In another thread recently it was suggested tune names mean nothing. I can't agree with that, though often they mean nothing. Sometimes knowing the story behind a tune makes a huge difference to how you play play. True or false? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8DShjWdGwc
True. The name can have a bearing on the way I play a tune, especially if it is explicit like the example you give. Anyone who has ridden a horse, for example, would recognize it in The Foxhunter. There are many tunes in which I use the title in trying to catch the nature of the piece, for example The Kid on the Mountain is often hammered out at full pelt, without any thought to the title. Imagine a little white goat leaping playfully about, and you get a different feel altogether. Usually I try to let the tune tell me what it should sound like, although sometimes I find it a struggle actually to keep to what the composer wanted. For example I find myself playing An Chuilfhionn as a lament, where it is really a celebration. And there are pitfalls: there is a pibroch called A Bhoilich (Vaunting -- 'boasting', or 'showing off') and I always play it as such. But it was originally written, so the story goes, as a lament for a dying youth. The youth got better, so the composer said 'Ach, we'll make a Boalich of it'.
The Whistler at the Wake has a great story behind it, which I often think of when I play it. To me it accounts for the sad-sweet sound of the tune, and the tune made more sense to me when I first heard the story.
Another tune that springs to mind is The Skylark. It's obvious to anyone who has lain in an open meadow in June what that unusual first phrase is all about.
I don't believe that tune names mean nothing in general, though there are certain tunes, particularly those with multiple titles, which seem to bear no relation to the names which have been applied to them. The Girl Who Broke My Heart doesn't seem to speak to the broken-hearted quite as eloquently as, for example, The One that was Lost, or My Former Wife, but there's bound to be a story there...
Thank you for putting me right, shanty. All these years I've been woefully misled, but your eloquent dissertation has convinced me that it has all been illusory. How could I have been so foolish?
Many tune names are a delight in themselves, whether they conjure up any feeling that can then be assigned to the tune. The tradition--or at least the craic-- would be diminished without The Cat's Rambles to the Child's Saucepan and Splendid Isolation and I Buried My Wife and Danced on her Grave and My Mind WIll Never Be Easy and Poor But Happy at 53.
Besides, the names give performers something to talk about to the audience between sets....
Also, people's monikers that become associated with tunes help to extend the sense of community and heritage of the people who play this music, carrying across generation and around the globe.
Every time I play a Paddy Fahey tune I think of ....well...Paddy Fahey. However I love all those tunes with Trips, Visits, and Favourites in their title. Then of course there are the tunes with the strange names like 'Sailing into Walpole's Marsh' for instance. The story I heard on that one was that it was about poachers after the wild ducks on the marsh of a West of Ireland land owner name of Walpole. I had a few pints in the late Con Curtain's Big Baloon in London in the sixties. The Big Baloon was a pub and he was the landlord. I'd imagine that Shanty's contribution 'Never' and 'Pretentious Crap' were probably about Ian Paisley and Johnny Rotten. On the other hand 'Johnny with the Queer Thing' conjures up something else entirely.
Gam- you're welcome! Let me elaborate. Tune names are fun and interesting but otherwise serve no purpose. They instill no further meaning on the tune than what you get out of it when playing or listening to it. Stories about the composer or his/her state of mind/ purpose in writing the tune are as meaningless as all the drivel written about any other artists. What matters **only** is what YOU take from the tune.
And further- My entire life has been immersed in one form of art or other. I've always shyed away from stories/bios about artists. For a lot of people the bio becomes more important than the art. That's all I'm saying....
Ian Paisley is certainly the antipathy of pretentiousness while John Lydon, the Sex Pistols and that entire branch of what became known as 'punk rock' is the poster child for pretentiousness and is a fine example of what I'm talking about.
I am inclined to think that the rather unpredictable nature of Tommy Potts rendition of the Butterfly goes well with what real butterflies do if you watch them - they don't flounce around the way most of us play the tune. And I am wondering if Tripping up the Stairs is a name related to the way the melody moves.
"This tune was definitely composed by Junior Crehan. He told me himself that he was annoyed that Matt Molloy had not credited him on the album. Here's the story Junior told about the origin of the name: Junior's mother used to play the concertina in the back yard when the weather was fine. There was a stream in the field behind the house and the otters would come out of the stream when they heard the music and lie basking as if they were listening to it. Perhaps they were!
