don't understand why anyone would say sessions are not supposed to sound good. They will never sound as acoustically balanced as anything you can get in a recording studio, of course, but I've heard some amazing music in pubs/bars, sometimes better than what you hear on stage because the participants are so relaxed. I certainly don't say to myself "well it doesn't matter how I sound because it's a noisy bar anyway"---it's quite the opposite---"I'm playing in public; therefore I want to sound as good as I possibly can". That's not a performance---it just means that other people will be listening to what I play. So I want it to sound good. Doesn't everyone think this way?
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by kennedy
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I guess not kennedy, though I certainly do, I consider it just politeness to make an effort. But I can understand sessions not sounding good, but not for want of trying! too many scratchy fiddlers, whistlers noodling, guitarists playing in the wrong key, drunken box players etc!
I am just fortunate to live in the heartlands of Trad, where these things just do not happen, possibly because there will be a player or two who are paid to make sure it doesnt degenerate.
The sessions I go to around here generally dont have this dichotomy between 'players' and 'punters', The session is a part of the whole social craic, there will likely as not be a few 'punters' who play but are just out socialising. There is generally respect for the music, musicians and we are all part of it together. Not to say the odd crowd of birthday celebrators dont come in and be rowdy, but a song normally brings them into the circle.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Are there no tone-deaf musicians in the heartlands of Trad? Is there some sort of agressive policing, or shaming taking place? Is it because, while there are clusters of tone-deafness in so many other places across the world, the heartland of Trad is not thus blessed?
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Thank you llig for encouraging me to seek enlightenment and understanding. However I'm afraid we are going to remain at odds over the definition of performance because there is more than one meaning and the many definitions can merge and become blurred. So there's no need to proclaim one of us being right and the other wrong.
The reason I don't understand the notion of non performance is that, for me, as soon as you have a player (performer) and a listener (audience) the ingredients for performance are met. It's enough that the listener is a fellow musician; it doesn't need to be a public presentation nor does it require any 'showboating'.
Let's say you bring a new tune to your session. You do what you can to deliver that tune well, you'll put your expertise into it, play with spirit and you present your skill to those listening ie your fellow musicians. As I see it, they are your audience and you've just performed.
One of your mates throws out another tune. You are not familiar with it so you listen and you become the audience and then you could join in with his performance. You and your friends are the audience for each other.
Furthermore ' performance music' requires the music to be played to certain expected requirements so that it 'sounds good.' Otherwise I imagine a 'non performance session 'to go something as follows;
Somebody throws out a tune, no one is listening. Not the other musicians, nobody; there is no audience.
But they've got instruments in their hands. Somebody joins in out of time but no one is listening - it doesn't matter. Someone else joins in but he's not listening either so he's not in time either. He's just took his fiddle from out of its box and although its tuned a full semi-tone flat he carries on, after all he's still playing the tune! And so on. Eventually the non performance stumbles to its conclusion but nobody notices, no one is listening. What did it sound like? Dunno, but so what, it doesn't matter.
But whatever our differences in opinion regarding 'performance' or 'non performance', let's not get bogged down over this point.
My main point is to try and persuade you that the bodhran has a place in Irish music sessions.
# Posted on March 23rd 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I'm annoyed, Gran, that you are not even making an effort to understand.
And you others, where did I ever say a session was "supposed" to sound bad? All I suggested was that if your primary concern is that you sound good, why the feck would you want to play down the pub.
I play down the pub to play, learn and swap tunes (if it sounds good, it's a more than welcome bonus). And so do my mates. And a drum just gets in the way. It's as straight forward as that.
And what annoys me about bodhran players, especially good bodhran players, is that I've never met one who is open to realising that they can get in the way of people learning, playing and swapping tunes. They think they contribute. They don't.
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Dunno about that -Sounds like you got a very focused high powered session on the go. In which case I can understand you views on Goats Arse Bangers. How exactly does good bodhran player get in the way for you though? In terms of cohesive musicianship? Its an opinion I would value.. Personally I welcome someone with an intuititave gift on the Bodhran. I find I can melt into the melody and improvise with more confidence and quality.
I would suggest that the Bodhran if sympathetic to the choons/other musicians can add real depth and another level of cohesion to the music. In a big session, Noisy Bar especially..Any thoughts?
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Suppose Noisy Bar isnt usually condusive with a good session anyway
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I've an open mind, I'm not saying that it's not possible for a skin twonker to help in the learning, playing and swapping tunes. It's just that I've never experienced it. They just get in they way merely by clouding the sound, making it harder to hear the tune. But it's not a big session, 3, 4, maybe 5 or 6 tune players at the most.
I agree though, that in a big session, the grounding of the rhythm does make it easier and more fun to improvise away. And that is fun, (but a bit w a n k y)
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
If your Bodhran is made out of greyhounds does it make u play faster..It certainly means you are probably from West Belfast or South Armagh and enjoy a bit of Badger baiting
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
For those who havnt..google or You Tube ..John Joe Kelly.. It is here me thinks the Bodhran argument will cease
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
What if it's made out of a whippet? Quieter? Smaller?
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Can be shoved down smaller holes..Ideal
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
with any luck its owner is equally easy to get rid of
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Aprapos of nothing to do with the topic, our local radio featured a story about Belfast's own Tina, the elephant that was quartered in someone's back garden during WW2. Great story.
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Atahualpa Quigley
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
..there was someone earlier talking about Jumbo Bodhrans
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Tina was not the only unusual exotic animal to before domesticated in Belfast in this period. A certain Bare Knuckle prize fighter from the New Lodge called Buck Alec had a tame lion which he used to walk the streets with.. It was either Buck Alec from the New lOdge or Stromy Weather from the Shankill..The Lion was aquired from a Zoo in England that had to get rid of its animals at the time. Local folklore would suggest it was very Old and had no teeth..Buck Alec was on occasion brought home in a wheelbarrow..As for the lion , it probably was happy to frolic with Belfasts many itinerant Dogs. A Belfast phenomenon, Dogs that have homes, and owners but can be found roaming the city. There was a couple that followed us around as kids. No one knew where they went to or came from.
