The subject of tradition .vs. innovation has for a long time been discussed. But only in last few weeks have I discovered the musicians whom I regard as great innovaters and respectful of the tradition. No, I don't know exactly why these musicians stand out. But thats probably what I'll spend the next few years finding out.
They are the likes of: Gerry 'Banjo' O'Connor, John Carty, Niall Keegan, Kevin Crawford, Laurence Nugent, Tommy Potts, Neilidh Boyle, Finbarr Dwyer, Liam O'Floinn and Donal Lunny.
For some reason or other, Mícheal Ó Súilleabháin, Eileen Ivers, Sharon Shannon (not all of her stuf) and others push the boat out too far for my liking.
Just curious as to where you 'sessioneers' have your tastes when it comes to traditional Irish music and how much 'out' stuff do you listen to and enjoy (i.e. music that widens the boundaries for our music.)
Wondering why you've chosen some of the musicians you've stated 52Paddy - can understand Lunny and Gerry banjo. Don't think the rest of them are proven innovators though!
I like what Niall and Caoimhin Vallely have been doing with their new band Buille.
You can hear some of their stuff here. http://www.myspace.com/buille
HUGO CHAVEZ: "i wouldn't include gerry o c in my group.
Great player, but i find his music pretty hard to enjoy."
-> I can understand that. But I personally do enjoy his music. It only really dawned on me a few days ago when listening to his Myraid album and The Findhorn set on that CD (Sean sa Cheo/Glass of Beer/Sailor's Bonnet.) I just couldn't help but smile and chuckle at his little tricks...goosebumps and all! His little ways of having a bit of fun with the tunes really bring it to an interesting level. Though his version of The Moving Cloud still leaves something to be desired in my books.
DODGER: "dear 52Paddy Technically, "innovation" is defined merely as "introducing something new;""
-> That puts a new perspective on things. But I am taking it to mean bringing the tradition forward, to new heights, while not detracting from it. Still vague I know.
LLIG: "52 paddy, as a flute player, how can you not put Matt Molloy on your list?"
-> Ouch! I deserve a slap on the wrist for forgetting him...
SLIGEACH: "Don't think the rest of them are proven innovators though!"
-> Interesting you say that. It depends on what you take innovation to mean, which, by definition, should indeed counter for everybody I mentioned as well as many others I've forgotton at this instance. Carty and Dwyer are masters of subtle variation and, in another sense, self-expression (a la Bobby Casey.) They really "get inside" the tunes and, for me, spark a whole new mindset and approach to playing. Really surprised you don't consider Niall Keegan an innovator considering that you do consider Gerry and Lunny. But it is all subjective I know.
SWFL Fiddler: "After a long time, it's accepted.
Is it still radical, new and innovative by then?"
-> But people can forever learn from the great innovators. Tommy Potts is still regarded and listened to after over half a century on. I believe people will always go back and refer to and learn from those musicians that made their stamp on the tradition, through whatever means (and, maybe it is these that are then, by default, innovative - i.e. innovation may not be specific to moving the music theoretically outside the barriers which it currently lies in.)
FISHMONGER: "I like what Niall and Caoimhin Vallely have been doing with their new band Buille."
-> I've heard them a few times, saw them live in fact. They're getting a good bit of air time at the moment but need to listen more before I make my mind up.
Probably showing my bias, but I would have considered Niall as an innovator before Kevin. No offense Mr. Crawford. I'll get an earful for that.
SWFL, you're probably right. I'm still thinking of Matt Molloy as an innovator. Which he is, but how many years ago did he introduce his innovations?
I'm spinning my wheels here. I am not for giving insight into innovation.
Why is how long ago the innovations happened of any relevance to how splendid and important they are? Matt Molloy transformed flute playing. Tis a bloody minded and isolated individual indeed not to accept it.
Sorry to get shirty, I didn't mean to. And I wasn't accusing anyone in particular.
It is an interesting topic, looking for the advanced guard (the avant garde) in traditional music. But I just feel that Matt Molloy is such a giant in this field that any didcussion about it should really be dominated by him.
A great innovator to me is a musician who is capable of sitting alone in a corner of pub for two hours playing tunes and keeping the great unwashed entertained. That sort of rules out Donal Lunny but it certainly does include Joe Burke.
I liked Sharon Shannon's music when she first appeared on the scene. But now I find that every tune she plays has the same bass guitar, drums and acoustic guitar sound; it all just blends into one. Every tune sounds the same. Even when she plays a slow air, there's a busy dance tune tucked onto the end.
It would be nice to see her and other 'group' players doing a solo album with minimal or no accompaniment.
There are different levels of innovation. Innovation where the player does something original, other players recognize it's newness, but it is not a radical departure. Another type of innovation is more experimental**, & thus more likely to fail but the originator plays it just the same. These changes are more likely to be controversial. So is this the question, "How radical is the innovation currently being played in traditional music?" This is the point where I always post this interview; http://www.brendantaaffe.com/caoimhin_oraghallaigh.html I like the Tommy Peoples interview as well.
** not simply fusion or playing a different instrument. In other words if you hear a tenor banjo or bouzouki for the 1st time you don't think, "I have to get me one of those." you think, "How am I ever going to do that on my instrument?"
There are many excellent trad musicians, too numerous to mention here. Then there are those touched by greatness. Their imagination and innovation is a natural occurrence and something which the rest of us can only attempt to immitate and which many of us immitate superbly.
Was Coleman really an innovator? I mean, beyond having a virtuosic command of the Sligo style? Can you be inventive but not innovative? Maybe his major innovation was using the tech of his day to record and disseminate his music (although others had already done that).
First of all hello everyone! I've wandered on to this site plenty times, but just joined. great stuff here and great to have a site for chat!
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I think it's worth mentioning at this point, the problematic use of the word 'traditional'. We see hierarchies with instruments for example, when really, some of our most popular instruments are appropriated from other 'foreign' countries eighteenth century and before. The practice is real, living and tangible, but the concept and ideology of 'tradition' imaginary. However, no-one has come up with another term for it, so, as loaded as it is, I guess we'll just have to deal with it!
It;s largely to do with power, who has the authority to decide what is traditional and what isn't? Is it good enough for me to say that's traditional because it 'just is'. A friend of mine and I were talking about new tune composition, it being a difficult , and often unfruitful task. Our mutual conclusion was that many new tunes sound pretentious and unnecessarily flash. I was proven wrong the other day when I listened to tunes composed by Jack Talty. As a man said at the session : 'They've got the smell of the bog off 'em".
So, yes, innovation, innovators. I think it's implied that to be innovative, you are proficient within the genre itself. So in my view, John Carty would very much be 'up there', Tommy Potts.....haha.....have you guessed I'm a fiddler already? :p
List is endless, but we have to remember that innovation happens on micro levels too, subtle variations of ornamentation and bowing etc (outside of melodic variation).
I think it does. I'm thinking innovation in keeping the tune fresh, ornaments, white space, dynamics, phrasing, feeling, not in terms of reinventing the sound or the instrument.
But that's what we're talking about, right? Whether innovation can be a personal thing and a culture-wide thing at the same time.
Sligeach - Anybody.......Anybody.....We're talking here about good traditional musicians. Anyway to stretch a point...how about the first good traditional musicans to sit in the corner of a pub and play solo for hours non stop. Surely they were innovators. I once stood on top of a railway signal pole and played a few tunes. Surely I was an innovator for people who fancied doing something like that.........(It didn't catch on, but never mind)
Jmbu
A really good musician will probably not play a tune with the same ornamentation in the same place, every time they play that tune. A musician develops his/her own style through ornamentation,phrasing, breathing, bowing etc. and this can of course influence other musicians approach to their instrument.
But I think we are talking about a wider impact of certain musicians on traditional music.
FreeReed
As much as I love sessions and have a healthy respect for their importance within the tradition they are what they are, nothing less, nothing more: they do exactly what it says on the tin! Sessions are where we meet, exchange tunes, learn and keep the music breathing - they are the life-blood of TM.
They've always been there - ceilidhing in eachothers houses.
There is nothing innovative about this. Admitting this is by no means an attempt to degrade musicians who do not play outside the session realm!