# Posted on February 11th 2003 by milesnagopaleen"
shanty: now you sound less like a drunken imbecile and more like an intelligent person with a point of view; so I will take the time to refute your rather inclusive statement that titles 'serve no purpose'. True, certain titles, especially in recent times, are flippant or irrelevant to the tune, and seem designed to serve the composer more than the audience; but this is not always the case. Tunes that have been passed about (I hesitate to say passed down) go through the Chinese Whispers process, and on occasion the original title will provide an insight into what the music is all about. If you bear in mind the title while going through the tune, you can often get hold of some aspect that otherwise you might have missed, and the whole tune takes on a different character. There have been several 'eureka' moments in my lifetime, and if it hasn't happened to you, then you are missing something.
"...the names give performers something to talk about to the audience between sets..."
Oh sure. Who among us hasn't strung together a set just because the names where funny? I can't be the only one that enjoys The Glass of Beer while they Speed the Plough and Toss the Feathers with The Maid Behind the Bar.
How coincidental that the Times article should appear today. Maybe Bogman had a premonition? As far as paintings and works of art are concerned I have always thought that some of the 'Untitled ones' could have been named Ripoff No 1 and so on. However tunes like The Whinny Hills of Leitrim always brings back memories of the miles of gorse covered fields and road sides that could be seen in that part of the country when I was young.
bogman, if you're referring to the TunePal discussion, I re-read my comments about the names not being important. And I actually said that the names of the tunes aren't the "most important part". (If all you know is the name of the tune, but not the tune itself, you may have a nice story, but it's not nearly as good a situation as knowing a tune, and not knowing the name...)
But I still think the names are important. For instance, it's really hard to call out the next tune in the middle of a set by lilting the first part. The names allow us to classify the tunes, communicate about them, as well as give us stories, and give us another point of reference in remembering them.
You can know the name of the next tune you plan on playing, but if you call it out in the middle of a set someone is bound to misunderstand what you're saying. Also, I cannot count the number of times someone has named a tune & then gone & played something different, or maybe they just gave the wrong name. Tune names? ~ It depends, stuff happens.
Many years ago I learnt the hornpipe "Peacock's Feather" & it became a regular in our session. Somewhere along the way people decided they did not like the tune & it was set aside. Eventually someone came up with a different "Peacock's Feather" & everyone really enjoyed the tune. Seems there was always someone who could not resist bringing up the fact that there is a PF #1 to go with our PF #2. We combined them & never played one without the other. So, guess what? The most recent time we played these together my mates began saying they weren't fond of tune #1 but the 2nd is a grand, fun tune. History repeating itself?
Rozzer, interesting article, it is a coincidence that I submitted this thread yesterday. Reverend, I wasn't referring to any posts in particular, I had just had a quick read through the thread and it had set me thinking. Shanty seems to think attributing any importance to tune names is "pretentious crap" - can't quite see where the pretentiousness comes into it myself, could just as easily say that ignoring tune names is hollow - but I won't, because you don't HAVE to pay any notice to tune names.
Of course there is no real link between tunes and names but imagination can make a difference in how you play a tune. I remember years ago a woman who would start crying when she heard the tune Mo Mhathair because it reminded her of her mum, I've always thought of her emotion when playing the tune ever since. Place names can set a picture in your head or maybe suggest the style of playing you heard when in that area.
Imagination and memories can have a big effect on the emotion put into a tune though it's not the be all and end all, IMO. But I would sooner be seen as spouting shantys "pretentious crap" that approach the music with an attitude of hollow indifference.
well put, bogman. and thanks for the link. lovely film.
however, there is one tune played around here whose title is particularly evocative of its content.
it's called "The Little Lump o' Lye"
I am in Will Harmon's camp on this issue, more than I agree with shanty--the names are part of the music, sometimes just part of the fun, sometimes evoking something about the tune itself. It is, after all, hard to play The Rolling Waves without thinking of surf on the shore, or Haste to the Wedding without thinking of those joyful occasions. The tunes are beautiful in thier abstract selves, but the names, including the names of the composers, add a richness to it all.
