A lot of the track-naming on trad CDs, etc. is inaccurate ... we all know that ... variety of reasons but I suspect that a lot of the problem is down to the fact that the track listing is left to "techies", possibly from notes provided by the musicians themselves.
My copy of "The Irish Music Anthology" - see http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display.php/667 - a budget-priced compilation of tracks from (mainly) the 20s, 30s and 40s and compiled by Ron Kavana lists Paddy Killoran as playing that well-known (i.e. NOT) jig "The Grease In The Bog". (NB I've corrected the track in question when I posted the CD to the recordings database here.)
I first had visions of Travolta, Neutron-Bomb and co giving it "Summer Loving" in Kiltimagh. The next image that sprung to mind wasn't quite so savoury ...!
Anway ... same album lists the Flanagan Brothers as playing a set of polkas "The Spring (sic) of Shillelagh/The Rose Tree". It's a great track, the first polka in particular being a classic. The only problem is, I suspect that the naming of the first tune is wrong. The second polka seems definitely way up the left as far as naming is concerned. It isn't The Rose Tree as I know it, nor indeed as I've heard the Flanagan Brothers play it on another CD of golden age stuff that I've got (seems to be a close relative of The Lisdoonvarna/Leather Away The Wattle-O). Anyone aware of this album and got the correct (or *a* correct) name for the tune in this set?
And anyone got any other howlers - funny, irritating, whatever - from recordings in their collections?
My good friends Cara (www.carasmusic.com) recorded a cracking CD over in Co Roscommon last year that featured a self-penned track called 'Standing in the Rath', meaning the fairy ring at Corrigeenroe.
When a semi-literate well-wisher did a review on Mudcat, it had transmogrified into 'Standing in the Bath'
Not from recordings but here's one from a web site. There's an album called Totally Traditional Tin Whistles (or something like that). One of the players is Festy Conlon. I looked up the album on a web site thinking to buy it. They had Festy listed as Festy Colon. That sounds like a disease. On a banjo list someone wrote in talking about playing "Shoulder's Joy". I wrote back suggesting he should follow that by More Power to Your Elbow and Pig Ankle Rag. He wasn't amused.
This isn't an Irish trad howler, but I've got a 1968 LP on the Supraphon label of the Prague Quartet playing a couple of Beethoven's string quartets. I always felt that there was something odd about the recording, and then I realised - Supraphon had speeded it up by 6% in order to get the tracks onto the LP..
It wasn't so much the change in pitch that was the problem but the speeded-up vibrato by the players, which sounded very unnatural and ruined the recording. Fortunately I kept the LP and recently I've loaded the tracks onto my computer, adjusted the speed and pitch with Cool Edit, and then burnt it onto a cd. It's now a fine recording.
Another oddity I had in my youth was a cheap LP of Beethoven's "Emperor" piano concerto. If you let it run on after the end of the last movement on the second side, and wound the volume level up high, you could just hear a voice saying "right chaps, we'll print that". Another "feature" of this LP was that the last movement was quite obviously recorded with a different orchestra in an entirely different acoustic, at a slightly different pitch, and, I suspect, with a different soloist. Btw, the names of the soloist, orchestra and conductor were obviously fictitious.
I very much regret having thrown out this unique load of rubbish many years ago!
I wonder whether there are any similar oddities around in Irish trad music recordings - if there are, they should be cherished as collector's items!
Trevor
Maybe not so much a howler as one of them philosophical/logical conundrums: My copy of Finbar and Eddie Furey's "The Lonesome Boatman" lists the title track as "The Lonesome BoatMEN" [emphasis mine]. Which for me begs the question, if there is more than one boatman around, how could they be lonesome? Or is the implication that all boatmen are characteristically and inherently lonesome?
Further to Trevor's recollections, I bought a copy on CD of Messiaen's 'Saint François d'Assise' whose every disc was a pressing of the first one: disc 1,1,1 and 1 rather than 1,2,3, and 4. Anyone who's heard it, may well ask, how could I tell the difference ....
I've done a Google search for that Prague Quartet recording of Beethoven's Op. 74 and 95 by its label number - SUA ST 50916. There is one website that lists it, http://www.classic-choice.co.uk/pdf/pdf4.pdf
and it appears that the disc can be purchased for £5 (but I'm sure how).
It doesn't look as if the recording is available on cd, but if it ever surfaces I would hope that the producers do the decent thing and make sure it runs at the correct speed and pitch!