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Probably the canine wing of MI5
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
As for Tina..I wonder how many Bodhrans one coud get out of an elephant
# Posted on March 24th 2009 by Miss Mulligan
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, there's no need to get annoyed. I understand you very well. Any annoyance you feel is simply because I don't agree with you. Maybe if you tried to understand me you'd be think more positively about the drum. I'm genuinely sorry if your sessions have been blighted by lousy bodhran playing but that is not what our discussion has been about.
# Posted on March 25th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
How can you understand me "very well" if you have no concept of the differentiation between the words performance/perform and playing/play? That's not disagreeing, that's blatantly drawing a blank on the whole centre of the argument.
Where I play is never blighted by lousy bodhran playing, they never get through half a set without being asked to stop.
# Posted on March 25th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Simple. I've spelt out my reasons why the distinctions are at least blurred. Take the time to read what I've put regarding playing /performing and then offer some reasoning as to why you think there's no blurring.
You seem to be hanging on to the importance of your distinction to support your view that the bodhran has no place in a public session. That's the whole crux of this discussion over and above everything else.
You think the drum offers nothing worthwhile to the music in a session. I beg to differ and the peevishness of your recent responses is down to the fact you don't like to be challenged on this point. I understand very well your opinion and I will continue to oppose it.
# Posted on March 26th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
No, you don't understand me (yet). But before, you said, "I think the words performance/perform and playing/play are interchangeable." Which is quite different from saying, "the distinctions are at least blurred."
This is progress, thank you.
Yes, often the distinctions are blurred, and for good reason. For example, for a performance to be a really good performance, there should be a good amount of actual playing within it.
Though the crux of your argument is that, because every public session is a performance, then the bodhran has a place. And yes, a lot of sessions are also performances and in these sessions, yes, the bodhran can have a place. Your problem came from discounting the possibility that a session could not be a performance. What if it's less of a performance? On a sliding scale, less less less and even more less of a performance, Would this make the bodhran less relevant?
But do I think the drum offers nothing worthwhile to the music in a session? That's a good question. Put it this way. If the musicians are just wanting to play for each other, to hear each other play, swap and learn tunes, then yes, the drum offers nothing worthwhile to the musicians in that session.
Maybe you can understand that distinction? The difference between being worthwhile to the music, or being worthwhile to the musicians.
# Posted on March 26th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
think the problem here is your original definition of performance.viz' 'It's a performance if you care about the public. It's a performance if your function is that of making a good sound'. For me this is an over-simplification so we then digressed into a swamp of semantics. I tried to clarify my understanding of the words ' playing' and 'performance' in my post of 23rd. If you read it you may get a clearer idea of what I'm driving at.
In that post I also spoke of the distinctions being blurred. I'm glad we agree about this blurring and can move away from the the narrower definition. I said there are levels of performance. On the performance sliding scale of which you speak, the relative importance of one instrument to another remains the same. No instrument becomes less relevant.
I can understand that if you wish your music to be just tunes and nothing but tunes you will not wish to hear accompanying instruments will not be worthwhile to that particular parcel of musicians. OK That's up to you.
Conversely many musicians like the music with more of the other elements that make up good music not just the tunes. These musicians still relish the opportunity to play together and swap tunes. They also welcome other instruments which offer accompanying elements to the music and consider it all worthwhile.
I can understand the distinction for a preferred instrumental combination - simple or complex. But if a musician is worthwhile he's worthwhile to the music.
# Posted on March 26th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
See there's the rub of it, the proverbial nail on the head as it were:
"many musicians like the music with more of the other elements that make up good music not just the tunes."
Isn't this such a splendid stark contrast to THE tunes being THE music.
It's not about preferred instrumental combinations, it's about the tunes. It's not about wishing my music to be just tunes and nothing but tunes. It's about THE music being THE tunes.
You say that, "if a musician is worthwhile he's worthwhile to the music." How can a musician, handicapped by an inability to play melody, be worthwhile to the music when the music is the tunes?
# Posted on March 26th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Michael, thank you for saving me the trouble of joining in. I could not say any of this better than you are. Good on you.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
But there is much more to the music than the tunes, there are the different tones from different instruments, there is the ebb and flow between musicians, there is the manual dexterity involved in playing the tunes, there are the myriad variations and ornaments and articulations, there is the interpersonal relationships between the people playing, there are the rhythms and accents, the subtle dynamics, there are harmonies and the drones, If there is only the tunes then what is the Pipe drones about?! The fact is that the bodhran is a valid and valuable addition to many sessions, not yours fair enough but to suggest that therefore the bodhran is itself inappropriate in trad sessions displays enormous Hubris and conceit. IMO and countless other trad players a session is incomplete without a good drummer . So If our local bodhran player and a few of his mates turned up at your session he would be turned away ? because '' the bodhran is at best redundant''
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Have you ever considered why folk like Bobby Gardiner, and the rest, play with Bodhran players like Johny?
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
like ;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6sPWV5_o1U&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-0z7cysswU&feature=related
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
they are on the telly ... performing.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ahh , so what do you think they are doing differently [apart from using mics] that they would not be doing at a session? Like GC I dont recognise your distinction, I think it is artificial . So what, in that clip, are they doing that they wouldn't at a session that was not being recorded?
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I dunno. I can't speek for them. but it must be more than swapping, learning and playing tunes.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
IMO this perform/play dichotomy is an artificial construct that you have created to justify your beliefs and behaviour.
There are few tunes these lads dont know, and they will most likely pick them up there and then whether they are on stage or not.
Its all about playing tunes and playing with the tunes.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
If not, can you describe the actual difference in your actions between when you play and when you perform?
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I explained it all further up. It's a problem with these longer threads.
Quite simply, you care about the sound.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I asked what the difference is in what you do, not what some fictional other person might do.
So there is no actual physical difference in your actions apart from your attitude? or...