Al--I'm not camping right now! I said that the names, sometimes, are fun and interesting. But if you heard the 'Morning Thrush' d'ya really think you'd equate it with a thrush's call? If you played the tunes you named to someone who didn't know the tunes do you think they'd even come close to 'feeling' what's expressed in the title? And what one person 'feels' or gets from a tune may be totaly different from what the artist/writer/composer intended. Mostly these are fun dance tunes and not epic wagnerian operas(thank God). To me they're just tunes. And they are simple, mostly, and perfect, mostly and hence, to me,The titles are unimportant except in differentiating between them.
Didn't mean to offend any one...Apologising if I did....
"I heard somewhere that Neil Gow's second "wife" was his fiddle."
I'm not sure who started that yarn, but it's contradicted by the note printed with the tune when Nathaniel Gow published it. He meant it literally.
What is a bit weird about that tune is that Niel Gow didn't really write it. It's only very slightly adapted from the Irish tune "Kitty Tyrrell" - and even more bizarrely, Nathaniel Gow printed the Irish original in the same book as his dad's lament, with no comment. I can't begin to imagine the sort of family relationships that would make all that happen.
the title of tunes only give me a hint into the composer's heart at the time they wrote it but like any piece of art that you create or purchase, you then make it your own...that's the generosity of creation...to me anyway
janmarie
Apropos of the subject matter, I resurrect an old joke...
An (American) Indian child goes to his mom and asks, "Mother, how did I come to be named?"
Mother replies, "After your father and I conceived your brother, we looked outside the tipi and saw a huge elk running nearby. So we named him Running Elk."
And after your father and I conceived your sister, we looked outside the tipi and saw an owl hooting up in the tree, for it was nighttime. So we named her Hooting Owl."
"Why do you ask, Two F*cking Dogs?"
"But if you heard the 'Morning Thrush' d'ya really think you'd equate it with a thrush's call?" - shanty
I'm talking about the playing of, not the listening to, they are two different things. The listener will recognise something played with feeling, it doesn't necessarily matter to them where the feeling comes from but often it mean a lot to the player.
Ahh-bogman I'm sorry, I missed that important part of your post. Let me rethink it.........
...............................................
...............................................
Nahh, doesn't matter, still pretentious crap
just kidding-- In all honesty I think creation is a very personal thing. Of course if something moves you to write a tune it will be, for you, very meaningful. You will play it and relate it to what inspired you. To no one else will it have the same meaning. Sure you can pick up the shades of happy/sad/excited/etc but mostly with dance tunes such as these are I don't think there's much meaning that translates from a title. That DOES NOT mean that I feel there is no emotional meaning in the music. I do very much. I don't believe that *that* translates well into language.
It seems obvious to me that tune the Morning Thrush with its repeated phrases is intended to remind us of the bird's song:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~The Song Thrush's characteristic song, with melodic phrases repeated twice or more, is described by the nineteenth-century British poet Robert Browning in his poem Home Thoughts, from Abroad:
That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bernie29!!! You are Not gonna tell me that if you did not know the title of that song, and herd it for the first time, played by Seamus (yes I'm on first name basis) That you'd go. . . . . . . . . Ah! Yes a morning thrush!
Come on man!!! What if he'd called it ''Traffic Jam on Interstate 695''. Oh well, I'm sure I'm a minority, in so many ways, on this site, on this subject and others, but the titles mean little to me. I love the tune Mist Covered Mountain but the title holds no significance for me. I don't care what mountain/s the song refers to. I don't even think about mountains when I play it but it is very moving for me.
I have composed four ragtime pieces for piano. Sometimes I tell the audience the title and the story behind the title and sometimes I just give them the title. It depends on the audience and where I am performing.
For example, my first attempt to compose a piano rag was also the first one I finished. Since I have never been able to think of a good, snappy, memorable title for this original piano rag, I gave it the title of "Piano Rag Number One".
And there are similar stories for the other three piano rags I composed.
fauxcelt here's a suggestion-- Ist street rag, 2nd street rag, 3rd street rag etc. Easy for you to keep track of and in the future the artsy types will discuss how each composition evokes the feeling of the named street in your hometown!!!