Trevor
I think I've mentioned this before, but there's a double LP called "The Irish Folk Tour" which featured Clannad, De Danann and others including Miko Russell. One of the tunes which Miko plays is the reel "The Ivy Leaf", and he introduces it in his strong Clare accent, with the result that it is titled on the sleeve as "I Will Leave". True!
it's not really a howler, but it shows how little the old record companies knew about those irish musicians they were recording. one side of a michael coleman 78 i have is labeled 'humorous of ennistymon.' personally, i've never found the tune all that funny, but ....
i think the title for the other side is similarly garbled, but since i'm at work, i can't grab the 78 to look.
A common problem used to be was when they used to transfer a recording from LP to cassette format. To maximise tape use the original layout may have to have been changed somewhat. For our puposes the best and most touching example of this was - well, I can only assume that's the reason why the double cassette tape is so blatantly wrong on nearly all the tracks - the Outlet label of Belfast's cassette of ...(guess that old favourite title!....):
The Best of Irish Traditional Music - Various Artists.
However, nearly every track upon this compilation is in itself a redeeming feature. There are tracks by Joe Burke, Seamus Tansey, Sean McGuire, Roger Sherlock, the great Josephine Keegan, who does 2 Reavey tunes...and many other of the classic players....great stuff....no, in fact, the best. Great test for anyone who fancies themself as a bit of a buff for either tunes or players. Like one of those kiddie puzzles or exam questions, where, you have to match the name to the example given.
Another more recent faux pas, which I discussed laterally with Our Cath, is on that Paddy Glackin album In Full Spate. The reel, which he calls The Last House in Connaught, I've always heard called Dinny O'Brien's, allegedly written by his son the late great Paddy O'Brien of Newtown, Co. Tipperary. I've never heard it called The Last House in Connaught before.
Correct me if I'm wrong, please, but it is often played in a set where Dinny's goes first, then next up comes Farewell to Connaught. However, where Paddy may have got confused is that there is also a reel called The First House In Connaught. This can be heard on The Boys of the Lough's Good Friends...Good Music album. Deadly tune. All three are totally seperate entities, and the only excuse I can think was that Paddy might have had a wee dram of Paddy P's after the recording, to calm the nerves....
Something which annoys me from time to time(although not usually unintentional or particularly amusing) is the naming of tracks as "The badger set" or whatever after something which is an "in story or joke" to the band or after the name of the first tune of the set etc.
I do not mind this practice as long as the full tune listings are provided on the CD or album sleeve but this isn't always the case and I find it really frustrating if I have enjoyed a particular tune and can't trace the title. Bands often do this at live gigs too and we can be none the wiser about the tunes which are being played. Perhaps, for the average listening punter, this doesn't matter too much but if you've got an interest in learning tunes and playing the music it can get quite irritating.
Oh, yeah, as much as I love them, Dervish's naming (or lack thereof) drives me nuts. And then there's Lunasa. Everything's called 'Einar' or 'Aiobreann' or some such. So how's a girl supposed to crib tunes?
Someone gave me a cassette (not pirated I hasten to add - the genuine original in shrink wrapped packaging) of Tannahill Weavers Land of Light and after much searching I discovered it was actually a complete album of John Fortune - and very nice it is too!
Sarah
(VERY late at work supposedly writing reports but got bored)
But - this phenomenon of which you guys speak - a whole set given a name without the names of the individual tunes - is it the band or the producers who decide this? If it's the producer, then, what are they trying to do - make each set like a "piece" of music for the punters? if it's the band.....why?
Incidentally, it's not a recent phenomenon - the Bothy Band did it on....em....er....oh...eh...either Old Hag, or Out of the Wind...possibly both...ahem...
One that sticks in my mind is "The pirates are dug and the frost is all over".
I saw this on the sleeve of an LP by a band from Germany in the 1980s. The sleeve notes also mentioned the source of a tune as that well-known Donegal fiddler "Danny Mekon" (anyone else around here remember "The Eagle" comic and the adventures of Dan Dare?)
Then there was the conversation I had a decade ago with a Québécoise friend who was raving to me about her new discovery, a fiddler whose record she'd been listening to. You must have heard him, she said, his name is Martinez. No, I said, is he Mexican? No, you must have heard of him, Martinez, Martinez, Martinez!
Gradually the penny dropped: Martinez... Martin Ez... Martin Hayes. We were in the metro at the time and I can still hear my squeals of hysterical laughter echoing round the station.
