This topic is sort of inspired by the "Where do you get your tunes?" discussion but also from some observations I made on Footstompin.com with regard to folk and traditional music in general.
Increasingly, it seems that amateur singers and musicians appear to source their material from "the professionals" ie from albums etc. Often, this isn't particularly traditional in nature at all and much of it is original or newly composed music.
So, we now have a "Top...down" approach whereas it used to be more of a "Bottom...up" thing. The musicians and/or singers would learn at "grassroots" level and those who chose to perform and tour would distribute this music to others, sometimes far and wide.
Of course, I've no problem with being influenced by "the big boys" to a certain extent. There's been lots of great new tunes and new parameters have been set over the years. Something to which we can all aspire. Ideally though, it should be more of a two way process and, at the moment, I feel that it's weighted rather heavily towards the "Top...down" approach.
I'm sure many of you will say something like "I just learn the tunes at my local session and don't worry too much about where they come from" which is probably the best outlook but what do you all think?
Aren't many of the tunes we learn and play at our local session originally from the playing of Coleman, Morrison, Killoran, Murphy, Rowsome, Clancy, etc. if not Bothy, Solas, Dervish, etc. etc? I don't think it's a new phenomenon to learn and cite the recordings of "the big boys."
Everywhere, really. At the moment, I'm mostly trying to learn tunes I taped at a session I just started going to. It seems they repeat a lot of the same ones every time. That might be a problem later, but they seem like a lot at the moment.
It seems like every time I listen to The Chieftains or Altan, I hear something I'll just die if I don't learn.
Not all the good tunes are played by "the big boys" - some of them are played by the really good boys ... and girls ...
I'm saying that I think Scotsman has a point - there's a pool of players that keep the old stuff going, but it sometimes seems to me that a lot of sessions these days are governed by tunes learned from whatever are the fashionable CDs to listen to at the moment.
By the by, on a slightly different tack, this means that I sometimes feel left out, as I don't know what the fashionable CDs are at any time and I virtually never listen to any - I just play. This means that I AM learning virtually all my tunes from sessions, whether local or otherwise, and travelling to get new tunes. Hmmm, can't help feeling I've heard of this approach before somewhere ...
The question is whether you have a choice. If you have got sessions to go to and meet people with vast repertoires you probably won't learn so many tunes from CDs.
With songs you have even more of a problem if ITM is not the way of life in your local community. You want to sing/play what you heard and liked.
Even with the top - down direction there are variations. Many singers are unable to see the potential of a song unless it is performed by somebody like Christy Moore. I try to pick songs by lesser-known artists and get my singing friends interested.
Tell you what is great for learning tunes - and this definitely applies for those without too much local access to tunes. And it's something I wouldn't have bothered with were it not for this site (The Session, that is). Try YouTube - the number of great players/recordings of sessions - it's fantastic! much better than CDs IMHO.
Songs, well ... not my bag, so I haven't bothered to look for them
Even if you learn a lot of tunes from albums, one thing which can inhibit the playing of a new tune is often frankly the nature of the session itself. If it (or your playing) doesn't set a large part of the group on fire, you just have to play it on your own while the others are having a break - unless it turns out that they actually know it.
Okay, neither of these tunes are ITM, but I'm just bursting to let someone know!!
I have just learned my first set - Woohoo!! , and yes they were from a CD.
Blazing Fiddles to be exact, 'Fire On'.
The tunes in question were;
Farquhar and Hettie's Waltz by Farquhar Mac'Rae &
My Cape Breton Home by Jerry Holland
I live in the Borders and I don't know of many sessions going on if any. I think the closest would be Edinburgh, which is still a fair treck.
I just feel a huge sense of achievement. It's fabby, and the CD was a good reference point whilst learning.
One advantage proffessionally recorded music has is it's a lot clearer to listen to.
Don't want to highjack this thread but does anyone else remember that feeling of achievement??