For example these lads, you think they care more about their sound on stage than they do in the pub? If so, which I dispute, what is it that they do that is different on that stage compared to a pub session ? | They introduce the tunes... there's one for a start. but its hardly a major difference, is it? What else?
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
One's attitude dictates the actions. You project your tone, you look at the audience, you engage them, you communicate with them. You don't play a set of reels for 20 mins all in the same key. You have arrangements, intros, codas.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Llig, If you are still running with the idea that it's a performance if you have an audience. Why have you not considered my earlier suggestion that your fellow musicians are your audience; you engage them, you communicate with them etc. This is performance criteria as is the requirement to to fulfill certain expectations such as playing in time and in the same key as each other. Otherwise it's a collection of instrumentalists sitting down in the same room and practising their own thing. They would not be in concert with each other.
But to get to the other main point, the nail as you put it and it hinges around our differences regarding the definition of THE MUSIC.
For you THE tunes are THE music. If you can't play the tunes you are no use to the music. Your idea of a perfect session (as you've given me to conclude) consists of two or more players knocking out tunes in unison each and every time you have your session.(which may well consist of 20 mins of reels in the same key). The musicians are worthwhile because they are playing the tune.
Whereas for me, the TUNES are the most important PART of the MUSIC. But the music has other parts which make it 'more whole' to my ears. I think the music is better served with accompaniment, the musicians are worthwhile to the music both those playing the tune and those playing the accompaniment.
So there we have two different types of session you might come across. The first a tunes only session which excludes accompaniment. The second a tunes plus accompaniment session. Take your pick, enjoy your choice but just know someone somewhere will disapprove!
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"I think the music is better served with accompaniment."
Gran Cassa, that's Michael's point in a nutshell. THIS music has been played for tens of generations without accompaniment. It developed as a music based ***entirely*** on the melody line, with no harmonic (and exceedingly little rhythmic) accompaniment. When you add such accompaniment, you are no longer playing THIS music. You've changed it.
The point is, all you need to play this music is a melody instrument. No single rhythm or backing player can produce THIS music alone. Only a melody player can do that. And while you may hear accompaniment as fleshing out the sound of the tunes, some of us--accustomed to the old unaccompanied sound--hear it as diluting the tradition.
Also, playing ***with*** other musicians isn't performing for them, it's communion. That's precisely the difference between playing "for" someone vs. playing "with" them.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
So llig, by your definition, sessions are not performances , right? but yet there are sessions where some of this stuff happens, but not all. So where is the dividing line between play/perform?
Yet at our sessions we welcome bodhran players. So what has play/perform dichotomy got to do with the drum being welcome of being part of the music?
The lads on stage in that clip, did none of what you define as performance , apart from naming a set of tunes, which also can happen at sessions. So they were playing not performing by your criteria. right?
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Will,CPT have you any proof of your statement?It sounds completely at odds with my understanding. For example some of the oldest clips we have of trad include the bodhran, and thats just this century. What about Coleman? Vesey? Paddy Killoran They all recorded accompanied. Your not trying to say they were diluting the tradition are you?
Pre turn of the century what records are you referring to to support your contention? The guitar has been in Ireland for hundreds of years, what makes you think it was not played as well?
Here we have Joe Cooley with bodhran;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGzJdoMeoQY
Packie Russel , with Bodhran
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENzhd_JgAgg
Dennis Murphy, with Bodhran
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iuXCsD5jis
How can you say that playing with accompaniment like the bodhran is 'diluting the tradition'?
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBwTNaGGPBE&feature=related
Another old clip of a Clare session, with Bodhran....
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
In fact the earliest recording from Paddy Killoran was with guitar; 1930.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
'Another old clip of a Clare session, with Bodhran....'
Only they called it a tambourine in those days (did you hear him use the 'bells' at the start?).
The first traditional flute recordings by Tom Morrison, you forgot to mention those...
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Yep, 1927. Plus Packie Dolan in 1926
And there is a painting dated 1842 that shows a Bodhran player and fluter playing together.
Here is an interesting history ;
http://comhaltas.ie/music/treoir/detail/bodhran_its_origin_meaning_and_history/
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Yes Will and llig.I'm not disagreeing with you.I understand there are two types of sessions as I stated in my previous post. In case it came across otherwise please be assured that I wasn't being disparaging to one type over another even though I have an obvious preference. liig and I were never going to agree because we were arguing for different causes. The issue of defining the word 'perform' became a red herring. Whatever the accompanist musician does - perform or commune, he isn't going to be welcome where the tunes are wanting to be played in a session devoted entirely to melody. Fair enough.
Isn't the point about 'diluting' the tradition subjective? Some might argue that the tunes are strengthened by the accompaniment. Of course the music is changed but I suppose it depends on your own aesthetic judgment as to whether this is improvement or not. But isn't this another discussion on what 'trad' means?
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ion, the 1920s and 1930s are hardly the roots of this tradition. And yes, Coleman's uninformed pianist certainly did dilute, if not completely annihilate, the traditional aspects of Coleman's music. You'd have to have a tin ear not to hear that.
But Coleman was innovative for his time--that he even recorded, using the new technology, speaks to that. You can also hear it in his approach to the music, so flashy compared to his contemporaries, Killoran and Morrison. Coleman is not who I would hold up as the standard bearer for this old, old music. In fact, any recorded example is a later comer to this tradition.
Most of the historians and musicologists who've studied this music (including the likes of Hammy Hamilton, Seamus Ennis, and Mick Moloney) agree that the bodhran was a relative newcomer to the music and certainly gained widespread use only after Sean O'Riada (who was never a strict traditionalist) introduced it into his ensembles.
Eric Cunningham, who has researched the history of the bodhran at University of Limerick, writes (in Fintan Vallely's "Companion to Irish Traditional Music") that the bodhran has become an " Irish music icon since the 1960s. Folklore information is scarce; turn-of-the-century literature on Irish music does not mention it at all, and historic pictorial and written records point to the music tradition in Ireland being primarily melodic."