Somewhere(I know that's helpful!) there's a review of a performance by an Irish harpist (harper?-guy who plays the harp!) dating from the 1820's. He was playing in New York City and the review was in a New York paper or magazine.He performed Brian Boru's March and the reviewer describes, in great detail, the story he told while playing and how the music, and the way in which it was played, changed as his tale progressed. It was quite fascinating.
What's in a tune name.
What's in a tune name.
In another thread recently it was suggested tune names mean nothing. I can't agree with that, though often they mean nothing. Sometimes knowing the story behind a tune makes a huge difference to how you play play. True or false?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8DShjWdGwc
# Posted on July 23rd 2010 by bogman
Re: What's in a tune name.
True. The name can have a bearing on the way I play a tune, especially if it is explicit like the example you give. Anyone who has ridden a horse, for example, would recognize it in The Foxhunter. There are many tunes in which I use the title in trying to catch the nature of the piece, for example The Kid on the Mountain is often hammered out at full pelt, without any thought to the title. Imagine a little white goat leaping playfully about, and you get a different feel altogether. Usually I try to let the tune tell me what it should sound like, although sometimes I find it a struggle actually to keep to what the composer wanted. For example I find myself playing An Chuilfhionn as a lament, where it is really a celebration. And there are pitfalls: there is a pibroch called A Bhoilich (Vaunting -- 'boasting', or 'showing off') and I always play it as such. But it was originally written, so the story goes, as a lament for a dying youth. The youth got better, so the composer said 'Ach, we'll make a Boalich of it'.
# Posted on July 23rd 2010 by gam
Re: What's in a tune name.
The Whistler at the Wake has a great story behind it, which I often think of when I play it. To me it accounts for the sad-sweet sound of the tune, and the tune made more sense to me when I first heard the story.
Another tune that springs to mind is The Skylark. It's obvious to anyone who has lain in an open meadow in June what that unusual first phrase is all about.
I don't believe that tune names mean nothing in general, though there are certain tunes, particularly those with multiple titles, which seem to bear no relation to the names which have been applied to them. The Girl Who Broke My Heart doesn't seem to speak to the broken-hearted quite as eloquently as, for example, The One that was Lost, or My Former Wife, but there's bound to be a story there...
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by Dragut Reis
Re: What's in a tune name.
Never. Pretentious crap.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by shanty
Re: What's in a tune name.
Thank you for putting me right, shanty. All these years I've been woefully misled, but your eloquent dissertation has convinced me that it has all been illusory. How could I have been so foolish?
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by gam
Re: What's in a tune name.
Many tune names are a delight in themselves, whether they conjure up any feeling that can then be assigned to the tune. The tradition--or at least the craic-- would be diminished without The Cat's Rambles to the Child's Saucepan and Splendid Isolation and I Buried My Wife and Danced on her Grave and My Mind WIll Never Be Easy and Poor But Happy at 53.
Besides, the names give performers something to talk about to the audience between sets....
Also, people's monikers that become associated with tunes help to extend the sense of community and heritage of the people who play this music, carrying across generation and around the globe.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by Will Harmon
Re: What's in a tune name.
Paddy Fahey called all his compositions Fahey,s
to make it easy for listeners to remember them.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by gooseinthenettles
Re: What's in a tune name.
Every time I play a Paddy Fahey tune I think of ....well...Paddy Fahey. However I love all those tunes with Trips, Visits, and Favourites in their title. Then of course there are the tunes with the strange names like 'Sailing into Walpole's Marsh' for instance. The story I heard on that one was that it was about poachers after the wild ducks on the marsh of a West of Ireland land owner name of Walpole. I had a few pints in the late Con Curtain's Big Baloon in London in the sixties. The Big Baloon was a pub and he was the landlord. I'd imagine that Shanty's contribution 'Never' and 'Pretentious Crap' were probably about Ian Paisley and Johnny Rotten. On the other hand 'Johnny with the Queer Thing' conjures up something else entirely.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by Free Reed
Re: What's in a tune name.