A small child was taken to his grand-dad's funeral. Back home, during the post-funeral get-together, his mum looked out of the window and saw the infant had dug a hole in the flower border and was kicking his teddy-bear into it, chanting "in the name of the Father and of the Son and in the hole 'e goes"
Trevor
I remember at a church service some years ago in celebration of St Blaise, a local saint and patron saint of throat illnesses, where the priest would bless people coming up to the altar rail (that dates it!) by crossing two candles on either side of their neck, scissors fashion.
Anyway, a young lad at the back of the church ended up in tears. It transpired his loving elder brother had gone down the church for his blessing and then came back and told his young brother the priest was going to cut his head off with the candles! Kids ...!
Trevor
Unintentional howlers ...!
Unintentional howlers ...!
A lot of the track-naming on trad CDs, etc. is inaccurate ... we all know that ... variety of reasons but I suspect that a lot of the problem is down to the fact that the track listing is left to "techies", possibly from notes provided by the musicians themselves.
My copy of "The Irish Music Anthology" - see http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display.php/667 - a budget-priced compilation of tracks from (mainly) the 20s, 30s and 40s and compiled by Ron Kavana lists Paddy Killoran as playing that well-known (i.e. NOT) jig "The Grease In The Bog". (NB I've corrected the track in question when I posted the CD to the recordings database here.)
I first had visions of Travolta, Neutron-Bomb and co giving it "Summer Loving" in Kiltimagh. The next image that sprung to mind wasn't quite so savoury ...!
Anway ... same album lists the Flanagan Brothers as playing a set of polkas "The Spring (sic) of Shillelagh/The Rose Tree". It's a great track, the first polka in particular being a classic. The only problem is, I suspect that the naming of the first tune is wrong. The second polka seems definitely way up the left as far as naming is concerned. It isn't The Rose Tree as I know it, nor indeed as I've heard the Flanagan Brothers play it on another CD of golden age stuff that I've got (seems to be a close relative of The Lisdoonvarna/Leather Away The Wattle-O). Anyone aware of this album and got the correct (or *a* correct) name for the tune in this set?
And anyone got any other howlers - funny, irritating, whatever - from recordings in their collections?
# Posted on November 24th 2003 by Aidan Crossey
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
My good friends Cara (www.carasmusic.com) recorded a cracking CD over in Co Roscommon last year that featured a self-penned track called 'Standing in the Rath', meaning the fairy ring at Corrigeenroe.
When a semi-literate well-wisher did a review on Mudcat, it had transmogrified into 'Standing in the Bath'
Greg
# Posted on November 24th 2003 by Skipjack
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Not from recordings but here's one from a web site. There's an album called Totally Traditional Tin Whistles (or something like that). One of the players is Festy Conlon. I looked up the album on a web site thinking to buy it. They had Festy listed as Festy Colon. That sounds like a disease. On a banjo list someone wrote in talking about playing "Shoulder's Joy". I wrote back suggesting he should follow that by More Power to Your Elbow and Pig Ankle Rag. He wasn't amused.
# Posted on November 24th 2003 by SteveKendall
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
This isn't an Irish trad howler, but I've got a 1968 LP on the Supraphon label of the Prague Quartet playing a couple of Beethoven's string quartets. I always felt that there was something odd about the recording, and then I realised - Supraphon had speeded it up by 6% in order to get the tracks onto the LP..
It wasn't so much the change in pitch that was the problem but the speeded-up vibrato by the players, which sounded very unnatural and ruined the recording. Fortunately I kept the LP and recently I've loaded the tracks onto my computer, adjusted the speed and pitch with Cool Edit, and then burnt it onto a cd. It's now a fine recording.
Another oddity I had in my youth was a cheap LP of Beethoven's "Emperor" piano concerto. If you let it run on after the end of the last movement on the second side, and wound the volume level up high, you could just hear a voice saying "right chaps, we'll print that". Another "feature" of this LP was that the last movement was quite obviously recorded with a different orchestra in an entirely different acoustic, at a slightly different pitch, and, I suspect, with a different soloist. Btw, the names of the soloist, orchestra and conductor were obviously fictitious.
I very much regret having thrown out this unique load of rubbish many years ago!
I wonder whether there are any similar oddities around in Irish trad music recordings - if there are, they should be cherished as collector's items!