Precisely Michael's point.
Cunningham goes on to cite Michael O'Suilleabhain from his address at the 1996 Crossroads Conference: "If you just go back a small bit, the bodhran was played one day a year [new year's wren]. All the old lads I talked to around 1970/71 told me, 'you take out the bodhran any day of the year other than 26 December and you're mad. It's like wearing a shamrock on the first of June."
But back to the salient point: bodhran provides a beat. Melody instruments already do that. Bodhran's cannot genuinely play the melodies. Melody instruments, obviously can play the melodies. To play *the tunes,* a drum is extraneous.
I happen to enjoy playing with a well-played bodhran. But let's not pretend it's "traditional" or a vital part of this music.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Gran Cassa, the music that first drew me into this tradition was solo playing--fiddlers like Junior Crehan, Paddy Canny, John Kelly, and Martin Rochford, and fluters like Paddy Carty and Packie Duignan. When I first met living traditional players, it was again hearing them in a solo context: John Vesey, Mick Moloney, later Kevin Burke (after his days with the Bothy Band).
I didn't know it at the time, but this solo playing was in direct line with the old, old days of a fiddler or a piper playing for kitchen and crossroad dances. The whole business of ceili bands (which first appeared in the 19teens), sessions (which are an invention of Irish emigres in London and America mid-1900s), and full-fledged bands playing to listening (non-dancing) audiences (1950s) is a modern adjunct to music 300 or more years old.
Sure, to modern ears, percussion and harmonic accompaniment may seem to augment the music. But I'd hazard a guess that those ears just haven't listened to what the music can be without such froo fraw. For me, the music comes alive when the melody player is free to interpret and improvise with the rhythm and timing, wallow in modal ambiguity, and make each melody note sound like the most important thing in the world at that moment.
Such fierce focus on the melody is a large part of what sets this music apart from the chord-laden, drum-machined, polyphonic music that is most of the rest of Western music. I'm glad a few people are still willing to celebrate that uniqueness.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Guitar, you say?
Guitarist Paul de Grae writes "It's modern form...dates from the nineteenth century. Although long established in Iberian traditional music, the guitar is a relative newcomer to Irish music, and has yet to be completely accepted. It was first used to accompany traditional music on recordings made in America in the 1920s. On these, the guitar playing is clearly influenced by the swing band jazz style of the era."
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Its fine to express an opinion, as Paul does, but without historical records his opinion is merely that. The fact is that the guitar was being made in Ireland at least 200 yrs ago. What supporting evidence does Paul offer for his opinion ?
Will, you quote opinions, unsupported by facts.
A painting by Daniel Maclise exhibited at the Royal Academy London in 1833 records a Halloween house party at the house of Father Mathew Horgan in County Cork.A couple dance close to the middle of the floor. Music is being provided by a small group playing pipes, fiddle, flute and bodhrán .
The facts here are clear, How can you argue with them?
We can say, with a very high degree of certainty that the word bodhrán was used with reference to some sort of drum in 16thcentury Ireland. This is backed up by Historical records.
Where are the facts to support your assertion? Not opinions, however Illustrious the names might be.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ion, you just like to argue. Paul de Grae and Eric Cunningham have done years of research to back their findings. No, I can't upload an Irishman from 200 years ago and ask him to testify here--you're endless mongering for "proof" is silly and non-productive. Ho hum.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Sorry Will, but your quotes from Eric Cunningham don't actually contain any *evidence* to counter the 1842 picture shown here: http://www.bfs.org.uk/pan/historyoftheirishflute.pdf
and the recordings referred to above.
Foot stomping happens and is not melodic.
But I get your main point.
# Posted on March 27th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
You say they have done years of research, so where is it? What is it your are disputing? the Etymology and historical records that identify the Bodhran as being an Irish drum early 15th C
or the painting that depicts the bodhran pipes etc in 1833? What? I dont understand . It appears to me that it is you who are just interested in arguing even though the facts are clear. All you do is repeat a couple of names, Where is their research published? What are the findings? What are you disputing? The Dating of the 1772 Guitar made in Ireland? as held in the Edinburgh collection? What?
The evidence is clear. The Bodhran has been a part of traditional music making for at the very least 180yrs. It has been mentioned in documents dated 1435.
It has been present on some of the earliest recordings of Irish music , 1926.-30.
So let us move on from spurious arguments that it is a modern addition. It is not. The facts are there . There are no supporting facts to support the argument that it is a modern addition. None, merely ill informed opinions.
Whether it is accepted in the odd session in Scotland or USA does not detract from the fact that it is a traditional Irish Instrument as old if not older than any. It is accepted by the best Irish Musicians today as demonstrated on the above you tube clips and numerous commercial recordings.
It is accepted in traditional Irish sessions the length and breadth of ireland.If not warmly welcomed by all!
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Wow. jig, maybe you should change your name to dogma....
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I've not been bothered to read more than a quarter of this, but I have one question. Who, that plays either the fiddle, flute or pipes, couldn't play the bodhran? I don't mean ethically or morally, just... rhythmically. Fair question, fairly asked.
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Pomme de Terre
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
p.s. or any other decent instrument I forgot in the heat of the moment. Boxes, whistles (so long as they're not the nasty low ones which sound like a pot of turds being slopped around).
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Pomme de Terre
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
p.p.s. Have to just remark on Michael's plaudits for Lunny: he sounds like a fart in a spacesuit. Hate his playing. Ffftputty fuffity bong fuffffff....
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Pomme de Terre
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
p.p.p.s. But I imagine that is one of the perks of being the PRODUCER. You get to ruin the record with your own vanity recording that heck! isn't even your own vanity recording!
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Pomme de Terre
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
p.p.p.p.s. (I'm thinking all of Matt Molloy's records apart from the first one here... among many many many others).
And Arty is just as bad. Lovely bloke. But fed up with his guitar sound. Give it a rest!
And all the wouldbes.... just shut up. Bored. Give me album upon album of unaccompanied stuff. I'll be happy. PLEASE! I hate the sh*te sound of decent music ruined by bad accompaniment - or any accompaniment.