Meadhbhboyd
I would think that innovators are more than just proficient in their respective genre. Many of us are proficient musicians but does that mean we are capable of being innovators, creating something truly original that will impact massively on our fellow musicians. I don't think so. I think each of us can recognise (quietly within) when we meet someone within our own genre who has that something special that sets them way apart from the "proficient" musician.
Great insight Fidkid. Invention vs innovation.....
Matt Molloy... absolutely innovative. His music transcends genre and generation with an chilling accuracy and a firm grasp of at least what I think of as traditional playing, he never comprimises, yet is very popular and appeals to a very wide audience, I don't see how anyone who likes any style of music wouldn't hear his playing and enjoy it, and feel like dancing moving their bodies, and just getting into it.... again without comprimise... Innovation without a doubt in my mind.
Inventiveness is a skill, and possibly a teachable one. Some inventors produce more lovely things than others, and swing wider in general, but I think it is certainly a skill that is compulsory to a great innovator... but I agree there is a difference.
I think Patrick Kelly deserves a mention, if not some outright study. He seems to have been quite attached to personal settings of tunes; he once remarked, as a criticism, that another fiddle player always played the tunes exactly as he got them. His jig playing in particular was rather feisty, and I'm reminded of at least one recording in which he goes through a tune constantly replaying pieces legato or staccato, with more or less backbeat.
Nell Galvin, I'm not sure of - whether she's an innovator or receptive to a tradition which has become alien to us, but her style is phenomenally unique, to say the least. There's a very strange harmonic element to her music: she'll do something like play a D major tune and end it on a big G chord, or play a sudden sequence of ascending fifths, and it's almost jarring to hear.
Both musicians are heard less than they should be, I think.
sorry to burst your bubble but carty isnt an innovator, he just copies brian rooney.
if donal lunney is in there, then surely alec finn should be. lad o'beirne. patsy tuohey. noel hill. lots that can be mentioned. in fact too many
id agree with fidkid about coleman and the fact about his recordings, he was great but the virtuoso style was more abundant than people mite think. i mentioned lad o'beirne just there because he took it a step further with his compositions and twists on tunes.
id leave out niall keegan, kevin crawford, (the new) liz carroll, and i cant say i know laurence nugents music.
One of the most insightful statements I've ever heard about trad came from Mick Moloney. I don't have it to hand but it was along the lines of "Change, innovation and creativity are normative in trad."
Growing up it was drummed into me that good trad involves putting style on a tune though variation or ornament; other than as a learning process, slavishly copying another musician's take on a tune was anathema. The tension, and endless fascination, comes of course, from successfully setting the balance between the cultural stability and continuity (perhaps the first characteristics that come to mind when one thinks of tradition) of local and regional styles with ones own creativity. Now Rooney and Carty, are masters of this, which makes them very fine trad musicians but does it really make them innovators?
So who do I think have been innovators? Perhaps anyone "successfully" bringing a new instrument into the tradition e.g. John J Kimmel with the first recorded use of button accordion in trad. Or anyone "successfully" taking a technique from one instrument onto another e.g. Matt Molloy (though he certainly wasn't the first to use piping techniques on the flute but he was perhaps the most visible to do it successfully) and Dermot Byrne (playing box with a Donegal fiddle style). Or maybe anyone "successfully" pollinating trad with other genres e.g. Tommy Potts (classical music and popular song), Jolyon Jackson (electronica, though few have followed in his path. Does that mean he failed? ), Bothy Band (rock band-like percussive accompaniment), or Sean O' Riada (classical ensemble playing).
To add some spice, what about some innovations that have "failed"? Saxophones in céilí bands? Hiberno-jazz? G/F sharp tuning on the button accordion?
This is a very traditional thing to do. A lot of tunes end on the fourth and not the root. And specifically on the pipes also, they often play the G on the regulators through a D tune and the end of tune in D but with the fourth on the regulators.
It's a common thing to think of certain individuals as innovators just because they are good players. John Carty as mentioned above is a good example. Sure he's interesting and inventive, but not innovative. Lunasa is another good example. So many people who like and admire them have never heard the bothy band.
It is a subtle one, teasing out the differences between inventiveness and innovation, not least because, as PJ says, inventiveness is paramount to good traditional playing.
And I think it's made doubly difficult when considering composed tunes. I think Liz Carrol's playing is not really innovative, but her tunes sure are. But then again, she's following very closely the Chicago tradition of tune writing from Ed Reavy, who was certainly an innovator.
PJ Doherty: I agree, but are you making a distinction between a good trad musician and a good innovator? And if so, what i the difference?
Re Bothy Band : "A rock band in folk clothing" (Melody Maker - it was in inlay card for best of)
sligeach: Absolutely! I'm not saying that they *just* have to be proficient within the one genre, I'm sure you know people who are bi-musical, and beyond that....I'd say I'm a traditional musician by trade, but play violin in other contexts (rock, blues, 'free improv'...yadda ya). I'd like to think my mingling with different genres makes me a better musician overall. No point living with blinkers on!
Would you all agree that exposure to a wide variety of music makes (people) better musicians/innovators?
If any of you were at Ennis Trad Fest this year, Andrew McNamara presented Shuckin and Jivin' : basically a club night, he was the DJ, played a vast variety of music from quicksteps, Paddy in the Smoke, showband, bluegrass, blues and beyond. Ennis Trad has been revered as a 'musicians' festival (typical tourist season over), people are into all sorts. So people's overall tastes in music feeds into their practice (subtly of course...)? what do you think?
Meadhbh
My point is that being "proficient" ( within whatever number of genres) is often not enough to be an innovator! Being proficient is not a passport to being creative, original and innovative. Don't you think?
meadh, I think all I'm trying to draw out is that I don't think you can be a "good" trad musician without being creative enough to put your own stamp on a tune but that being able to pull off a seemingly infinite series of delightful variations on the second phrase of the turn of a reel doesn't make one an innovator. Innovation for me, is something that forces us to look at the tradition in a new way. (Yep llig, I think we're in agreement here (though I thought Reavy lived in Philly!).)
meabh, I don't think anyone would disagree that an exposure to a wide range of music makes one a better musician though it doesn't necessarily follow that it would make one a "better" trad musician.
Sligeach: Yes, but being proficient (ie.knowing your instrument, knowing about context, repertoire, limitations, etc etc) certainly helps.
It seems like everyone here is legitmizing this notion of 'you either got it or you don't ' .....I think you can acquire it through hard work and acculturation and others perhaps can't , but make music in a more passive way. This whole discussion is subjective anyhow, so ultimately doesn't matter what each of us thinks, only to see things from different perspectives.
PJ, I agree with you completely: innovation, for me, is working within the given framework of a tune, and finding new ways of playing it, while in keeping with the contour and character.
So what about this: learned variations of tunes. Is it enough to reproduce them in you style of playing, or is it a cop-out, should people be striving to create their own variations?
The first (putting your stamp on a tune) is really essential.
Whereas innovation in itself isn't essential.
Not all innovations work, certainly not for all listeners/players.
Some innovations can sound strained or forced, as if the player/group are trying too hard to be different. I think this is more of a problem with group playing in a commercial setting where the need to stand out fromt he crowd can result in gimics rather than wiorthwhile innovation. Of course this comes down to the personal taste and judgement of the listener. And there is nothing wrong with going for a broader audience in order to shift more cds.
Meadhbh
You must be better than proficient! And musicians, with a lot of "hard work and acculutration"( as with any anything in life) can surpass their natural ability. A musician who has "got it", and lives,breathes and sleeps music, like it or not, has the edge!
Think we might be at cross-purposes here. For me "working within the given framework of a tune, and finding new ways of playing it, while in keeping with the contour and character" isn't innovation, far from it. What you're describing is what any "good" trad musician does every time he plays. What your describing is the tradition at work.
It may be that you and I may be using the term "variation" to mean different things. If you're asking about copying the way someone varies the melody of a tune but putting in your own ornaments and rhythmic emphasis, then sure, why not. That said, melodic variation, rhythmic emphasis, ornamentation and articulation are usually so intimately tied together that there's a chance it won't be pretty. A more common "trick" is to lift a melodic variation from a musician who plays a different instrument to yourself.