Trevor
# Posted on November 24th 2003 by lazyhound
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
From an Italian band: the derriere
# Posted on November 24th 2003 by Joe Quinn
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
I have a Chieftains #4 LP in vinyl which has Side A pressed on both sides. A case of A-A and not A-B
# Posted on November 24th 2003 by Joe Quinn
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Maybe not so much a howler as one of them philosophical/logical conundrums: My copy of Finbar and Eddie Furey's "The Lonesome Boatman" lists the title track as "The Lonesome BoatMEN" [emphasis mine]. Which for me begs the question, if there is more than one boatman around, how could they be lonesome? Or is the implication that all boatmen are characteristically and inherently lonesome?
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by sts
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Further to Trevor's recollections, I bought a copy on CD of Messiaen's 'Saint François d'Assise' whose every disc was a pressing of the first one: disc 1,1,1 and 1 rather than 1,2,3, and 4. Anyone who's heard it, may well ask, how could I tell the difference ....
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by nastyweegirl
Trevor - if there's an issue of that Prague Qt recording available at the moment, I wonder whether the music still runs 6% faster?
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by nastyweegirl
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
I've done a Google search for that Prague Quartet recording of Beethoven's Op. 74 and 95 by its label number - SUA ST 50916. There is one website that lists it,
http://www.classic-choice.co.uk/pdf/pdf4.pdf
and it appears that the disc can be purchased for £5 (but I'm sure how).
It doesn't look as if the recording is available on cd, but if it ever surfaces I would hope that the producers do the decent thing and make sure it runs at the correct speed and pitch!
Trevor
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by lazyhound
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
I should've said "but I'm not sure how" !
Trevor
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by lazyhound
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
I think I've mentioned this before, but there's a double LP called "The Irish Folk Tour" which featured Clannad, De Danann and others including Miko Russell. One of the tunes which Miko plays is the reel "The Ivy Leaf", and he introduces it in his strong Clare accent, with the result that it is titled on the sleeve as "I Will Leave". True!
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by Kenny
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
it's not really a howler, but it shows how little the old record companies knew about those irish musicians they were recording. one side of a michael coleman 78 i have is labeled 'humorous of ennistymon.' personally, i've never found the tune all that funny, but ....
i think the title for the other side is similarly garbled, but since i'm at work, i can't grab the 78 to look.
sarah in portland
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by eleyne
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
I had a Tansey recording where, lacking a separating back-slash or dash, one set was down as "The Frost is All Over Paddy O'Brien's Jig".
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by LongNote
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
A common problem used to be was when they used to transfer a recording from LP to cassette format. To maximise tape use the original layout may have to have been changed somewhat. For our puposes the best and most touching example of this was - well, I can only assume that's the reason why the double cassette tape is so blatantly wrong on nearly all the tracks - the Outlet label of Belfast's cassette of ...(guess that old favourite title!....):
The Best of Irish Traditional Music - Various Artists.
Here's a link to it:
http://www.outlet-music.com/search/details.asp?info=The4249995
However, nearly every track upon this compilation is in itself a redeeming feature. There are tracks by Joe Burke, Seamus Tansey, Sean McGuire, Roger Sherlock, the great Josephine Keegan, who does 2 Reavey tunes...and many other of the classic players....great stuff....no, in fact, the best. Great test for anyone who fancies themself as a bit of a buff for either tunes or players. Like one of those kiddie puzzles or exam questions, where, you have to match the name to the example given.
Another more recent faux pas, which I discussed laterally with Our Cath, is on that Paddy Glackin album In Full Spate. The reel, which he calls The Last House in Connaught, I've always heard called Dinny O'Brien's, allegedly written by his son the late great Paddy O'Brien of Newtown, Co. Tipperary. I've never heard it called The Last House in Connaught before.
Correct me if I'm wrong, please, but it is often played in a set where Dinny's goes first, then next up comes Farewell to Connaught. However, where Paddy may have got confused is that there is also a reel called The First House In Connaught. This can be heard on The Boys of the Lough's Good Friends...Good Music album. Deadly tune. All three are totally seperate entities, and the only excuse I can think was that Paddy might have had a wee dram of Paddy P's after the recording, to calm the nerves....
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by Key Maniac Lad
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Ooh, a stocking stuffer for Sensei! TY Danny!
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by emily_bmore
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
In a mailorder catalogue I found Harry Bradley's "Bad Turns & Horse Shoe Bends" listed as: "Bad TUNES & Horse Shoe Bends"...
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by Irina
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Something which annoys me from time to time(although not usually unintentional or particularly amusing) is the naming of tracks as "The badger set"
or whatever after something which is an "in story or joke" to the band or after the name of the first tune of the set etc.