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Pomme de Terre
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
To Will. I can appreciate your attachment to the music in the way you describe. The freedom to interpret a tune in such an aleatoric manner does have charm. And I can see how that style would suit the 'tunes only session'. But is it not just a bit fanciful to suggest that this is the only way the music was played? Can it be played or is it played in that fashion by two or more players?
There does seem to be a strong argument for accepting accompaniment as being part of the tradition. Ionannas has put forward several relevant points and david h's invitation to go the history of the flute pdf makes interesting reading which includes a remark relating to a confusion between traditional and old.
But I still respect your right to play the music as you see fit. Is it not possible for the two approaches to co-exist somehow?
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Lack of evidence is not evidence.
The commonplace is often not recorded.
How do we know that a dance in a house did not sometimes lead to a raid on the cutlery drawer ?
Did an old lady never say "don't tap you feet like that when grandads playing, you know he doesn't like it" ?
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Oh, I completely accept that people have been "accompanying" this music in various ways, no doubt from the beginning. Bones, spoons, clapping in time, etc. The drum beat of feet seems to happen whenever this music is played well.
And I didn't mean to suggest that the music was played ONLY by one instrument at a time--there's plenty of evidence for players pairing up (a la the fiddling Byrne brothers) to play for dancers. Obviously, the tradition of "doubling" (playing an octave apart) can develop only where people play together, and where some modicum of such "accompaniment" is welcome.
But none of that makes the following type of hysterical claims tenable. As Ion wrote:
"It is accepted by the best Irish Musicians today as demonstrated on the above you tube clips and numerous commercial recordings. It is accepted in traditional Irish sessions the length and breadth of ireland.If not warmly welcomed by all."
That's just bombast and hyperbole. I don't care if Ion himself believes it, but there should be room for another point of view--that many traditional Irish musicians would rather just hear the tunes without all the clatter. Who knows--if the bodhran really has been played to the tunes for hundreds of years, maybe there have been generations of melody players gritting their teeth and just leaning a little harder into their instruments to hear the tune itself.....
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
David-h, Lack of evidence is also not a disproof of something. It's near impossible to find evidence that something did NOT exist or was not commonplace.
All this bawling for "proof" about a folk music history is rather silly on an internet board, eh? One painting doesn't prove a wholesale endorsement for anything, nor does citing "experts" who've done years of research. (If you want their research, go talk to Hammy, Eric, or Mick. I'm sure at least some of it is available through the universities of Limerick, Cork, and Dublin, and perhaps the Traditional Irish Music archives.)
It's also spurious to cite 20th century and later recording artists as standards of the tradition. Besides, there is no shortage of great players who've recorded over and over again without a drum.
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
And just to be clear, I personally enjoy playing with a well-played bodhran. I'm very fortunate to get to do that at my local sessions. But these drummers also know the tunes and understand when to sit out. (And they are each learning to play the tunes on melody instruments.) And I savor the times where just the melody players play, without any accompaniment.
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"maybe there have been generations of melody players gritting their teeth " Well I do wonder why no-one has picked up on the expression on that guys face in the 1842 painting.
I only commented because I read over and over again here and elsewhere about the bodhran being a late (1960 ish) entrant into the music, and then I see that picture (in an article by one of the experts you mention) and hear the 1920s recordings. Somewhere there is an archive B&W video clip of a guy who had been making them since early 1950's.
So I think, ha, something doesn't add up here. Mental to note to pay attention in future. Are people using history or lack of it to back up a personal preference (or combat someone else stubborness).
Michael made his point succinctly above - he and his mates don't like it and he explained clearly the reason why. And I can't see how anyone can't understand his distinctions about performance etc.
FWIW anything fancier and 'more modern' than the clip in the OP and I usually dislike hearing it even in performance.
# Posted on March 28th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
There's probably a distinction to make also between the old days and how ubiquitous bodhran's have become after Sean O'Riada's careful arrangements of the music and featuring the drum in the 1960s. Certainly there's been something of a bodhran craze in the last 50 years, but that doesn't mean the drum was anywhere near so popular 100 or 200 years ago. Was it around and sometimes played? No doubt. But we can have no idea about how well it was accepted by musicians back then. And the modern day anecdotes about foreigners thrashing a goat at sessions in Ireland are legion to the point of cliche (codified well in Boys and Girl from County Clare). Surely that makes some tradition-steeped musicians wince.
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Will, your session seems to give you the best of both worlds then. Tunes alone and tunes with accompaniment. You savour tunes without 'clatter' as you put it yet still enjoy playing with your bodhran players. This is because the drummers know the tunes, know when to sit out and play melody instruments also. Well that's the session I like to go to as well. So why do we find ourselves so at odds? If the session is enjoyable do all the labels and definitions we've thrashed out matter so much?
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
LOL, Gran, that was you and llig who were thrashing out labels and definitions.
I don't think we really are "so at odds." I'm pretty flexible when it comes to enjoying any chance to get to play this music with friends.
But what makes a session "enjoyable" varies widely from one person to the next, and some people are less tolerant of certain nodes along the spectrum of possible session behavior. And some people, it seems, value consistency above all else. Some want accompaniment at their session every time, while others prefer no accompaniment ever.
Me, I like variety. Sure, I have a preference for sessions where we can hear the tunes themselves, the nuances of melodic variation and all the twiddly bits, without being buried under layers of thumping and chords. But I also enjoy well-played backing. I'm glad both types of sessions are available.
That said, it would be nice if more backers understood that the tunes are central, and backing is, well, backing.
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I provided evidence to support my assertion. Why is then so difficult to provide some yourself? if there is any. I was not , as you rather insultingly put , bawling, simply making a point and asking for some evidence to support your statement, as I provide some to support mine.