A pitfall of learning a tune from the recording of professional "interpreters" (entertainers) is that these individuals sometimes insert some quirky styling into their performance; which may well make the rendition more attractive to new listeners, and make more money for the recording artists. All well and good, but unwittingly copying these variations may do a disservice to the tune, and identify the copier as someone easily influenced.
Example:
In the Olden Days (gather round, younguns) a singing group popularized a song with a chorus which began "Hal an tow, jolly rumelow".
The Group modified this slightly to "Hal an tow. (pause, stomp heels) jolly rumelow". No big deal.
When recording the song for an album, it was found that stomping on the studio floor played merry hell with the recording levels, so a small toy drum was found, and whacked instead of the foot-stomping.
Copiers of this performance could be identified for years afterwards by the little drums in their possession, used only for this song.
So, by all means learn tunes from Big Artists, but it is good to also seek out other versions to make sure no artifices have been inserted.
John, I thought you were being deliberately ironic by getting your title wrong. Not to worry.
Anyway I probably endorse the Michael Gill School of Irish Music general approach, but with qualifications. I had probably heard most tunes of my repertoire on eg first a recording, then heard it played out at a session, which thus consolidated it my memory (*A* particular tune of said repertoire that is...), then got my head round it and thus had it in my repertoire. Or the process could have gone in the other direction: Heard it at a session, liked it, got its name, wanted to learn it, obsessed about it till I found an album containing it, played it to death, and thus learned it, thus incorporated it to repertoire.
(Although 6 months to a year I'll have lost it again....)
But being a mild-mannered shy retiring middle of the road kind a guy, my real answer is a middle of the road answer. My much-preferred type of recording is that of a live session. And that's neither bottom-up or top down, or its both. And that's true.
I'm afraid I'll have to side with a "middle of the road" approach, as I am not argumentative by nature. For living in the middle of BFE, I do not have many sessions easily at hand. So, we have to fall back to recordings for the most part. It is not by choice.
Now, even though many of the "big boys" compose their own tunes and they become the popular hit, isn't that where the tunes come from in the first place? Someone had to write the classics, the "old" tunes. To be honest, I like to put a new one in with the classics just to spice it up a bit so I don't become tired of them (kesh jig, john ryans, etc.).
It is however nice to learn a tune from a "professional entertainer" for the sole reason of hearing different versions. Especially fantastic when you get the same tune. I especially like it when the artist plays the tune "naked" first time through then gradually "clothes" it with variations of ornamentation. Sadly, there aren't enough of those that do.
What amuses me is that this is the exact opposite of how I learn tunes - or my teacher, anyway. Or it's exactly the same. No idea.
My teacher always says, rather jokingly, "What you really want to play is the tune that nobody else knows or has ever heard of! Find the great ones and bring them back." So he scours o'Neill's and finds really nice tunes that he's never heard of, and tries them out to bring them back into circulation. It is a thrilling idea, living in Rhode Island, to think that at any point in time, I may be one of less than ten people or fewer, in-state, who even know of a tune.
I think I learned my tunes the way you put together a jigsaw puzzle; it's all aimed at having a complete picture. I learn tunes I hear and like, or ones my pals are playing, and then I'll fill in the standards here and there when I come across good sources, or hear them over and over at the session until they show up on my instrument one day.
I think it's a good idea to always be searching for the standards to fill in the gaps. It's always a bit strange when I meet people that have been playing for a only a few years and know a bunch of tunes made popular on recent CDs, but don't seem to know any of the base repertoire. One needs to achieve a good balance or foundation I think. Also, since the music is such a social phenomenon, you would want to know the standards so you have a better chance of knowing tunes in common with people you meet either in your travels or theirs.
Off the cuff, about albums, I find it irritating when a trad or trad-based band / player puts out an album whose cover lists each track only by a short snappy title, not necessarily that of a tune, and doesn't give a full list of tunes in each set (or at least say they are tunes, and not a song!). Well, the Bothies did it ("Old Hag You Have Killed Me") and so have / do other good outfits, but I'm likely to pass over such an album in a shop (where of course you can't see the info that may be in the inside notes) unless I already know it's good or likely to interest me.