Gam- you're welcome! Let me elaborate. Tune names are fun and interesting but otherwise serve no purpose. They instill no further meaning on the tune than what you get out of it when playing or listening to it. Stories about the composer or his/her state of mind/ purpose in writing the tune are as meaningless as all the drivel written about any other artists. What matters **only** is what YOU take from the tune.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by shanty
Re: What's in a tune name.
And further- My entire life has been immersed in one form of art or other. I've always shyed away from stories/bios about artists. For a lot of people the bio becomes more important than the art. That's all I'm saying....
Ian Paisley is certainly the antipathy of pretentiousness while John Lydon, the Sex Pistols and that entire branch of what became known as 'punk rock' is the poster child for pretentiousness and is a fine example of what I'm talking about.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by shanty
Re: What's in a tune name.
I am inclined to think that the rather unpredictable nature of Tommy Potts rendition of the Butterfly goes well with what real butterflies do if you watch them - they don't flounce around the way most of us play the tune. And I am wondering if Tripping up the Stairs is a name related to the way the melody moves.
I may well be wrong but what's the harm in it ?
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by David50
Re: What's in a tune name.
The Otter's Holt
"This tune was definitely composed by Junior Crehan. He told me himself that he was annoyed that Matt Molloy had not credited him on the album. Here's the story Junior told about the origin of the name: Junior's mother used to play the concertina in the back yard when the weather was fine. There was a stream in the field behind the house and the otters would come out of the stream when they heard the music and lie basking as if they were listening to it. Perhaps they were!
# Posted on February 11th 2003 by milesnagopaleen"
http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/636#comment23080
[shrug] Just sayin'.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: What's in a tune name.
shanty: now you sound less like a drunken imbecile and more like an intelligent person with a point of view; so I will take the time to refute your rather inclusive statement that titles 'serve no purpose'. True, certain titles, especially in recent times, are flippant or irrelevant to the tune, and seem designed to serve the composer more than the audience; but this is not always the case. Tunes that have been passed about (I hesitate to say passed down) go through the Chinese Whispers process, and on occasion the original title will provide an insight into what the music is all about. If you bear in mind the title while going through the tune, you can often get hold of some aspect that otherwise you might have missed, and the whole tune takes on a different character. There have been several 'eureka' moments in my lifetime, and if it hasn't happened to you, then you are missing something.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by gam
Re: What's in a tune name.
On a related note in today's Irish Times, maybe inspired by this thread, you never know!
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2010/0724/1224275393219.html
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by rozzer
Re: What's in a tune name.
"...the names give performers something to talk about to the audience between sets..."
Oh sure. Who among us hasn't strung together a set just because the names where funny? I can't be the only one that enjoys The Glass of Beer while they Speed the Plough and Toss the Feathers with The Maid Behind the Bar.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: What's in a tune name.
“No 52. Rosined horsehair on metal, with tapping foot”
Great and timely article rozzer.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: What's in a tune name.
How coincidental that the Times article should appear today. Maybe Bogman had a premonition? As far as paintings and works of art are concerned I have always thought that some of the 'Untitled ones' could have been named Ripoff No 1 and so on. However tunes like The Whinny Hills of Leitrim always brings back memories of the miles of gorse covered fields and road sides that could be seen in that part of the country when I was young.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by Free Reed
Re: What's in a tune name.
bogman, if you're referring to the TunePal discussion, I re-read my comments about the names not being important. And I actually said that the names of the tunes aren't the "most important part". (If all you know is the name of the tune, but not the tune itself, you may have a nice story, but it's not nearly as good a situation as knowing a tune, and not knowing the name...)
The names allow us to classify the tunes, communicate about them, as well as give us stories, and give us another point of reference in remembering them.
But I still think the names are important. For instance, it's really hard to call out the next tune in the middle of a set by lilting the first part.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by Reverend
Re: What's in a tune name.
You can know the name of the next tune you plan on playing, but if you call it out in the middle of a set someone is bound to misunderstand what you're saying. Also, I cannot count the number of times someone has named a tune & then gone & played something different, or maybe they just gave the wrong name. Tune names? ~ It depends, stuff happens.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by Ben Steen
Many years ago I learnt the hornpipe "Peacock's Feather" & it became a regular in our session. Somewhere along the way people decided they did not like the tune & it was set aside. Eventually someone came up with a different "Peacock's Feather" & everyone really enjoyed the tune. Seems there was always someone who could not resist bringing up the fact that there is a PF #1 to go with our PF #2. We combined them & never played one without the other. So, guess what? The most recent time we played these together my mates began saying they weren't fond of tune #1 but the 2nd is a grand, fun tune. History repeating itself?