This statement;>>It is accepted by the best Irish Musicians today as demonstrated on the above you tube clips and numerous commercial recordings. It is accepted in traditional Irish sessions the length and breadth of ireland.If not warmly welcomed by all.">>
Is not , as you put it, bombast and hyperbole. It is a mere fact as I said, demonstrated . I make the point that the bodhran is not always welcomed but it is accepted as a traditional instrument, because quite simply, it is and I provide evidence to support this . Few musicians are really going to welcome any instrument played really badly, no matter how traditional it is, that includes pipes, whistles flutes banjos, etc . So my statement does not say that it is welcomed, but accepted, same with the spoons, they may be very unwelcome, but I doubt here are musicians who is going to say they are not a traditional instrument. Perhaps you misunderstood my meaning., maybe I wasnt clear.
I was surprised and delighted to find the supporting evidence for what appeared to me obvious, and extend my thanks to Liam Ó Bharáin for his work and Comhaltas for publishing it. I am glad they have finally put to rest the myth that the bodhran is a relatively new addition, that the name is a modern derivative.
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I'm sure Liam is deeply grateful for your thanks, Ion. All his work was done so that someone could "win" an argument on the internet.....
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Some of the longest threads on this site have resulted from the mistaken notion that arguments, especially on the internet, can be won or lost.
I can imagine it now, "Oh, I am so sorry, here I was mistaken all along, and all I needed was your wisdom, and your examples, to set me straight. You have my humble apologies, and I will never, ever disagree with you again."
Yeah, that'll happen........
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by AlBrown
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Sigh. No one said the bodhran didn't exist way back when. Wren boys have been playing them (once a year) for hundreds of years.
The point is that pub sessions and bands and the iconic status and ubiquity of the bodhran are all inventions of the 20th century. I mean, Irish coins didn't have a bodhran on them, they had a harp, right? And it's bleeding obvious that the tradition predates 1900 or 1842 or 1833. And it's no secret that many traditional musicians dislike the drum and harmonic backing because these can so easily detract from the melodies.
Besides, the tunes sure as hell didn't get passed along, generation to generation for the last 300-400 years, by goat thumpers....
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
That was precisely my point Al. All the "evidence" or "proof" in the world isn't going to resolve this or, as Ion says, put it "to rest." That's just silly.
On the other hand, it's good to see some motion toward common ground with Gran Cassa, eh?
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Will, At least two of us are in total agreement!
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by AlBrown
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I see internet threads like this as a chance to talk about shared interests, discuss differing views ("two minds are better than one only if they hold different ideas"), and perhaps even learn something. But people who are intent on winning an argument or converting others to their world view are like those pesky evangelists knocking at the door with their apocalypse-is-tomorrow brochures. Only here, our watch dog doesn't run them off as readily.
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I don't give a shinola whether something is traditional or not. A lot of traditional stuff is rubbish, and a lot of contemporary stuff is good. You should be making choices on a quality basis, not some abstract concept of tradition.
(having said that, often, tradition is a reasonable bench mark, not least because you are not just trusting your own judgement, but those of previous generations also. The difficulty comes where people use tradition as en excuse to carry on with something. The continued existence of the bodhran, and in particular, Ionannas's defence of it, is a good example.)
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
There's an echo among threads....
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I'd say, the difficulty comes where people use tradition as an excuse to carry on with something *deleterious.*
# Posted on March 29th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ok, so we play traditional Irish Music, we play it using traditionally accepted ornaments and articulations, on traditionally accepted instruments, and now your saying that some aspects of this tradition are ' deleterious', . So how does one judge which aspects of the tradition are 'good' and which deleterious? Which parts do we jettison then and which parts do we keep? and who is to judge and using what criteria?
We already know that some of the best , universally acclaimed , players of ITM are happy to play accompanied by the bodhran. are they wrong and you right? or is there some middle ground?
The fact is, you are entitled to your dislike of the drum, as we are entitled to enjoy playing with a drummer. There is no more than that. But please dont attempt to justify your dislike under the cover of it not being traditional.
If you cant feel to enjoy playing trad with a bodhran player, IMO, that is your loss, but I couldn't give a toss. I do object to the slagging that goes on and all I do is stand to defend the tradition against those that would knock it.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Typical, not reading/understanding what I wrote. So you "stand to defend the tradition against those that would knock it." .... Rather than making choices on a quality basis, not some abstract concept of tradition.
Of course you are entitled to enjoy playing with a drummer. Just don't attempt to justify it under the cover of it being traditional.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
But we dont need to justify it? Its just something we do because we always have, and we enjoy it. That is enough.
I might also say in response that you skip over the questions I ask, that might call for some thought and reflection, in favour of a knee jerk somewhat aggressive reply. I read and understood everything you have said here, I simply disagree. If you would like to ask a few questions then go ahead.
>> You should be making choices on a quality basis,<< Well I will skip over you telling me what i should and should not to to say that I do in fact judge on a quality basis. We are specifically talking about good bodhran playing as demonstrated in th OP link.
I Enjoy playing with a good bodhran player because we are able to communicate rhythmically, so there is plenty of too and from of musical ideas. I enjoy it because there is space for me to express my self musically with out getting in the way of another similarly pitched instrument.
This is why I like playing with a good accompanist ,I am free to take musical risks with the assurance that the beat will continue, that there is another musician there supporting me, backing me up so to speak! I dont do it because it is traditional, but because I enjoy that aspect of the tradition.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
So, you: "don't need to justify it" (not sure about your question mark, I'm assuming it was a mistake). And you: "don't do it because it is traditional."
So why have you posted so many posts explaining why you think it's traditional?
And I'm confused as to where "there is plenty of too and fro of musical ideas when you are "free to take musical risks" with someone who is merely "supporting you, backing you up".
It's no fun attempting a debate with you.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
yep, my mistake. ?
My posts were in response to will CPT
>>Gran Cassa, that's Michael's point in a nutshell. THIS music has been played for tens of generations without accompaniment. It developed as a music based ***entirely*** on the melody line, with no harmonic (and exceedingly little rhythmic) accompaniment. When you add such accompaniment, you are no longer playing THIS music. You've changed it.