That's why I nominated Paddy Murphy, a true innovator. He pioneered the concertina system that spawned players like Noel Hill. Concertina playing transformed in his hands.
I've *very* seldom heard a trad player, live, play something that has made me sit up in astonishment and think, "I just didn't know you could DO this on a (whatever)...!" - meaning music of an undreamed-of richness, not just pyrotechnics, although possibly including these. That though was my experience listening to Phil Cunningham playing a march called The Wee Man From Skye at a Silly Wizard gig in the 80s. (He recorded it on his solo album "Airs And Graces", but without the revelatory duende that was manifested in the gig performance.)
I don't know enough about piano box to know whether Phil is behind any radical change in playing style or indeed PA design, but I'd certainly never heard it played like that in Scottish pub lounges. I imagine Donald Shaw of Capercaillie has taken on board influences from Phil Cunningham's playing, or that they have influences in common.
I would consider the harmonica player Brendan Power an innovator. He redesigned the instrument and introduced new techniques that have become accepted standards within the tradition. Not all of his music is to my taste but his technical input has to be admired.
Invention and Variation have been brought up, and reading rambling's concept of placing a "stamp on a tune" being part of being an accomplished player, I find a little confusing.
Every player has a voice even the very beginner.... I think that more accomplished players have incorporated favorite variations, and melody inversions, as well as ornamentation into their "voice". I still don't equate that with re-arrangement or even innovation.
Re-arrangment (which is how some people might interpret 'stamping' is a risky path to follow, if one hopes to be a positive force for traditional music of any kind).
And Voicing is lovely... its crucial... even every beginner has their own special scratchy tone or use of ornamentation... I think that is great... and IS an important part of tradition, therefore it doesn't follow that having one's own voice makes him or her an innovator.
Just what is an innovator then? I love traditional music of many kinds, but only play Irish. I see innovators as modern incarnations, who even write their own tunes, that relate to their own real life..yet their music is plain, and clear and easily indentifiable in their idiom. Usually they come from music families it seems, and have spent their whole lives studying their trade.
Yet all innovators have their own voice..... sort of like a set-subset concept from our early years of math.
Ok Sandy... put a sock in it right I'm going to fiddle and have coffee and stop staring at this stupid computer.
I just spent a long time typing up my thoughts on innovators and innovation in trad, then accidently pressed the back button and lost it all. So a short version is that innovation in trad is a difficult subject. I think an innovator is someone who not only plays the music using the same ideas and putting their own touch on them but also puts in something new that fits into the trad idiom.
My list of innovators of recent enough times is; Matt Molloy, Tommy Potts, Donal Lunny + Andy Irvine for the use of Bouzouki in ITM, and Martin Hayes.
People who go a little bit outside of the tradition, but in my opinion make good music; Michael McGoldrick and Brian Finnegan.
My list would be: O Riada; Lunny; Irvine; McGlynn; Veillon and McSherry.
I know Veillon is Breton, but he does play Irish music and he has had a profound effect on people like McGoldrike and Finnegan - his influence is so obvious on both of these fine flautists.
The reason why I include McGlynn is that, to my limited knowledge, and a guitarist's knowledge would be much greater than my own, he's the one who started playing tunes on the guitar, as opposed to just backing them. I could be wrong. Maybe Brady, Sproule or Moynehan is known to have done so before him.
There are many people who flat picked tunes on the guitar before Arty McGlynn, but that's not the point. Flat picking tunes on the guitar didn't introduce any thing that flat picking tunes on the tenor banjo had already introduced.
Well you would need to ask them that but seeing that he is credited by being the first to flatpick tunes I would have thought that would have made him pretty influential for lots of guitarists. Off the top of my head I would think that John Doyle and Donal Clancy might cite him as an influence. Possibly Arty as well. As I said you would need to ask them though. I am not going to second guess.
I am not about to jump in the middle of your dispute with Llig and I wouldn't argue about the influence of Arty McGlynn, not for a second. I was simply offering a possible answer to your question.
For whistle I would suggest names like Mary Bergin, Sean Ryan and Micho Russell. In Scotland Marc Duff.
There are numerous guitarists that have been innovative. As said above Michael O Domhnaill, Arty McGlynn and Dick Gaughan. More recent examples would include John Doyle, Steve Cooney and Denis Cahill.
If folk like Phil Cunningham are allowed then another Scottish musician that I would say has influenced Irish music through innovation would be Gordon Duncan. There are few musicians who have been so prolific in terms of composition and expanding the possibilities of their instrument and whilst his influence is more keenly felt in Scotland I would say many musicians, pipers in particular, in Ireland, Brittany and Galicia owe him a lot.
i think people could go round in circles talking about something like this. innovator is a very powerful word.
there are plenty of great musicians mentioned here that are still around whether its matt molloy, mary bergin, john carty who we all enjoy listening to. as do i. But really do people go out of their way to find something innovative or do they just like listening to good music? i think i know the answer. im off to listen to some 'at the racket', who here said the saxophone doesnt work???
Flatpicking Irish tunes on the guitar was, for a lot of us, a natural extension of flatpicking American tunes, which we'd been doing for several years before McGlynn and Gaughan started recording. And I agree with llig that there wasn't anything really innovative about it.
I wonder if there have always been musicians equally "innovative" or original as many of those being mentioned, but that they came before such widespread dissemination of playing through the mass media, or have never sought out mass media outlets.
I think it is revealing that most of the names mentioned have been from recent decades.
That isn't to criticise the palyers being named. But perhaps what is really being assessed is how influential were players, which comes down not just to genius/talent but also exposure.
>Invention and Variation have been brought up, and reading >rambling's concept of placing a "stamp on a tune" being part >of being an accomplished player, I find a little confusing.
>Every player has a voice even the very beginner.... I think that >more accomplished players have incorporated favorite >variations, and melody inversions, as well as ornamentation >into their "voice". I still don't equate that with re-arrangement >or even innovation
I was really borrowing from PJ rather coming up with a concept.
I wasn't equating putting a stamp on a tune with innovation. The first is a requirement for any good player. The second isn't. Nor does innovation necessarily make a player greater than another very fine player. I like many innovations. But over valuing of novelty in itself is one of the defining characteristics of our childish modern era.
What is new is not necessarily bettre than what was old (regardless of what politicians say). It may be, but it also may not be.
otherwise, we'd whoop with joy when Johnny Djembe walked into the session pub (for example)
Many other innovations are developed in and for commercial music releases and may work well in that environment. But commercial music is not synonymous with trad. There is certianly a relationship between "commercial trad" and music as played, and it is a largely symbiotic relationship. But the two are not identical.
PS, Sandy B. I don't agree that evreyone puts their own stamp on a tune right from the start as a beginner. Not strongly enough to really say anything at least. They may not play as an exact clone of other players (though many try to). But a true personal voice only develops with experience, and never will if you slavishly follow any of the great players or even the innovators.
"I wonder if there have always been musicians equally "innovative" or original as many of those being mentioned,"
Of course there have. And in the days before mass media and mass travel, it's what created regional styles.
And there's one more thing about flat picking diddley tunes, whether guitar, banjo mandolin or whatever, that needs mentioning. All the great innovators in this music build on the past. You have to, that's the prerequisite of innovation in a traditional music. First you have to understand the music and play it as it is, then build on what is there. It's of vital importance not to discard any of it. Flat picking tunes, unfortunately, discards a huge amount of the music in terms of articulation. Flat picked tunes are a desert of content when compared to the fiddle/flute/pipes they came from.
Riffing on the flatpicking guitar & saxophone strands of this thread, I think that seeing the possibilities of an instrument outside the tradition, and bringing it into the tradition, counts as innovation. Whether it’s Moynihan/Irvine/Lunny with the bouzouki, or that fellow that plays the khaen.
It's an innovative farming method that takes 10 distinct fields of rotating crops and fallow, chops down the hedgerows between them and ploughs the whole lot together into one huge and flat mono-crop with accompanying artificial phosphate fertilisers and insecticides.
