When you join a session where you are not known, you are often asked "Give us one of your own".
I´m talking about friendly sessions, of course. This has often happened to me at sessions in Britain and Ireland and I usually play 3 jigs:
The Woods of Old Limerick + First Night in America + The Letrim jig.
I realise that, apart from songs, solo performances are not really part of session playing and "party piece" might not be the best description but, in the case of the tunes I mentioned, by the time we get to the Letrim, everyone has joined in.
I also have a couple of other tunes up my sleeve for this type of occasion.
What do you play when you´re asked to play one of your own ?
A different arrangement or setting of a well known session tune ?
An obscure hornpipe in the key of B flat minor ?
Do you mind all the others joining in ?
For some it´s the moment of truth, a sort of lie detector test.
Others are glad of an opportunity to strut their stuff before an attentive audience.
There are even those who introduce their offering by saying something like "I learnt this one from Joe Cooley" meaning, of course, from a recording of Joe´s.
Does your session give an entrance test to newcomers ?
I've always considered "paty pieces" to be tunes everyone has fun with rather than solo pieces. Like the Sligo version of The Pinch of Snuff where it changes keys a bunch. The solo pieces are different and I rarely do any.
I was at the session in Feakle at Pepper's Bar last November and was asked to "give us a tune," so I suggested a medley with tunes I figured they knew assuming everyone would play along. I ended up playing on my own to my surprise. After they asked a few others with the same result I realized that the request was for a solo.
On most of the occasions I can remember this happening (how often do guitar players get asked to lead a tune?), I played Merrily Kiss the Quaker’s Wife on guitar – because I can usually play it without stumbling badly and if they let me go solo for a bit, it gives me a chance to try a two-string roll where somebody might actually hear it. The downside is that it gives me a chance to *bungle* a two-string roll where somebody might actually hear it.
I've often seen it as an oppertunity to play Sigh Beg Sigh Moor, which is a nice piece to play as a solo, with say one other fiddle doing a harmony. Solos are a good thing, in my opinion at least, in big sessions because it's a nice chance to play new tunes, without worrying if enough other people know them. Saying that, if its at a festival or something, if asked to "give on of my own", to lead a new set I would probably play the jig of slurs, followed by swallows tails, seeming as they are popular tunes, known by a lot of musicians.
Our local session almost always invites newcomers to "give us a tune" and we'll either lend support or listen as appropriate. But it's certainly not intended as a "test"--just a way to welcome a new face to the circle.
When I've been invited to start a tune, I usually let circumstances guide my choice--an up-tempo reel if things have been dragging a bit, or a slow, swingy version of Garrett Barry's, say, if my bow arm's ready to fall off from the previous pace. At my local sesh, if someone asks me to play something, I usually try to pick a tune that will bring in another player who hasn't had much chance to play yet. Lord knows if I go solo, it's never stellar enough to qualify as "showing off." :-| So I might as well use "my turn" for someone else's benefit.
Although playing a solo can be nervewhracking, it a way it's less awkward than being asked to lead a set - where you never know whether people will know your stuff. And it's even more awkward when you're not sure which is being asked. The question is - why are we so often incapable of simply asking?
Hm. If asked to play a tune, I'll often say something along the lines of, "if everyone will join me!" and then suggest a set I know well. Or of asked for something solo (I usually pray they won't) I'll play something impossibly obscure the first tune and then something exceedingly common the second tune in the hopes everyone will be so tired of listening to me that they'll join in.
BTW, Mike, I prefer "I learned this one from the playing of Joe Cooley". That way everyone knows I'm not saying I learned it from whoever I'm namedropping.
Here is my Rite of Passage:
I turn up at strange session.
Sit there puddin'-like for a while.
They say "play us a tune"
Mind goes blank as every tune I'd been thinking to play or ever knew starts to dribble out of secret hole in the back of my head. I frantically try to catch one before it disappears but it's like stamping on mercury.
Start on one I think they might know.
They don't know it and sit in stony silence.
Play it three times in the hope it will catch on.
It doesn't.
Switch to next tune.
Starting to play too fast and jerkily now.
Finish quickly after two times, just as I realise - too late! - that someone has joined in.