The point is, all you need to play this music is a melody instrument. No single rhythm or backing player can produce THIS music alone. Only a melody player can do that. And while you may hear accompaniment as fleshing out the sound of the tunes, some of us--accustomed to the old unaccompanied sound--hear it as diluting the tradition.>>
The word ''merely.' is yours llig, I dont consider support to be anything but highly valuable, I offer my support to my friends and people in need where I can. There is no 'mere' involved. It is a precious thing not to be taken for granted and to be respected. I appreciate it greatly when a friend offers their support in a project, which then becomes a joint project, shared.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Thanks for reiterating my point, Ion. It still stands.
The old tunes survive today because they were passed down by melody players, not by drummers. I'm happy to be part of that community of people who can pass them on to the next generation.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ok, but you are not passing it on as we got it, but changing it , you are subtracting an age old part of the tradition. The accompaniment . You have absolutely no proof to support your other contentions. and I have provided plenty to counter them. As I pointed out, the oldest recordings we have contain accompaniment;guitar, Piano, and bodhran. The Bodhran is a thread in the weave, if you pull a thread from the weave it can all fall apart.
The reality of it is that YOU are 'diluting the tradition',
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
LOL, piano as an age-old part of the tradition, just because the record label stuck some jazz interloper on the Coleman recordings in 1920.
I apologize. See, I thought we were talking about the ***tunes,*** which are passed on from one ***melody player*** to the next. Whack (slapping hand to forehead)! Wow. I completely forgot that the drummers and piano players and guitarists are the gatekeepers of this 300+ years old tradition.
Ion, it would educafy all of us deeply if you would please dig up and graciously present here the evidence, which is surely out there (no doubt on the CCE site) that it was, after all, Padraig O'Tubiddiddiddiddelly, famous bodhran player from Co. Offaly, who penned the first Irish tune back in 1247, a slip jig, rumor has it, eh?
LOL, seriously, thanks for the laugh! I needed that.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Okay, I know shouldn't, but I'm stuck in the house with a late winter ice storm shuddering away outside. I honestly don't mean to disparage you, Ion (jig, tradpiper, etc.), but I'm really having a hard time taking you seriously at all when you hold up as traditional hallmarks these 1920 AMERICAN recordings that are marred by AMERICAN jazz influenced guitar and piano backing, much of which doesn't even manage chords or rhythms to match the tunes.
Is that what you think this tradition is?
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Besides, as has been pointed out over and over and over, and no one has ever in good faith disputed, the rhythm and pulse is integral to the melodies, not something separate from them. So any competent melody player playing the tunes necessary also provides the rhythm and pulse. Melody players can pass along the tunes *and* the very pulse of the music without any other assistance. No drummer can do that.
In this music, drums are extraneous.
It's kinda like medieval medicine. Back then, if they wanted to bleed someone, they stuck a few leeches on. Today, we do therapeutic phlebotomies for certain conditions. But we've learned not to bleed a patient dry, and we've also discovered that bleeding doesn't help many conditions--we reserve it only for things like iron overload, where it actually helps.
Are leeches still medicinally used? Yes. The anticoagulant qualities of their saliva is useful in certain circumstances. But leeches are applied with far more understanding and discretion than they were 400 years ago.
A shame that the same can't be said about bodhrans....
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
ha ha te he he. Bodhrans are the leeches sucking the life blood of the music, he he.
Come off it Will, they're not that bad. More like flees, surely?
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
The thing about these long discussions is that it can take a long debate to come up with morsels like Will's "Besides, the tunes sure as hell didn't get passed along, generation to generation for the last 300-400 years, by goat thumpers...." There are others who take a while before they resort to throwing pearls before swine.
But. I am going through a bloody-minded phase of playing my little repertoire of irish tunes in a sort of bouncy 'english barn dance band' style. And it occurs that we don't really know whether the melody players *have* passed on the rhythms for generations. Do we ?
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"irish tunes in a sort of bouncy 'english barn dance band' style."
Stop it right now. You're making me shiver
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Been playing this too:http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/3570
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Will and llig. (this is before david h's problem came up! ;) Come on lads. The common ground we are looking for is in danger of being flooded with foul invective. This is my view from the flood bank; For my part I've acknowldeged that there are are at least two different approaches to the music.
One being that the music is all in the tunes; melody instruments are welcome and accompanying instruments are not. In this approach backing instruments are considered to be extraneous.
Another approach is to have the tunes accompanied by non-melodic instruments, not all tunesmiths like this but some do, but there are degrees of acceptance. These range from non acceptance to embracing via toleration even through gritted teeth! It's a matter of preference.
Mixing the two aims or puposes of these different approaches is difficult if not impossible to achieve but Will's session seems to be able to accommodate them both.
The discussion regarding tradition has produced interesting texts and histories and you can fit the testimonies to suit your viewpoint. But llig's urging of us to make choices according to quality rather than tradition resonates happily with me but, again, the different approaches require a different quality control.
If I've missed any point you'd like me to address let me know. Otherwise I'd be interested how you would find the middle ground or are we doomed to squabble till page 500+?!
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Excellent middle ground there Gran, thanks for that. I can agree with all of that. With one slight proviso:
I don't think there's been any foul invective, mere gentle ribbing I'd say.
(plus, it's worth pointing out that the actual tunes played in both camps are the same tunes, it's just that in one camp, you can't hear them as clearly. And choosing your camp depends on how much this matters to you.)
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Funnily enough, as it happens it was the writing down of the music that saved some of it as some tunes were lost to the tradition until resurrected from the dots from 'The Book' .
Will cpt, You say that the Bodhran is' Extraneous' definition: >> introduced or coming from without; not belonging or proper to a thing; external; foreign:>> Yet we know that it is an Irish drum identified as such from the early 15thC. So what exactly makes you say that the drum is Extraneous?
Will you seem to be setting up a strawman to tilt at. If that is the best you can muster then I see no reason to carry on this discussion. The facts are clear to anyone who can read.