I do not mind this practice as long as the full tune listings are provided on the CD or album sleeve but this isn't always the case and I find it really frustrating if I have enjoyed a particular tune and can't trace the title. Bands often do this at live gigs too and we can be none the wiser about the tunes which are being played. Perhaps, for the average listening punter, this doesn't matter too much but if you've got an interest in learning tunes and playing the music it can get quite irritating.
# Posted on November 25th 2003 by Johannes J
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
I agree with you John, and have had the same frustration as you in that situation...
# Posted on November 26th 2003 by Andee
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Dervish do that and it drives me mad.
# Posted on November 26th 2003 by Dow
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Oh, yeah, as much as I love them, Dervish's naming (or lack thereof) drives me nuts. And then there's Lunasa. Everything's called 'Einar' or 'Aiobreann' or some such. So how's a girl supposed to crib tunes?
# Posted on November 26th 2003 by cwildeky
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Someone gave me a cassette (not pirated I hasten to add - the genuine original in shrink wrapped packaging) of Tannahill Weavers Land of Light and after much searching I discovered it was actually a complete album of John Fortune - and very nice it is too!
Sarah
(VERY late at work supposedly writing reports but got bored)
# Posted on November 26th 2003 by Sarah the Flute
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Ah, Sarah - ye'll HAVE to get to The Blythe soon.
But - this phenomenon of which you guys speak - a whole set given a name without the names of the individual tunes - is it the band or the producers who decide this? If it's the producer, then, what are they trying to do - make each set like a "piece" of music for the punters? if it's the band.....why?
Incidentally, it's not a recent phenomenon - the Bothy Band did it on....em....er....oh...eh...either Old Hag, or Out of the Wind...possibly both...ahem...
# Posted on November 26th 2003 by Key Maniac Lad
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
One that sticks in my mind is "The pirates are dug and the frost is all over".
I saw this on the sleeve of an LP by a band from Germany in the 1980s. The sleeve notes also mentioned the source of a tune as that well-known Donegal fiddler "Danny Mekon" (anyone else around here remember "The Eagle" comic and the adventures of Dan Dare?)
Then there was the conversation I had a decade ago with a Québécoise friend who was raving to me about her new discovery, a fiddler whose record she'd been listening to. You must have heard him, she said, his name is Martinez. No, I said, is he Mexican? No, you must have heard of him, Martinez, Martinez, Martinez!
Gradually the penny dropped: Martinez... Martin Ez... Martin Hayes. We were in the metro at the time and I can still hear my squeals of hysterical laughter echoing round the station.
# Posted on November 28th 2003 by Jeeves Tones
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
Like all those prayers and hymns that kids get wrong? Like, "Hail Mary, full of grapes, the Lord is a tree..."?
# Posted on November 28th 2003 by Zina Lee
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
"...Lead a snot into temptation..."
# Posted on November 28th 2003 by cuchulain54
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
"Lead on O Kinky Turtle..."?
# Posted on November 28th 2003 by Zina Lee
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
"Our Father who art in heaven, how do you know my name..."
-Max
# Posted on November 28th 2003 by Max Becher
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
“… and Shirley, good Mrs. Murphy, shall follow me all the days of my life”
# Posted on November 28th 2003 by cuchulain54
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
A small child was taken to his grand-dad's funeral. Back home, during the post-funeral get-together, his mum looked out of the window and saw the infant had dug a hole in the flower border and was kicking his teddy-bear into it, chanting "in the name of the Father and of the Son and in the hole 'e goes"
Trevor
# Posted on November 28th 2003 by lazyhound
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
My younger bruv for years believed at communion the priest was saying "Noddy's nice" as he gave out the hosts
Then my daughter after doing a project at school on trains believed Away in a Manger contained the line
"Be there in my siding
until morning is night"
there again it might have just been a premonition about Connex!
Sarah
# Posted on November 29th 2003 by Sarah the Flute
Re: Unintentional howlers ...!
I remember at a church service some years ago in celebration of St Blaise, a local saint and patron saint of throat illnesses, where the priest would bless people coming up to the altar rail (that dates it!) by crossing two candles on either side of their neck, scissors fashion.
Anyway, a young lad at the back of the church ended up in tears. It transpired his loving elder brother had gone down the church for his blessing and then came back and told his young brother the priest was going to cut his head off with the candles! Kids ...!
Trevor
# Posted on November 29th 2003 by lazyhound