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by Ben Steen
Re: What's in a tune name.
Of course tune names are revealing. Like Neil Gow's first wife wasn't worth lamenting over apparently.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by pennhorse
Re: What's in a tune name.
Rozzer, interesting article, it is a coincidence that I submitted this thread yesterday. Reverend, I wasn't referring to any posts in particular, I had just had a quick read through the thread and it had set me thinking. Shanty seems to think attributing any importance to tune names is "pretentious crap" - can't quite see where the pretentiousness comes into it myself, could just as easily say that ignoring tune names is hollow - but I won't, because you don't HAVE to pay any notice to tune names.
Of course there is no real link between tunes and names but imagination can make a difference in how you play a tune. I remember years ago a woman who would start crying when she heard the tune Mo Mhathair because it reminded her of her mum, I've always thought of her emotion when playing the tune ever since. Place names can set a picture in your head or maybe suggest the style of playing you heard when in that area.
Imagination and memories can have a big effect on the emotion put into a tune though it's not the be all and end all, IMO. But I would sooner be seen as spouting shantys "pretentious crap" that approach the music with an attitude of hollow indifference.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by bogman
Re: What's in a tune name.
well put, bogman. and thanks for the link. lovely film.
however, there is one tune played around here whose title is particularly evocative of its content.
it's called "The Little Lump o' Lye"
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by pipewatcher
Re: What's in a tune name.
after that we usually play "The Dumplin' in the Ladle". But that title doesn't seem to match the tune at all. go figure...
cheers,
pipewatcher
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by pipewatcher
Re: What's in a tune name.
I am in Will Harmon's camp on this issue, more than I agree with shanty--the names are part of the music, sometimes just part of the fun, sometimes evoking something about the tune itself. It is, after all, hard to play The Rolling Waves without thinking of surf on the shore, or Haste to the Wedding without thinking of those joyful occasions. The tunes are beautiful in thier abstract selves, but the names, including the names of the composers, add a richness to it all.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by AlBrown
Re: What's in a tune name.
Al--I'm not camping right now! I said that the names, sometimes, are fun and interesting. But if you heard the 'Morning Thrush' d'ya really think you'd equate it with a thrush's call? If you played the tunes you named to someone who didn't know the tunes do you think they'd even come close to 'feeling' what's expressed in the title? And what one person 'feels' or gets from a tune may be totaly different from what the artist/writer/composer intended. Mostly these are fun dance tunes and not epic wagnerian operas(thank God). To me they're just tunes. And they are simple, mostly, and perfect, mostly and hence, to me,The titles are unimportant except in differentiating between them.
Didn't mean to offend any one...Apologising if I did....
Drunken Imbecile
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by shanty
Re: What's in a tune name.
I heard somewhere that Neil Gow's second "wife" was his fiddle.
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by DrSilverSpear
Re: What's in a tune name.
a rose by any other name is still among the heather...
# Posted on July 24th 2010 by pipewatcher
Re: What's in a tune name.
shanty, You didn't offend me in the least. We just disagreed. No harm in that. The world would be pretty boring if we all thought the same way!
# Posted on July 25th 2010 by AlBrown
Re: What's in a tune name.
"I heard somewhere that Neil Gow's second "wife" was his fiddle."
I'm not sure who started that yarn, but it's contradicted by the note printed with the tune when Nathaniel Gow published it. He meant it literally.
What is a bit weird about that tune is that Niel Gow didn't really write it. It's only very slightly adapted from the Irish tune "Kitty Tyrrell" - and even more bizarrely, Nathaniel Gow printed the Irish original in the same book as his dad's lament, with no comment. I can't begin to imagine the sort of family relationships that would make all that happen.