If you are suggesting that the bodhran is NOT an integral part of the tradition, then surely you have some reasons to justify that? I offer the oldest recordings extant to demonstrate that it has been a part of Trad for at least 100yrs. We know that the bodhran was being played as part of the traditional music making scene in the early 19th C. as evidenced by a painting by Daniel Maclise exhibited at the Royal Academy London in 1833 recording a Halloween house party at the house of Father Mathew Horgan in County Cork.;
A couple dance close to the middle of the floor. Music is being provided by a small group playing pipes, fiddle, flute and bodhrán .
Has the level of discussion descended to likening the bodhran to leaches and fleas? Oh dear, perhaps there is little chance of a serious intelligent discussion then?
GC ;>>you can fit the testimonies to suit your viewpoint>>.
Really? is that so? so how do you suggest this evidence supports this statement?
>>THIS music has been played for tens of generations without accompaniment. It developed as a music based ***entirely*** on the melody line, with no harmonic (and exceedingly little rhythmic) accompaniment. When you add such accompaniment, you are no longer playing THIS music. You've changed it.>>
Seriously.I disagree. The evidence can not be twisted or used to support the contention that the bodhran is a new development. It can not be used to suggest that it was only used in the wren. It can not be used to say that the bodhran has not been a part of the traditional music making scene for the last , nearly 200yrs.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
Hot air for a cool breeze?
We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have you found? The same old bears.
Wish you were here.
Is sure is a lovely jar of pickled tradition you have there? Does it smell as bad as pickled eggs?
(Nice to be getting on with Gran though)
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
I would like to thank David also for the copy of one of the paintings he found.
Llig There are more than two camps ; there is the camp that likes sessions with, the camp that likes sessions without and the camp that likes solo accompanied by bodhran and the camp that likes solo, unaccompanied, and probably many more.
Personally I dont care for sessions particularly. I much prefer solo unaccompanied playing, followed by solo, accompanied by bodhran. Then duos accompanied by bodhran. etc
We have, as the OP posted, a tune accompanied by Bodhran, I think we can hear it well and the bodhran does not diminish it in any way, infact adds to it. and IMO that opinion is shared by the man himself.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
We have evidence that prehistoric man played wind instruments because some were made of bone and survived to this day. Other instruments, like drums, were probably played before those bone instruments were made, but being made of more perishable materials, disappeared from the earth. Without a "Wayback" machine, like in the cartoons, will we ever REALLY know which came first, the chicken or the egg?
Using the argument of 'tradition' gets slippery, because beyond a certain point, the evidence gets sketchy--as illustrated by the danger of using early recordings to justify one's definition of what is traditional.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by AlBrown
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Fair enough All, but how then do we justify our definitions of tradition? if we cant use what evidence we have? If the earliest recordings are not acceptable, which I dispute, then what DO we use? I also pointed out painting dated early 19th C, you are surely not saying that these are not acceptable as well? What about the 14th C mentions of Bodhrans? your not saying that perhaps someone used a time machine to put this evidence there are you
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Whoaa there Ionannas! I should have been clearer. I meant you can fit the different testimonies to argue the different viewpoints. I'm not betraying my personal belief (FWIW) that the bodhran has been used to accompany the music for a lot longer than 1950. But I am acknowledging that there are at least two different approaches to the music as described previously. It's pretty obvious by now that one camp's 'musical ingredients' should not be imposed on the other so I suppose any comments need to be directed to /at either of the particular camps if they are to have any relevance. We need to find a way that allows both camps to co exist somehow otherwise we'll forever stay glaring at each other from opposite sides of the playground! But how?
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Im sorry GC but i think its a lost cause, there are clearly a few people who feel that the bodhran is not welcome at their session, But it appears to be only a small minority of sessions , so we can live with that eh? I really dont think there is hope of 'converting 'llig, he has strongly defined views that he is entitled to.
As regarding your belief, well its not a belief, its a Proven fact.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by piobagusfidil
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Gran Cassa, it's a pleasure having a reasonable, reasoned discussion with you.
Other points? Well, I think it's safe to say that the skin drum predates human inhabitation of Ireland. Ion, even the CCE article makes that clear. The frame skin drum is not an Irish invention. It was brought in from outside. But that's beside my main point--(another formal definition of 'extraneous' that you'll find in any good dictionary), that a drum is *non-essential* for playing these tunes. That's all.
But it's damn unpleasant trying to discuss such things with someone who keeps trotting out the same "proof" even though it's irrelevant to the points being made. You can't move a conversation forward if you don't bother to try comprehending what the conversants are saying. Borders on incivility....
Oh well.
# Posted on March 30th 2009 by Will Harmon
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
You still here?!
Here's another can of worms! Yes I know this must be regarded as a novelty item, a bit of fun and I have no wish to be diparaging to the girls' drumming. It's their show. But if this sort of top heavy percussion was to become accepted into public sessions ................!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99xRAQRryVM
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Great. Could have done without the shakey thing though.
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Her right leg?!!
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by Gran Cassa
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmKheumDwCM
Great stuff!!
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Jeremy, Why don't you spend your time correcting mistakes and errors in your data base, rather than slicing up perfectly legitamate discussions?
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Ha, no - but I had noticed !
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
What other instrument has such history, asks so little and gives so much? No strings to break and land you in A&E/ER, no slobber to run down your toga, no hernia when you strap it on, and a Price/Yield quotient to die for. Not to mention all those tunes it has held platonically to its chest down the centuries. Every loft should have one- or a painting of one at least.
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by Here Lyeth
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
"every loft should have one". Exactly. And thats why there are so few in the archeological record. They get put in lofts, and garden sheds. And the mice get them. Then they get a bit of mesh nailed onto them. I know, first hand (well, not the mesh bit, yet)
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by David50
Re: GOOD bodhran / button accordion
Mice with bits of mesh nailed onto them?- you'll have the animal rights people onto you. Bodhrans, on the other hand, are good (and originally intended) for winnowing.
# Posted on March 31st 2009 by Here Lyeth