Llig:
>"I wonder if there have always been musicians >equally "innovative" or original as many of those being >mentioned,"
>Of course there have. And in the days before mass media ....
I was a bit surprised to read Micho Russell's name in a thread about great innovators. Now I love Micho's playing, I do. I never considered it innovative, though I mean this in the best way. I'll take some time to listen again. What about Donncha Ó Briain, is his innovative or simply good playing? http://www.rogermillington.com/tunetoc/goldeneagle.html
funny you mention Kevin Burke and Matt Molloy since I think of them as being very similar - both great players who learned a lot from older musicians. KB's very innovative - you just don't approve of his innovations. I just saw him play with a string quartet and it was brilliant. Exactly why I mentioned the inquisition earlier - you can understand the tradition and have lived your whole life immersed in it and you still get treated like Peter Abelard
All great players learned from previous musicians. As I said before, it's a prerequisite to being great. But that doesn't make them innovative. Matt Molloy is innovative because he brought a whole new style of playing to us. He built a great deal on to his roots. I really don't think you can say the same of Kevin Burke. Good though he is, he's not an innovator. Playing with a string quartet is not an innovation in traditional music. And it's not about whether anyone approves of someone's innovations or not. Plenty of people still don't care much for Matt Molloy's playing, but they would never deny that he was innovative.
I know I should stop now - I appreciate your thoughtful response. But anyway, how can someone have recognizable influence yet not a unique style of their own innovation? You can listen to all the Michael Coleman and Martin Byrnes you want but you still won't sound like Kevin Burke.
As I said earlier, it is a subtle one, teasing out the differences between inventiveness and innovation, not least because inventiveness is paramount to good traditional playing.
There is a difference between having your own inventive style and introducing an innovative way of playing. But then, there is a grey overlap, of course.
However, with Michael Coleman, it's fairly straightforward. It's well documented that he wasn't a particularly outstanding player, in that his playing really wasn't that much different from a lot of other players of the time. But his influence was because of his recordings.
And I think the same can be said of Kevin Burke. He did one seminal recording, If The Cap Fits. It's a terrific record and had a seminal effect on many young fiddle players, myself included. But the actual fiddle playing on that record is not innovative. It may well be presented in a fresh and innovative way, but the playing itself, though outstanding, is not innovative. Maybe, perversely, that's what makes it such a good record.
The discussion has gone back and forth between great innovators and great influences, and if we look at the different posts, the replies seem to fall into one category or the other. Or then again, sometimes both, when an innovator also becomes a great influence (as opposed to an innovator that people have forgotten a few years later, like those folks that added icky synthesizer tracks to otherwise trad performances back near the end of the last century, ick).
Al, you're right, I also think it's important to separate the idea of being an innovative player of diddley tunes with being an innovative arranger of the kind of band/production/album presentation of diddley tunes thing.
Donal Lunny, for example, is the quintessential innovative producer/arranger. Planxty, Bothy Band, Planxty again, Moving hearts, outstanding pegigree. But his true innovation and best contribution to the music is not his arrangements, or his productions skill, or even his idiosyncratic but slavishly copied strumming. It is the tunes he writes.
I quite like his Prophet 5 work. But I certainly wouldn't put it among his "innovative" moments.
PS, Sandy B. I don't agree that evreyone puts their own stamp on a tune right from the start as a beginner
I considered "stamp" as some type of rebranding, and a different concept all together from perfecting or honing your tone, ornaments, rhythm and overall tune communication, in other words building on.. voice.
True some voices I'd be ok with never hearing ever again... other voices I cannot get enough of.. simply having a voice, as I mentioned in my post does not imply talent, skill, and certainly not innovation, only the fact that we each sound unique, even if you try with all your might.. to play exactly in style X, or like player Y, you sound like you.
I think our definition/usage of terms might be in diagreement however conceptually... the differences are likely neglible.
I agree Sandy. I've often said that the musicians who make an effort to have their own voice are never the best players. If you play from the heart, nothing can stop you from playing with your own voice. But if you make a specific effort to play with your own voice, if you make a conscious effort to find your voice, you will be, and sound, pretentious.
Great innovators
Great innovators
The subject of tradition .vs. innovation has for a long time been discussed. But only in last few weeks have I discovered the musicians whom I regard as great innovaters and respectful of the tradition. No, I don't know exactly why these musicians stand out. But thats probably what I'll spend the next few years finding out.
They are the likes of: Gerry 'Banjo' O'Connor, John Carty, Niall Keegan, Kevin Crawford, Laurence Nugent, Tommy Potts, Neilidh Boyle, Finbarr Dwyer, Liam O'Floinn and Donal Lunny.
For some reason or other, Mícheal Ó Súilleabháin, Eileen Ivers, Sharon Shannon (not all of her stuf) and others push the boat out too far for my liking.
Just curious as to where you 'sessioneers' have your tastes when it comes to traditional Irish music and how much 'out' stuff do you listen to and enjoy (i.e. music that widens the boundaries for our music.)
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by 52Paddy
Re: Great innovators
Hi paddy,
i wouldn't include gerry o c in my group.
Great player, but i find his music pretty hard to enjoy.
I agree on some of your other suggstions. I think it just boils down to opinion again, and personal taste.
How long before someone brings up caoimho...
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Hugo Chavez
Re: Great innovators
52 paddy, as a flute player, how can you not put Matt Molloy on your list?
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
inside the sphere Sweeny's Men, outside Stan Rogers
''From Honor Oak to Lisaniska, and whatever lies between!''
Brendan Ring (pipes, harp) 1994
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by lisaniska
Re: Great innovators
Wondering why you've chosen some of the musicians you've stated 52Paddy - can understand Lunny and Gerry banjo. Don't think the rest of them are proven innovators though!
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
Innovation is a funny thing, by the time it becomes accepted by the slow, glacial pace of tradition, it's no longer innovative.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Great innovators
sure it is. the tradition itself is based on innovation.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
Right Random, but it's very slow.
When it's new, most turn their noses up.
After a long time, it's accepted.
Is it still radical, new and innovative by then? [shrug]
It's very rare when something radically new is openly and widely embraced.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Great innovators
...or at least it seems that way.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Great innovators
I like what Niall and Caoimhin Vallely have been doing with their new band Buille.
You can hear some of their stuff here. http://www.myspace.com/buille
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Fishmonger
Re: Great innovators
HUGO CHAVEZ: "i wouldn't include gerry o c in my group.
Great player, but i find his music pretty hard to enjoy."
-> I can understand that. But I personally do enjoy his music. It only really dawned on me a few days ago when listening to his Myraid album and The Findhorn set on that CD (Sean sa Cheo/Glass of Beer/Sailor's Bonnet.) I just couldn't help but smile and chuckle at his little tricks...goosebumps and all! His little ways of having a bit of fun with the tunes really bring it to an interesting level. Though his version of The Moving Cloud still leaves something to be desired in my books.
DODGER: "dear 52Paddy Technically, "innovation" is defined merely as "introducing something new;""
-> That puts a new perspective on things. But I am taking it to mean bringing the tradition forward, to new heights, while not detracting from it. Still vague I know.
LLIG: "52 paddy, as a flute player, how can you not put Matt Molloy on your list?"
-> Ouch! I deserve a slap on the wrist for forgetting him...
SLIGEACH: "Don't think the rest of them are proven innovators though!"
-> Interesting you say that. It depends on what you take innovation to mean, which, by definition, should indeed counter for everybody I mentioned as well as many others I've forgotton at this instance. Carty and Dwyer are masters of subtle variation and, in another sense, self-expression (a la Bobby Casey.) They really "get inside" the tunes and, for me, spark a whole new mindset and approach to playing. Really surprised you don't consider Niall Keegan an innovator considering that you do consider Gerry and Lunny. But it is all subjective I know.
SWFL Fiddler: "After a long time, it's accepted.
Is it still radical, new and innovative by then?"
-> But people can forever learn from the great innovators. Tommy Potts is still regarded and listened to after over half a century on. I believe people will always go back and refer to and learn from those musicians that made their stamp on the tradition, through whatever means (and, maybe it is these that are then, by default, innovative - i.e. innovation may not be specific to moving the music theoretically outside the barriers which it currently lies in.)