What an original way of thinking about the music, relying on your teacher to provide you with obscure new tunes.
Jack - the jigsaw just seems to get bigger the more gaps you fill in!
Nicholas - what you describe is annoying. Designed for the consumer, rather than we tune geeks. But once you do find the names from these sets you can "impress your friends at sessions...."
shakey - Click on "Members" on this site, then on "Tunebooks" which is on top of the strip that pops out on the screen. It lists the tunes that have been copied from the "Tunes" database by members, the ones most copied being at the top of the list (Drowsie Maggie's at the top). The first five pages of tunes listed - at least - comprise tunes which are nearly all "standards" - i.e., tunes that have been played widely and regularly for some time. It makes a very good list.
Melodeon player and entrepreneur Dave Mallinson published a book of essential Irish session tunes - I forget its exact title. Piano accordionist Karen Tweed put out an album or two devoted to such.
Maniac... yes, it is like putting together a puzzle that keeps getting bigger.
Shakey... by "standards" I mean the older tunes and ones that have had enough time to become widely known. The list nicholas mentions is along these lines. But there are also tunes you would consider standards that might not appear on that list as well. If you know a good chunk of these you'll be able to share tunes with folks from just about anywhere.
"Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
"Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
This topic is sort of inspired by the "Where do you get your tunes?" discussion but also from some observations I made on Footstompin.com with regard to folk and traditional music in general.
Increasingly, it seems that amateur singers and musicians appear to source their material from "the professionals" ie from albums etc. Often, this isn't particularly traditional in nature at all and much of it is original or newly composed music.
So, we now have a "Top...down" approach whereas it used to be more of a "Bottom...up" thing. The musicians and/or singers would learn at "grassroots" level and those who chose to perform and tour would distribute this music to others, sometimes far and wide.
Of course, I've no problem with being influenced by "the big boys" to a certain extent. There's been lots of great new tunes and new parameters have been set over the years. Something to which we can all aspire. Ideally though, it should be more of a two way process and, at the moment, I feel that it's weighted rather heavily towards the "Top...down" approach.
I'm sure many of you will say something like "I just learn the tunes at my local session and don't worry too much about where they come from" which is probably the best outlook but what do you all think?
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by Johnny Jay
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
I just learn the tunes at my local session and don't worry too much about where they come from.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by ...
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
I knew you'd say that.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by Johnny Jay
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Aren't many of the tunes we learn and play at our local session originally from the playing of Coleman, Morrison, Killoran, Murphy, Rowsome, Clancy, etc. if not Bothy, Solas, Dervish, etc. etc? I don't think it's a new phenomenon to learn and cite the recordings of "the big boys."
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by slainte
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Everywhere, really. At the moment, I'm mostly trying to learn tunes I taped at a session I just started going to. It seems they repeat a lot of the same ones every time. That might be a problem later, but they seem like a lot at the moment.
It seems like every time I listen to The Chieftains or Altan, I hear something I'll just die if I don't learn.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by cathrynb
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Not all the good tunes are played by "the big boys" - some of them are played by the really good boys ... and girls ...
I'm saying that I think Scotsman has a point - there's a pool of players that keep the old stuff going, but it sometimes seems to me that a lot of sessions these days are governed by tunes learned from whatever are the fashionable CDs to listen to at the moment.
By the by, on a slightly different tack, this means that I sometimes feel left out, as I don't know what the fashionable CDs are at any time and I virtually never listen to any - I just play. This means that I AM learning virtually all my tunes from sessions, whether local or otherwise, and travelling to get new tunes. Hmmm, can't help feeling I've heard of this approach before somewhere ...
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by ethical blend
Re: Should read "Top...Down" or "Bottom...Up"
Hey, I've just realised that I made an Erse of my own heading for this discussion.
It should, of course, read "Top...Down" or "Bottom...Up".
Hope that makes more sense.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by Johnny Jay
Re: "Top...down"
The question is whether you have a choice. If you have got sessions to go to and meet people with vast repertoires you probably won't learn so many tunes from CDs.