# Posted on July 25th 2010 by Jack Campin
Re: What's in a tune name.
the title of tunes only give me a hint into the composer's heart at the time they wrote it but like any piece of art that you create or purchase, you then make it your own...that's the generosity of creation...to me anyway
janmarie
# Posted on July 25th 2010 by janmarie
Re: What's in a name.
Apropos of the subject matter, I resurrect an old joke...
An (American) Indian child goes to his mom and asks, "Mother, how did I come to be named?"
Mother replies, "After your father and I conceived your brother, we looked outside the tipi and saw a huge elk running nearby. So we named him Running Elk."
And after your father and I conceived your sister, we looked outside the tipi and saw an owl hooting up in the tree, for it was nighttime. So we named her Hooting Owl."
"Why do you ask, Two F*cking Dogs?"
# Posted on July 26th 2010 by fiddlerdan
Re: What's in a tune name.
"But if you heard the 'Morning Thrush' d'ya really think you'd equate it with a thrush's call?" - shanty
I'm talking about the playing of, not the listening to, they are two different things. The listener will recognise something played with feeling, it doesn't necessarily matter to them where the feeling comes from but often it mean a lot to the player.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLe9etQ0iwQ
# Posted on July 26th 2010 by bogman
Re: What's in a tune name.
Ahh-bogman I'm sorry, I missed that important part of your post. Let me rethink it.........
...............................................
...............................................
Nahh, doesn't matter, still pretentious crap
just kidding-- In all honesty I think creation is a very personal thing. Of course if something moves you to write a tune it will be, for you, very meaningful. You will play it and relate it to what inspired you. To no one else will it have the same meaning. Sure you can pick up the shades of happy/sad/excited/etc but mostly with dance tunes such as these are I don't think there's much meaning that translates from a title. That DOES NOT mean that I feel there is no emotional meaning in the music. I do very much. I don't believe that *that* translates well into language.
# Posted on July 27th 2010 by shanty
Re: What's in a tune name.
"I don't believe that *that* translates well into language. "
and thank the universe for art and music!!!! Great point, shanty, perfect.
janmarie
# Posted on July 27th 2010 by janmarie
Re: What's in a tune name.
It seems obvious to me that tune the Morning Thrush with its repeated phrases is intended to remind us of the bird's song:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~The Song Thrush's characteristic song, with melodic phrases repeated twice or more, is described by the nineteenth-century British poet Robert Browning in his poem Home Thoughts, from Abroad:
That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
# Posted on July 27th 2010 by Bernie 29
Re: What's in a tune name.
Bernie29!!! You are Not gonna tell me that if you did not know the title of that song, and herd it for the first time, played by Seamus (yes I'm on first name basis) That you'd go. . . . . . . . . Ah! Yes a morning thrush!
Come on man!!! What if he'd called it ''Traffic Jam on Interstate 695''. Oh well, I'm sure I'm a minority, in so many ways, on this site, on this subject and others, but the titles mean little to me. I love the tune Mist Covered Mountain but the title holds no significance for me. I don't care what mountain/s the song refers to. I don't even think about mountains when I play it but it is very moving for me.
# Posted on July 28th 2010 by shanty
Re: What's in a tune name.
I have composed four ragtime pieces for piano. Sometimes I tell the audience the title and the story behind the title and sometimes I just give them the title. It depends on the audience and where I am performing.
For example, my first attempt to compose a piano rag was also the first one I finished. Since I have never been able to think of a good, snappy, memorable title for this original piano rag, I gave it the title of "Piano Rag Number One".
And there are similar stories for the other three piano rags I composed.
Laurence
# Posted on July 28th 2010 by fauxcelt
Re: What's in a tune name.
fauxcelt here's a suggestion-- Ist street rag, 2nd street rag, 3rd street rag etc. Easy for you to keep track of and in the future the artsy types will discuss how each composition evokes the feeling of the named street in your hometown!!!
Somewhere(I know that's helpful!) there's a review of a performance by an Irish harpist (harper?-guy who plays the harp!) dating from the 1820's. He was playing in New York City and the review was in a New York paper or magazine.He performed Brian Boru's March and the reviewer describes, in great detail, the story he told while playing and how the music, and the way in which it was played, changed as his tale progressed. It was quite fascinating.
# Posted on July 29th 2010 by shanty