FISHMONGER: "I like what Niall and Caoimhin Vallely have been doing with their new band Buille."
-> I've heard them a few times, saw them live in fact. They're getting a good bit of air time at the moment but need to listen more before I make my mind up.
Interesting input guys.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by 52Paddy
Re: Great innovators
Probably showing my bias, but I would have considered Niall as an innovator before Kevin. No offense Mr. Crawford. I'll get an earful for that.
SWFL, you're probably right. I'm still thinking of Matt Molloy as an innovator. Which he is, but how many years ago did he introduce his innovations?
I'm spinning my wheels here. I am not for giving insight into innovation.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
Why is how long ago the innovations happened of any relevance to how splendid and important they are? Matt Molloy transformed flute playing. Tis a bloody minded and isolated individual indeed not to accept it.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
You miss the point, mate. We are embracing Matt Molloy's innovations.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
good
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Sorry to get shirty, I didn't mean to. And I wasn't accusing anyone in particular.
It is an interesting topic, looking for the advanced guard (the avant garde) in traditional music. But I just feel that Matt Molloy is such a giant in this field that any didcussion about it should really be dominated by him.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
"Matt Molloy transformed flute playing." - I'd go along with that.
Is there an equivalent transformer of fiddle-playing? (recent or otherwise)
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by domnull
Re: Great innovators
...and there's the rub. Who commonly thinks of Matt Molloy as an innovator?
A demi-god of the flute? Oh sure, but a radical innovator?
...but then, at one point, he was, eh? So...
Innaressin.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Great innovators
A great innovator to me is a musician who is capable of sitting alone in a corner of pub for two hours playing tunes and keeping the great unwashed entertained. That sort of rules out Donal Lunny but it certainly does include Joe Burke.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Free Reed
Re: Great innovators
SWFL, just listen.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
I liked Sharon Shannon's music when she first appeared on the scene. But now I find that every tune she plays has the same bass guitar, drums and acoustic guitar sound; it all just blends into one. Every tune sounds the same. Even when she plays a slow air, there's a busy dance tune tucked onto the end.
It would be nice to see her and other 'group' players doing a solo album with minimal or no accompaniment.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by amhrán
Re: Great innovators
There are different levels of innovation. Innovation where the player does something original, other players recognize it's newness, but it is not a radical departure. Another type of innovation is more experimental**, & thus more likely to fail but the originator plays it just the same. These changes are more likely to be controversial. So is this the question, "How radical is the innovation currently being played in traditional music?" This is the point where I always post this interview; http://www.brendantaaffe.com/caoimhin_oraghallaigh.html I like the Tommy Peoples interview as well.
** not simply fusion or playing a different instrument. In other words if you hear a tenor banjo or bouzouki for the 1st time you don't think, "I have to get me one of those." you think, "How am I ever going to do that on my instrument?"
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Ben Steen
That was weird. I think I just said I want my flute playing to sound like a bouzouki. This innovation stuff is too tricky.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
Martin Hayes.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Sugarfoot Jack
Re: Great innovators
Obvious fiddle - Michael Coleman
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by ScoilCheoilnaBotha
Re: Great innovators
fair play, now is there anyone in mustardland under the age of 35? Come on you popcorn munching lurkers.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
There are many excellent trad musicians, too numerous to mention here. Then there are those touched by greatness. Their imagination and innovation is a natural occurrence and something which the rest of us can only attempt to immitate and which many of us immitate superbly.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
Free Reed
Anybody can sit in a corner and play for two/three hours solid and keep the great unwashed entertained. It doesn't make you an innovator!!
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
Was Coleman really an innovator? I mean, beyond having a virtuosic command of the Sligo style? Can you be inventive but not innovative? Maybe his major innovation was using the tech of his day to record and disseminate his music (although others had already done that).
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by fidkid
Re: Great innovators
First of all hello everyone! I've wandered on to this site plenty times, but just joined. great stuff here and great to have a site for chat!
---
I think it's worth mentioning at this point, the problematic use of the word 'traditional'. We see hierarchies with instruments for example, when really, some of our most popular instruments are appropriated from other 'foreign' countries eighteenth century and before. The practice is real, living and tangible, but the concept and ideology of 'tradition' imaginary. However, no-one has come up with another term for it, so, as loaded as it is, I guess we'll just have to deal with it!
It;s largely to do with power, who has the authority to decide what is traditional and what isn't? Is it good enough for me to say that's traditional because it 'just is'. A friend of mine and I were talking about new tune composition, it being a difficult , and often unfruitful task. Our mutual conclusion was that many new tunes sound pretentious and unnecessarily flash. I was proven wrong the other day when I listened to tunes composed by Jack Talty. As a man said at the session : 'They've got the smell of the bog off 'em".
So, yes, innovation, innovators. I think it's implied that to be innovative, you are proficient within the genre itself. So in my view, John Carty would very much be 'up there', Tommy Potts.....haha.....have you guessed I'm a fiddler already? :p
List is endless, but we have to remember that innovation happens on micro levels too, subtle variations of ornamentation and bowing etc (outside of melodic variation).
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by meadhbhboyd
Re: Great innovators
sligeach - -
I think it does. I'm thinking innovation in keeping the tune fresh, ornaments, white space, dynamics, phrasing, feeling, not in terms of reinventing the sound or the instrument.
But that's what we're talking about, right? Whether innovation can be a personal thing and a culture-wide thing at the same time.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Jmbu
Re: Great innovators
Sligeach - Anybody.......Anybody.....We're talking here about good traditional musicians. Anyway to stretch a point...how about the first good traditional musicans to sit in the corner of a pub and play solo for hours non stop. Surely they were innovators. I once stood on top of a railway signal pole and played a few tunes. Surely I was an innovator for people who fancied doing something like that.........(It didn't catch on, but never mind)
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by Free Reed
Re: Great innovators
Jmbu
A really good musician will probably not play a tune with the same ornamentation in the same place, every time they play that tune. A musician develops his/her own style through ornamentation,phrasing, breathing, bowing etc. and this can of course influence other musicians approach to their instrument.
But I think we are talking about a wider impact of certain musicians on traditional music.
FreeReed
As much as I love sessions and have a healthy respect for their importance within the tradition they are what they are, nothing less, nothing more: they do exactly what it says on the tin! Sessions are where we meet, exchange tunes, learn and keep the music breathing - they are the life-blood of TM.
They've always been there - ceilidhing in eachothers houses.
There is nothing innovative about this. Admitting this is by no means an attempt to degrade musicians who do not play outside the session realm!
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
Meadhbhboyd
I would think that innovators are more than just proficient in their respective genre. Many of us are proficient musicians but does that mean we are capable of being innovators, creating something truly original that will impact massively on our fellow musicians. I don't think so. I think each of us can recognise (quietly within) when we meet someone within our own genre who has that something special that sets them way apart from the "proficient" musician.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
How tradition accepts innovation over time per the psychological "Five Stages of Grief":
1. Denial and Isolation.
2. Anger.
3. Bargaining.
4. Depression.
5. Acceptance.
# Posted on November 17th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Great innovators
Great insight Fidkid. Invention vs innovation.....
Matt Molloy... absolutely innovative. His music transcends genre and generation with an chilling accuracy and a firm grasp of at least what I think of as traditional playing, he never comprimises, yet is very popular and appeals to a very wide audience, I don't see how anyone who likes any style of music wouldn't hear his playing and enjoy it, and feel like dancing moving their bodies, and just getting into it.... again without comprimise... Innovation without a doubt in my mind.
Inventiveness is a skill, and possibly a teachable one. Some inventors produce more lovely things than others, and swing wider in general, but I think it is certainly a skill that is compulsory to a great innovator... but I agree there is a difference.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by SandyBottoms
Re: Great innovators
I think Patrick Kelly deserves a mention, if not some outright study. He seems to have been quite attached to personal settings of tunes; he once remarked, as a criticism, that another fiddle player always played the tunes exactly as he got them. His jig playing in particular was rather feisty, and I'm reminded of at least one recording in which he goes through a tune constantly replaying pieces legato or staccato, with more or less backbeat.