With songs you have even more of a problem if ITM is not the way of life in your local community. You want to sing/play what you heard and liked.
Even with the top - down direction there are variations. Many singers are unable to see the potential of a song unless it is performed by somebody like Christy Moore. I try to pick songs by lesser-known artists and get my singing friends interested.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by kuec
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Tell you what is great for learning tunes - and this definitely applies for those without too much local access to tunes. And it's something I wouldn't have bothered with were it not for this site (The Session, that is). Try YouTube - the number of great players/recordings of sessions - it's fantastic! much better than CDs IMHO.
Songs, well ... not my bag, so I haven't bothered to look for them
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by ethical blend
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Even if you learn a lot of tunes from albums, one thing which can inhibit the playing of a new tune is often frankly the nature of the session itself. If it (or your playing) doesn't set a large part of the group on fire, you just have to play it on your own while the others are having a break - unless it turns out that they actually know it.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by nicholas
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Okay, neither of these tunes are ITM, but I'm just bursting to let someone know!!
I have just learned my first set - Woohoo!! , and yes they were from a CD.
Blazing Fiddles to be exact, 'Fire On'.
The tunes in question were;
Farquhar and Hettie's Waltz by Farquhar Mac'Rae &
My Cape Breton Home by Jerry Holland
I live in the Borders and I don't know of many sessions going on if any. I think the closest would be Edinburgh, which is still a fair treck.
I just feel a huge sense of achievement. It's fabby, and the CD was a good reference point whilst learning.
One advantage proffessionally recorded music has is it's a lot clearer to listen to.
Don't want to highjack this thread but does anyone else remember that feeling of achievement??
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by buttercup chucklechunks
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
No
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by ethical blend
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
A pitfall of learning a tune from the recording of professional "interpreters" (entertainers) is that these individuals sometimes insert some quirky styling into their performance; which may well make the rendition more attractive to new listeners, and make more money for the recording artists. All well and good, but unwittingly copying these variations may do a disservice to the tune, and identify the copier as someone easily influenced.
Example:
In the Olden Days (gather round, younguns) a singing group popularized a song with a chorus which began "Hal an tow, jolly rumelow".
The Group modified this slightly to "Hal an tow. (pause, stomp heels) jolly rumelow". No big deal.
When recording the song for an album, it was found that stomping on the studio floor played merry hell with the recording levels, so a small toy drum was found, and whacked instead of the foot-stomping.
Copiers of this performance could be identified for years afterwards by the little drums in their possession, used only for this song.
So, by all means learn tunes from Big Artists, but it is good to also seek out other versions to make sure no artifices have been inserted.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by oldstrings
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Fifty years on some Morris side will be singing it and say the drum tradition goes back to Sir Francis Drake.
# Posted on November 25th 2006 by nicholas
"Top...Bottom" or "up...down" or whatever...
John, I thought you were being deliberately ironic by getting your title wrong. Not to worry.
Anyway I probably endorse the Michael Gill School of Irish Music general approach, but with qualifications. I had probably heard most tunes of my repertoire on eg first a recording, then heard it played out at a session, which thus consolidated it my memory (*A* particular tune of said repertoire that is...), then got my head round it and thus had it in my repertoire. Or the process could have gone in the other direction: Heard it at a session, liked it, got its name, wanted to learn it, obsessed about it till I found an album containing it, played it to death, and thus learned it, thus incorporated it to repertoire.
(Although 6 months to a year I'll have lost it again....)
But being a mild-mannered shy retiring middle of the road kind a guy, my real answer is a middle of the road answer. My much-preferred type of recording is that of a live session. And that's neither bottom-up or top down, or its both. And that's true.
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by Rudall the time
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
I'm afraid I'll have to side with a "middle of the road" approach, as I am not argumentative by nature. For living in the middle of BFE, I do not have many sessions easily at hand. So, we have to fall back to recordings for the most part. It is not by choice.