Slink off to bar.
It's great fun.
Having said that, next time I go back the ice is broken and it's not so bad.
In the short time I've been playing at the slow session (Green Briar Pub, Brighton, MASS) I've been asked twice to start a tune. I stay with The Blackthorn Jig and Banish Misfortune, since the object of a slow session is for all of us beginners to learn the tunes. Those are tunes I feel comfortable with.
I am a school music teacher, and the teacher in me thinks the best way to support beginners is to restrict the tunes to a relatively short list (say, 10 jigs and 10 reels) played over and over weekly at a relatively slow tempo so the newbies are able to "get it" as soon as possible.
Our slow session ALWAYS plays the "Maid Medley" (Maid Behind the Bar-Wise Maid-Sligo Maid) and "Bucks of Oranmore", played as a finale to the slow session.and a signal that the regular session is about to begin. Knowing that is very empowering for beginners.
The times I've been asked that [maybe only twice] I've always played that yummyful deliciously good Kevin Burke set of Pigeon on the Gate into Lafferty's. It's the only one that I do that is a "set" medley. It just works. Oh. The chills. Of course Kevin Burke does it like no otha! Holla! Oh am I tired..
I'm usually not asked, as guitar players are not expected to know how to play any tune.
However, if somebody is insensitive (or malevolent) enough to expose me to certain humiliation by saying this, I always play "The Frieze Britches", which I have played to the death since ever I can remember. Usually, before the tricky fourth part somebody joins in and my stumbling goes unnoticed.
I always say that this is a tune that has been in my family for generations. I learned it from my father. He learned it from his mother. And she learned it from a Paul Brady record!
Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
When you join a session where you are not known, you are often asked "Give us one of your own".
I´m talking about friendly sessions, of course. This has often happened to me at sessions in Britain and Ireland and I usually play 3 jigs:
The Woods of Old Limerick + First Night in America + The Letrim jig.
I realise that, apart from songs, solo performances are not really part of session playing and "party piece" might not be the best description but, in the case of the tunes I mentioned, by the time we get to the Letrim, everyone has joined in.
I also have a couple of other tunes up my sleeve for this type of occasion.
What do you play when you´re asked to play one of your own ?
A different arrangement or setting of a well known session tune ?
An obscure hornpipe in the key of B flat minor ?
Do you mind all the others joining in ?
For some it´s the moment of truth, a sort of lie detector test.
Others are glad of an opportunity to strut their stuff before an attentive audience.
There are even those who introduce their offering by saying something like "I learnt this one from Joe Cooley" meaning, of course, from a recording of Joe´s.
Does your session give an entrance test to newcomers ?
# Posted on August 24th 2005 by murfbox
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
I've always considered "paty pieces" to be tunes everyone has fun with rather than solo pieces. Like the Sligo version of The Pinch of Snuff where it changes keys a bunch. The solo pieces are different and I rarely do any.
I was at the session in Feakle at Pepper's Bar last November and was asked to "give us a tune," so I suggested a medley with tunes I figured they knew assuming everyone would play along. I ended up playing on my own to my surprise. After they asked a few others with the same result I realized that the request was for a solo.
# Posted on August 24th 2005 by Phantom Button
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
On most of the occasions I can remember this happening (how often do guitar players get asked to lead a tune?), I played Merrily Kiss the Quaker’s Wife on guitar – because I can usually play it without stumbling badly and if they let me go solo for a bit, it gives me a chance to try a two-string roll where somebody might actually hear it. The downside is that it gives me a chance to *bungle* a two-string roll where somebody might actually hear it.
# Posted on August 24th 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
I've often seen it as an oppertunity to play Sigh Beg Sigh Moor, which is a nice piece to play as a solo, with say one other fiddle doing a harmony. Solos are a good thing, in my opinion at least, in big sessions because it's a nice chance to play new tunes, without worrying if enough other people know them. Saying that, if its at a festival or something, if asked to "give on of my own", to lead a new set I would probably play the jig of slurs, followed by swallows tails, seeming as they are popular tunes, known by a lot of musicians.