Nell Galvin, I'm not sure of - whether she's an innovator or receptive to a tradition which has become alien to us, but her style is phenomenally unique, to say the least. There's a very strange harmonic element to her music: she'll do something like play a D major tune and end it on a big G chord, or play a sudden sequence of ascending fifths, and it's almost jarring to hear.
Both musicians are heard less than they should be, I think.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Danjo
Re: Great innovators
Liz Carroll - for her compositions.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Hup
Re: Great innovators
sorry to burst your bubble but carty isnt an innovator, he just copies brian rooney.
if donal lunney is in there, then surely alec finn should be. lad o'beirne. patsy tuohey. noel hill. lots that can be mentioned. in fact too many
id agree with fidkid about coleman and the fact about his recordings, he was great but the virtuoso style was more abundant than people mite think. i mentioned lad o'beirne just there because he took it a step further with his compositions and twists on tunes.
id leave out niall keegan, kevin crawford, (the new) liz carroll, and i cant say i know laurence nugents music.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by fiddleruairi
Re: Great innovators
Paddy Murphy revolutionized the anglo concertina.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Phantom Button
Re: Great innovators
One of the most insightful statements I've ever heard about trad came from Mick Moloney. I don't have it to hand but it was along the lines of "Change, innovation and creativity are normative in trad."
Growing up it was drummed into me that good trad involves putting style on a tune though variation or ornament; other than as a learning process, slavishly copying another musician's take on a tune was anathema. The tension, and endless fascination, comes of course, from successfully setting the balance between the cultural stability and continuity (perhaps the first characteristics that come to mind when one thinks of tradition) of local and regional styles with ones own creativity. Now Rooney and Carty, are masters of this, which makes them very fine trad musicians but does it really make them innovators?
So who do I think have been innovators? Perhaps anyone "successfully" bringing a new instrument into the tradition e.g. John J Kimmel with the first recorded use of button accordion in trad. Or anyone "successfully" taking a technique from one instrument onto another e.g. Matt Molloy (though he certainly wasn't the first to use piping techniques on the flute but he was perhaps the most visible to do it successfully) and Dermot Byrne (playing box with a Donegal fiddle style). Or maybe anyone "successfully" pollinating trad with other genres e.g. Tommy Potts (classical music and popular song), Jolyon Jackson (electronica, though few have followed in his path. Does that mean he failed? ), Bothy Band (rock band-like percussive accompaniment), or Sean O' Riada (classical ensemble playing).
To add some spice, what about some innovations that have "failed"? Saxophones in céilí bands? Hiberno-jazz? G/F sharp tuning on the button accordion?
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Sweeney Astray
Re: Great innovators
"play a D major tune and end it on a big G chord"
This is a very traditional thing to do. A lot of tunes end on the fourth and not the root. And specifically on the pipes also, they often play the G on the regulators through a D tune and the end of tune in D but with the fourth on the regulators.
It's a common thing to think of certain individuals as innovators just because they are good players. John Carty as mentioned above is a good example. Sure he's interesting and inventive, but not innovative. Lunasa is another good example. So many people who like and admire them have never heard the bothy band.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Cross post with PJ there, but I think we are agreeing
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
It is a subtle one, teasing out the differences between inventiveness and innovation, not least because, as PJ says, inventiveness is paramount to good traditional playing.
And I think it's made doubly difficult when considering composed tunes. I think Liz Carrol's playing is not really innovative, but her tunes sure are. But then again, she's following very closely the Chicago tradition of tune writing from Ed Reavy, who was certainly an innovator.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
PJ Doherty: I agree, but are you making a distinction between a good trad musician and a good innovator? And if so, what i the difference?
Re Bothy Band : "A rock band in folk clothing" (Melody Maker - it was in inlay card for best of)
sligeach: Absolutely! I'm not saying that they *just* have to be proficient within the one genre, I'm sure you know people who are bi-musical, and beyond that....I'd say I'm a traditional musician by trade, but play violin in other contexts (rock, blues, 'free improv'...yadda ya). I'd like to think my mingling with different genres makes me a better musician overall. No point living with blinkers on!
Would you all agree that exposure to a wide variety of music makes (people) better musicians/innovators?
If any of you were at Ennis Trad Fest this year, Andrew McNamara presented Shuckin and Jivin' : basically a club night, he was the DJ, played a vast variety of music from quicksteps, Paddy in the Smoke, showband, bluegrass, blues and beyond. Ennis Trad has been revered as a 'musicians' festival (typical tourist season over), people are into all sorts. So people's overall tastes in music feeds into their practice (subtly of course...)? what do you think?
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by meadhbhboyd
Re: Great innovators
John McSherry is there1
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
Meadhbh
My point is that being "proficient" ( within whatever number of genres) is often not enough to be an innovator! Being proficient is not a passport to being creative, original and innovative. Don't you think?
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
meadh, I think all I'm trying to draw out is that I don't think you can be a "good" trad musician without being creative enough to put your own stamp on a tune but that being able to pull off a seemingly infinite series of delightful variations on the second phrase of the turn of a reel doesn't make one an innovator. Innovation for me, is something that forces us to look at the tradition in a new way. (Yep llig, I think we're in agreement here (though I thought Reavy lived in Philly!).)
meabh, I don't think anyone would disagree that an exposure to a wide range of music makes one a better musician though it doesn't necessarily follow that it would make one a "better" trad musician.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Sweeney Astray
Re: Great innovators
Sligeach: Yes, but being proficient (ie.knowing your instrument, knowing about context, repertoire, limitations, etc etc) certainly helps.
It seems like everyone here is legitmizing this notion of 'you either got it or you don't ' .....I think you can acquire it through hard work and acculturation and others perhaps can't , but make music in a more passive way. This whole discussion is subjective anyhow, so ultimately doesn't matter what each of us thinks, only to see things from different perspectives.
PJ, I agree with you completely: innovation, for me, is working within the given framework of a tune, and finding new ways of playing it, while in keeping with the contour and character.
So what about this: learned variations of tunes. Is it enough to reproduce them in you style of playing, or is it a cop-out, should people be striving to create their own variations?
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by meadhbhboyd
Re: Great innovators
That is a good distinction PJ.
The first (putting your stamp on a tune) is really essential.
Whereas innovation in itself isn't essential.
Not all innovations work, certainly not for all listeners/players.
Some innovations can sound strained or forced, as if the player/group are trying too hard to be different. I think this is more of a problem with group playing in a commercial setting where the need to stand out fromt he crowd can result in gimics rather than wiorthwhile innovation. Of course this comes down to the personal taste and judgement of the listener. And there is nothing wrong with going for a broader audience in order to shift more cds.
- chris
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by ramblingpitchfork
Re: Great innovators
Meadhbh
You must be better than proficient! And musicians, with a lot of "hard work and acculutration"( as with any anything in life) can surpass their natural ability. A musician who has "got it", and lives,breathes and sleeps music, like it or not, has the edge!
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by sligeach
Re: Great innovators
Think we might be at cross-purposes here. For me "working within the given framework of a tune, and finding new ways of playing it, while in keeping with the contour and character" isn't innovation, far from it. What you're describing is what any "good" trad musician does every time he plays. What your describing is the tradition at work.
It may be that you and I may be using the term "variation" to mean different things. If you're asking about copying the way someone varies the melody of a tune but putting in your own ornaments and rhythmic emphasis, then sure, why not. That said, melodic variation, rhythmic emphasis, ornamentation and articulation are usually so intimately tied together that there's a chance it won't be pretty. A more common "trick" is to lift a melodic variation from a musician who plays a different instrument to yourself.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Sweeney Astray
Re: Great innovators
That's why I nominated Paddy Murphy, a true innovator. He pioneered the concertina system that spawned players like Noel Hill. Concertina playing transformed in his hands.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Phantom Button
Re: Great innovators
Phil Cunningham on the piano accordion, surely.