Now, even though many of the "big boys" compose their own tunes and they become the popular hit, isn't that where the tunes come from in the first place? Someone had to write the classics, the "old" tunes. To be honest, I like to put a new one in with the classics just to spice it up a bit so I don't become tired of them (kesh jig, john ryans, etc.).
It is however nice to learn a tune from a "professional entertainer" for the sole reason of hearing different versions. Especially fantastic when you get the same tune. I especially like it when the artist plays the tune "naked" first time through then gradually "clothes" it with variations of ornamentation. Sadly, there aren't enough of those that do.
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by Tessa
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
What amuses me is that this is the exact opposite of how I learn tunes - or my teacher, anyway. Or it's exactly the same. No idea.
My teacher always says, rather jokingly, "What you really want to play is the tune that nobody else knows or has ever heard of! Find the great ones and bring them back." So he scours o'Neill's and finds really nice tunes that he's never heard of, and tries them out to bring them back into circulation. It is a thrilling idea, living in Rhode Island, to think that at any point in time, I may be one of less than ten people or fewer, in-state, who even know of a tune.
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by Dan the Man
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
I think I learned my tunes the way you put together a jigsaw puzzle; it's all aimed at having a complete picture. I learn tunes I hear and like, or ones my pals are playing, and then I'll fill in the standards here and there when I come across good sources, or hear them over and over at the session until they show up on my instrument one day.
I think it's a good idea to always be searching for the standards to fill in the gaps. It's always a bit strange when I meet people that have been playing for a only a few years and know a bunch of tunes made popular on recent CDs, but don't seem to know any of the base repertoire. One needs to achieve a good balance or foundation I think. Also, since the music is such a social phenomenon, you would want to know the standards so you have a better chance of knowing tunes in common with people you meet either in your travels or theirs.
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by Phantom Button
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Off the cuff, about albums, I find it irritating when a trad or trad-based band / player puts out an album whose cover lists each track only by a short snappy title, not necessarily that of a tune, and doesn't give a full list of tunes in each set (or at least say they are tunes, and not a song!). Well, the Bothies did it ("Old Hag You Have Killed Me") and so have / do other good outfits, but I'm likely to pass over such an album in a shop (where of course you can't see the info that may be in the inside notes) unless I already know it's good or likely to interest me.
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by nicholas
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
What an original way of thinking about the music, relying on your teacher to provide you with obscure new tunes.
Jack - the jigsaw just seems to get bigger the more gaps you fill in!
Nicholas - what you describe is annoying. Designed for the consumer, rather than we tune geeks. But once you do find the names from these sets you can "impress your friends at sessions...."
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by Rudall the time
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Phantom Button - is there a 'standards' list somewhere?
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by shakey
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
shakey - Click on "Members" on this site, then on "Tunebooks" which is on top of the strip that pops out on the screen. It lists the tunes that have been copied from the "Tunes" database by members, the ones most copied being at the top of the list (Drowsie Maggie's at the top). The first five pages of tunes listed - at least - comprise tunes which are nearly all "standards" - i.e., tunes that have been played widely and regularly for some time. It makes a very good list.
Melodeon player and entrepreneur Dave Mallinson published a book of essential Irish session tunes - I forget its exact title. Piano accordionist Karen Tweed put out an album or two devoted to such.
# Posted on November 26th 2006 by nicholas
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Maniac... yes, it is like putting together a puzzle that keeps getting bigger.
Shakey... by "standards" I mean the older tunes and ones that have had enough time to become widely known. The list nicholas mentions is along these lines. But there are also tunes you would consider standards that might not appear on that list as well. If you know a good chunk of these you'll be able to share tunes with folks from just about anywhere.
# Posted on November 27th 2006 by Phantom Button
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
PB ... and KML ...
I presume the puzzle's getting bigger because the universe is expanding
# Posted on November 27th 2006 by ethical blend
Re: "Top...up" or "Bottom...down"
Benhall - yes indeed. Further proof of my theory.
# Posted on November 28th 2006 by Rudall the time