# Posted on August 24th 2005 by barrysmith90
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
Our local session almost always invites newcomers to "give us a tune" and we'll either lend support or listen as appropriate. But it's certainly not intended as a "test"--just a way to welcome a new face to the circle.
When I've been invited to start a tune, I usually let circumstances guide my choice--an up-tempo reel if things have been dragging a bit, or a slow, swingy version of Garrett Barry's, say, if my bow arm's ready to fall off from the previous pace. At my local sesh, if someone asks me to play something, I usually try to pick a tune that will bring in another player who hasn't had much chance to play yet. Lord knows if I go solo, it's never stellar enough to qualify as "showing off." :-| So I might as well use "my turn" for someone else's benefit.
# Posted on August 24th 2005 by Will Harmon
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
Although playing a solo can be nervewhracking, it a way it's less awkward than being asked to lead a set - where you never know whether people will know your stuff. And it's even more awkward when you're not sure which is being asked. The question is - why are we so often incapable of simply asking?
I do love to hear a few solos at a session.
# Posted on August 24th 2005 by kris
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
And I forgot to say - I'm not sure that I have anything in particular that would be a standby. Depends on the makeup of the session.
# Posted on August 24th 2005 by kris
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
Hm. If asked to play a tune, I'll often say something along the lines of, "if everyone will join me!" and then suggest a set I know well. Or of asked for something solo (I usually pray they won't) I'll play something impossibly obscure the first tune and then something exceedingly common the second tune in the hopes everyone will be so tired of listening to me that they'll join in.
BTW, Mike, I prefer "I learned this one from the playing of Joe Cooley". That way everyone knows I'm not saying I learned it from whoever I'm namedropping.
# Posted on August 25th 2005 by Zina Lee
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
Here is my Rite of Passage:
I turn up at strange session.
Sit there puddin'-like for a while.
They say "play us a tune"
Mind goes blank as every tune I'd been thinking to play or ever knew starts to dribble out of secret hole in the back of my head. I frantically try to catch one before it disappears but it's like stamping on mercury.
Start on one I think they might know.
They don't know it and sit in stony silence.
Play it three times in the hope it will catch on.
It doesn't.
Switch to next tune.
Starting to play too fast and jerkily now.
Finish quickly after two times, just as I realise - too late! - that someone has joined in.
Slink off to bar.
It's great fun.
Having said that, next time I go back the ice is broken and it's not so bad.
# Posted on August 25th 2005 by Bren
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
In the short time I've been playing at the slow session (Green Briar Pub, Brighton, MASS) I've been asked twice to start a tune. I stay with The Blackthorn Jig and Banish Misfortune, since the object of a slow session is for all of us beginners to learn the tunes. Those are tunes I feel comfortable with.
I am a school music teacher, and the teacher in me thinks the best way to support beginners is to restrict the tunes to a relatively short list (say, 10 jigs and 10 reels) played over and over weekly at a relatively slow tempo so the newbies are able to "get it" as soon as possible.
Our slow session ALWAYS plays the "Maid Medley" (Maid Behind the Bar-Wise Maid-Sligo Maid) and "Bucks of Oranmore", played as a finale to the slow session.and a signal that the regular session is about to begin. Knowing that is very empowering for beginners.
# Posted on August 25th 2005 by Greg the Piano Tuner
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
The times I've been asked that [maybe only twice] I've always played that yummyful deliciously good Kevin Burke set of Pigeon on the Gate into Lafferty's. It's the only one that I do that is a "set" medley. It just works. Oh. The chills. Of course Kevin Burke does it like no otha! Holla! Oh am I tired..
Cheers,
Armand
# Posted on August 25th 2005 by armandale
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
I'm usually not asked, as guitar players are not expected to know how to play any tune.
However, if somebody is insensitive (or malevolent) enough to expose me to certain humiliation by saying this, I always play "The Frieze Britches", which I have played to the death since ever I can remember. Usually, before the tricky fourth part somebody joins in and my stumbling goes unnoticed.
# Posted on August 25th 2005 by Janek
Re: Party Pieces or Rites of Passage ?
I always say that this is a tune that has been in my family for generations. I learned it from my father. He learned it from his mother. And she learned it from a Paul Brady record!
# Posted on August 25th 2005 by Pól