I've *very* seldom heard a trad player, live, play something that has made me sit up in astonishment and think, "I just didn't know you could DO this on a (whatever)...!" - meaning music of an undreamed-of richness, not just pyrotechnics, although possibly including these. That though was my experience listening to Phil Cunningham playing a march called The Wee Man From Skye at a Silly Wizard gig in the 80s. (He recorded it on his solo album "Airs And Graces", but without the revelatory duende that was manifested in the gig performance.)
I don't know enough about piano box to know whether Phil is behind any radical change in playing style or indeed PA design, but I'd certainly never heard it played like that in Scottish pub lounges. I imagine Donald Shaw of Capercaillie has taken on board influences from Phil Cunningham's playing, or that they have influences in common.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by nicholas
Re: Great innovators
I would consider the harmonica player Brendan Power an innovator. He redesigned the instrument and introduced new techniques that have become accepted standards within the tradition. Not all of his music is to my taste but his technical input has to be admired.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Patkiwi
Re: Great innovators
Hello all you Floridians. Could you please give your mate a group hug? thanks in advance.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
In the Floridian context, the Burmese Python must be the biggest innovator.
It could probably eat a session sideways.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by nicholas
Re: Great innovators
Invention and Variation have been brought up, and reading rambling's concept of placing a "stamp on a tune" being part of being an accomplished player, I find a little confusing.
Every player has a voice even the very beginner.... I think that more accomplished players have incorporated favorite variations, and melody inversions, as well as ornamentation into their "voice". I still don't equate that with re-arrangement or even innovation.
Re-arrangment (which is how some people might interpret 'stamping' is a risky path to follow, if one hopes to be a positive force for traditional music of any kind).
And Voicing is lovely... its crucial... even every beginner has their own special scratchy tone or use of ornamentation... I think that is great... and IS an important part of tradition, therefore it doesn't follow that having one's own voice makes him or her an innovator.
Just what is an innovator then? I love traditional music of many kinds, but only play Irish. I see innovators as modern incarnations, who even write their own tunes, that relate to their own real life..yet their music is plain, and clear and easily indentifiable in their idiom. Usually they come from music families it seems, and have spent their whole lives studying their trade.
Yet all innovators have their own voice..... sort of like a set-subset concept from our early years of math.
Ok Sandy... put a sock in it right I'm going to fiddle and have coffee and stop staring at this stupid computer.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by SandyBottoms
Re: Great innovators
Aw, hugs all around! Thanks random.
Gators nicholas, no pythons...unless they're the ones people get sick of as pets and let out into the swamps to prey on unwary tourists...
OK, we finally have definition of terms:
PJ: http://www.thesession.org/discussions/display/23130/comments#comment480450
PB: http://www.thesession.org/discussions/display/23130/comments#comment480466
Ta-da!
Now I'm going back to watch the pipers fight.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Great innovators
Hope you're bringing the popcorn, mate.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by DrSilverSpear
Re: Great innovators
I just spent a long time typing up my thoughts on innovators and innovation in trad, then accidently pressed the back button and lost it all. So a short version is that innovation in trad is a difficult subject. I think an innovator is someone who not only plays the music using the same ideas and putting their own touch on them but also puts in something new that fits into the trad idiom.
My list of innovators of recent enough times is; Matt Molloy, Tommy Potts, Donal Lunny + Andy Irvine for the use of Bouzouki in ITM, and Martin Hayes.
People who go a little bit outside of the tradition, but in my opinion make good music; Michael McGoldrick and Brian Finnegan.
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by Why Bother?
Re: Great innovators
600 years ago they'd all have been burned as heretics. Thankfully we're all enlightened now
# Posted on November 18th 2009 by airport
Re: Great innovators
My list would be: O Riada; Lunny; Irvine; McGlynn; Veillon and McSherry.
I know Veillon is Breton, but he does play Irish music and he has had a profound effect on people like McGoldrike and Finnegan - his influence is so obvious on both of these fine flautists.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
Arty McGlynn? Flippin heck, what a profound misunderstanding of the discussion.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Why do you disagree Lig?
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
I have to spell it out?
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Yea!
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
For heaven's sake, how old are you?
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Why is my age relevant?
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
have you aever listened to a bothy band record?
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
I do believe Sean O Rada was before The Bothy Band's time. And yes I would include Micheal O Domhnaill.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
But as an "innovator", you'd say Arty McGlynn before Micheal O Domhnaill?
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
No, not before O Domhnaill.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
The reason why I include McGlynn is that, to my limited knowledge, and a guitarist's knowledge would be much greater than my own, he's the one who started playing tunes on the guitar, as opposed to just backing them. I could be wrong. Maybe Brady, Sproule or Moynehan is known to have done so before him.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
Would you like a bigger shovel?
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
I believe Dick Gaughan started that before McGlynn, albeit that he is Scottish.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: Great innovators
Yes he is Scottish. Maybe you could point out which guitarist in trad Irish music he has had a profound effect on.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
There are many people who flat picked tunes on the guitar before Arty McGlynn, but that's not the point. Flat picking tunes on the guitar didn't introduce any thing that flat picking tunes on the tenor banjo had already introduced.
Arty McGlynn is not an innovator. Like him or not
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Well you would need to ask them that but seeing that he is credited by being the first to flatpick tunes I would have thought that would have made him pretty influential for lots of guitarists. Off the top of my head I would think that John Doyle and Donal Clancy might cite him as an influence. Possibly Arty as well. As I said you would need to ask them though. I am not going to second guess.
I am not about to jump in the middle of your dispute with Llig and I wouldn't argue about the influence of Arty McGlynn, not for a second. I was simply offering a possible answer to your question.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: Great innovators
Fair point.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
And apparently Dick Gaughan cites Sean O Riada as one of his influences - although I would admit to getting that titbit of 'knowledge' from Wikipedia.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: Great innovators
My reply was to lig.
I have no wish to become embroiled in a slagging match with No Cause For Alarm like the musicians in the Piping post.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
Hey that's not fair. I have no wish to get in a slagging match either and I didn't want to on the other thread either. You do me a great disservice.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: Great innovators
I apologise.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
Apology accepted. Let's move on.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: Great innovators
I don't mean to be rude, but I'm knackered. I'm going to hit the hay. Nice talking.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by mountainkid
Re: Great innovators
me too
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
For whistle I would suggest names like Mary Bergin, Sean Ryan and Micho Russell. In Scotland Marc Duff.
There are numerous guitarists that have been innovative. As said above Michael O Domhnaill, Arty McGlynn and Dick Gaughan. More recent examples would include John Doyle, Steve Cooney and Denis Cahill.
If folk like Phil Cunningham are allowed then another Scottish musician that I would say has influenced Irish music through innovation would be Gordon Duncan. There are few musicians who have been so prolific in terms of composition and expanding the possibilities of their instrument and whilst his influence is more keenly felt in Scotland I would say many musicians, pipers in particular, in Ireland, Brittany and Galicia owe him a lot.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: Great innovators
i think people could go round in circles talking about something like this. innovator is a very powerful word.
there are plenty of great musicians mentioned here that are still around whether its matt molloy, mary bergin, john carty who we all enjoy listening to. as do i. But really do people go out of their way to find something innovative or do they just like listening to good music? i think i know the answer. im off to listen to some 'at the racket', who here said the saxophone doesnt work???
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by fiddleruairi
Re: Great innovators
Flatpicking Irish tunes on the guitar was, for a lot of us, a natural extension of flatpicking American tunes, which we'd been doing for several years before McGlynn and Gaughan started recording. And I agree with llig that there wasn't anything really innovative about it.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by Bob himself
Re: Great innovators
I wonder if there have always been musicians equally "innovative" or original as many of those being mentioned, but that they came before such widespread dissemination of playing through the mass media, or have never sought out mass media outlets.
I think it is revealing that most of the names mentioned have been from recent decades.
That isn't to criticise the palyers being named. But perhaps what is really being assessed is how influential were players, which comes down not just to genius/talent but also exposure.
- chris
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by ramblingpitchfork
Re: Great innovators
Sandy:
>Invention and Variation have been brought up, and reading >rambling's concept of placing a "stamp on a tune" being part >of being an accomplished player, I find a little confusing.
>Every player has a voice even the very beginner.... I think that >more accomplished players have incorporated favorite >variations, and melody inversions, as well as ornamentation >into their "voice". I still don't equate that with re-arrangement >or even innovation
I was really borrowing from PJ rather coming up with a concept.
I wasn't equating putting a stamp on a tune with innovation. The first is a requirement for any good player. The second isn't. Nor does innovation necessarily make a player greater than another very fine player. I like many innovations. But over valuing of novelty in itself is one of the defining characteristics of our childish modern era.
What is new is not necessarily bettre than what was old (regardless of what politicians say). It may be, but it also may not be.
- chris
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by ramblingpitchfork
Re: Great innovators
otherwise, we'd whoop with joy when Johnny Djembe walked into the session pub (for example)
Many other innovations are developed in and for commercial music releases and may work well in that environment. But commercial music is not synonymous with trad. There is certianly a relationship between "commercial trad" and music as played, and it is a largely symbiotic relationship. But the two are not identical.
- chris
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by ramblingpitchfork
Re: Great innovators
PS, Sandy B. I don't agree that evreyone puts their own stamp on a tune right from the start as a beginner. Not strongly enough to really say anything at least. They may not play as an exact clone of other players (though many try to). But a true personal voice only develops with experience, and never will if you slavishly follow any of the great players or even the innovators.
- chris
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by ramblingpitchfork
Re: Great innovators
Hey 4 (no 5) posts in a row in a single thread.
I'm turning into Ceolachan
Now I really have to go into the TC room for the next 12-15 hours. No further putting it off
- chris
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by ramblingpitchfork
Re: Great innovators
"I wonder if there have always been musicians equally "innovative" or original as many of those being mentioned,"
Of course there have. And in the days before mass media and mass travel, it's what created regional styles.
And there's one more thing about flat picking diddley tunes, whether guitar, banjo mandolin or whatever, that needs mentioning. All the great innovators in this music build on the past. You have to, that's the prerequisite of innovation in a traditional music. First you have to understand the music and play it as it is, then build on what is there. It's of vital importance not to discard any of it. Flat picking tunes, unfortunately, discards a huge amount of the music in terms of articulation. Flat picked tunes are a desert of content when compared to the fiddle/flute/pipes they came from.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Riffing on the flatpicking guitar & saxophone strands of this thread, I think that seeing the possibilities of an instrument outside the tradition, and bringing it into the tradition, counts as innovation. Whether it’s Moynihan/Irvine/Lunny with the bouzouki, or that fellow that plays the khaen.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by fidkid
Re: Great innovators
It's an innovative farming method that takes 10 distinct fields of rotating crops and fallow, chops down the hedgerows between them and ploughs the whole lot together into one huge and flat mono-crop with accompanying artificial phosphate fertilisers and insecticides.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
I wonder if Dan (the khaen) sees himself as an innovator. Probably not.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by DrSilverSpear
Re: Great innovators
Some people have mentioned the influence of some musicians on others, as if that therefore makes them innovative. It doesn't.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by Conán McDonnell
Re: Great innovators
Quite right, though often the two do go together. Matt Molly is the archetypal innovator who has also had a tremendous influence, for example.
Kevin Burke, on the other hand, is not an innovative fiddle player at all, but his influence is widespread.
Lunasa is another one. Hugely influential, but not innovative at all.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Don't we wish we could edit posts
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Great innovators
Llig:
>"I wonder if there have always been musicians >equally "innovative" or original as many of those being >mentioned,"
>Of course there have. And in the days before mass media ....
That's the answer I was hoping for
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by ramblingpitchfork
Re: Great innovators
I was a bit surprised to read Micho Russell's name in a thread about great innovators. Now I love Micho's playing, I do. I never considered it innovative, though I mean this in the best way. I'll take some time to listen again. What about Donncha Ó Briain, is his innovative or simply good playing?
http://www.rogermillington.com/tunetoc/goldeneagle.html
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
funny you mention Kevin Burke and Matt Molloy since I think of them as being very similar - both great players who learned a lot from older musicians. KB's very innovative - you just don't approve of his innovations. I just saw him play with a string quartet and it was brilliant. Exactly why I mentioned the inquisition earlier - you can understand the tradition and have lived your whole life immersed in it and you still get treated like Peter Abelard
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by airport
http://www.rogermillington.com/tunetoc/index.html
This is the index page which includes clips of Mary Bergin & Micho Russell.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by Ben Steen
Re: Great innovators
O'Carolan
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by Jmbu
Re: Great innovators
All great players learned from previous musicians. As I said before, it's a prerequisite to being great. But that doesn't make them innovative. Matt Molloy is innovative because he brought a whole new style of playing to us. He built a great deal on to his roots. I really don't think you can say the same of Kevin Burke. Good though he is, he's not an innovator. Playing with a string quartet is not an innovation in traditional music. And it's not about whether anyone approves of someone's innovations or not. Plenty of people still don't care much for Matt Molloy's playing, but they would never deny that he was innovative.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
I know I should stop now - I appreciate your thoughtful response. But anyway, how can someone have recognizable influence yet not a unique style of their own innovation? You can listen to all the Michael Coleman and Martin Byrnes you want but you still won't sound like Kevin Burke.
# Posted on November 19th 2009 by airport
Re: Great innovators
As I said earlier, it is a subtle one, teasing out the differences between inventiveness and innovation, not least because inventiveness is paramount to good traditional playing.
There is a difference between having your own inventive style and introducing an innovative way of playing. But then, there is a grey overlap, of course.
However, with Michael Coleman, it's fairly straightforward. It's well documented that he wasn't a particularly outstanding player, in that his playing really wasn't that much different from a lot of other players of the time. But his influence was because of his recordings.
And I think the same can be said of Kevin Burke. He did one seminal recording, If The Cap Fits. It's a terrific record and had a seminal effect on many young fiddle players, myself included. But the actual fiddle playing on that record is not innovative. It may well be presented in a fresh and innovative way, but the playing itself, though outstanding, is not innovative. Maybe, perversely, that's what makes it such a good record.
# Posted on November 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
The discussion has gone back and forth between great innovators and great influences, and if we look at the different posts, the replies seem to fall into one category or the other. Or then again, sometimes both, when an innovator also becomes a great influence (as opposed to an innovator that people have forgotten a few years later, like those folks that added icky synthesizer tracks to otherwise trad performances back near the end of the last century, ick).
# Posted on November 20th 2009 by AlBrown
Re: Great innovators
Al, you're right, I also think it's important to separate the idea of being an innovative player of diddley tunes with being an innovative arranger of the kind of band/production/album presentation of diddley tunes thing.
Donal Lunny, for example, is the quintessential innovative producer/arranger. Planxty, Bothy Band, Planxty again, Moving hearts, outstanding pegigree. But his true innovation and best contribution to the music is not his arrangements, or his productions skill, or even his idiosyncratic but slavishly copied strumming. It is the tunes he writes.
I quite like his Prophet 5 work. But I certainly wouldn't put it among his "innovative" moments.
# Posted on November 20th 2009 by llig leahcim
Re: Great innovators
Rambling...
PS, Sandy B. I don't agree that evreyone puts their own stamp on a tune right from the start as a beginner
I considered "stamp" as some type of rebranding, and a different concept all together from perfecting or honing your tone, ornaments, rhythm and overall tune communication, in other words building on.. voice.
True some voices I'd be ok with never hearing ever again... other voices I cannot get enough of.. simply having a voice, as I mentioned in my post does not imply talent, skill, and certainly not innovation, only the fact that we each sound unique, even if you try with all your might.. to play exactly in style X, or like player Y, you sound like you.
I think our definition/usage of terms might be in diagreement however conceptually... the differences are likely neglible.
# Posted on November 20th 2009 by SandyBottoms
Re: Great innovators
I agree Sandy. I've often said that the musicians who make an effort to have their own voice are never the best players. If you play from the heart, nothing can stop you from playing with your own voice. But if you make a specific effort to play with your own voice, if you make a conscious effort to find your voice, you will be, and sound, pretentious.
# Posted on November 20th 2009 by llig leahcim