On what instrument?
The way I've heard it, on whistle, flute, or fiddle, a cut is a cut. While it may make some difference which finger you use to produce it, and people do argue over that, it's still a cut.
In many cases the pitch isn't really audible, so the interval is irrelevant.
I'm curious how (and why) you would do large-interval cuts in the first place.
Why? Because my ear may prefer to hear a wide-interval ornament on certain notes, or in certain tunes. Off the key root, a 4th or 5th sounds good to my ear. Even at a very fast speed (blips), the pitch is a still perceptible "tinting", although from the purely percussive standpoint "irrelevant".
Instruments: flute (Boehm system), mandolin, OM, TB etc.
How? On the mandos, there are multiple techniques. Hammer-ons or pull-offs from a higher neck position; raking from an adjacent string (which may may or may not be in the same position as the primary note), two-handed tapping, or a combination of several of the above for multiple highland pipe sounding "bits". (think Richard Thompson on electric guitar). On the flute, the instrument imposes limits (register shifts or fingerings); 4ths or 5ths in the keys of D/Dm and Em/E are doable.
I make no claim to play "authentic ITM"; I'm not Irish and have no Irish genetics. For me, sonic vocabulary drifts at will between the source instrument(s)/source player(s) and various instrument I may be playing, according to the way my mind/ear hears things. On certain type of tunes, the sound/phrasing might be ala Martin Carthy, or John Kirkpatrick or Swarbrick(fiddle) regardless of whether I'm playing a stringed instrument or flute. Flute ornamentation and phrasing drifts onto mandos. I just try to get close to whatever sounds "right" (to me) whether the effect is Billy Pigg, Annbjorg Lien, Paddy Carty, Peter Green, RT, Hendrix, clawhammer banjo, Flaco Jimenez, Tommy Peoples, Johnnny Almond, Sugarcane Harris or even Etta James (vocals). I subscribe to the Ry Cooder/David Lindley concept of "it's all one big instrument."
Whenever possible, using "existing" descriptive terminology for sonic/playing techniques seems to be common sense, rather than (re)coining a term. Maybe the ornaments may be nameless or not used in ITM, but may in some other genre: Scottish, Breton, Gallicia.....
Well if you're not trying to play Irish traditional (genetics has nothing to do with it), then how you sound your cuts is wide open to personal interpretation.
Is there a term for fat interval cuts? Not that I'm aware, at least not in this tradition. But it won't surprise me if someone else knows....
No the pitch of a grace note is not Irrelevant, not at all, Completely wrong. They all have subtle differences but that are quickly apparent to the educated ear. If you doubt that ring up your local pipe band and ask them! By the way, they are called grace notes within the Piping traditions. I gather the classical bods use grace notes in a different sense [ of meaning] so that would explain any confusion if your from a classical background originally.
Cuts , although as Ben EB says , are blips but they are pitched blips, certainly on pipes and whistle. To demonstrate try the various cranns , for whistle/pipes/flute , fiddlers cant do cranns Though as James Kelly showed me there are a few ways to imitate the effect.
From D cut with A F G in succession, then try cuts with FGA trhen GAF and then AGF, . all with the D between each note.
They each have a slightly different tang, flavour.
I tend to use the first and last crann, but I practice the others for luck.
Even with fiddle, if the note is sounded then , as Brendan Mulkere showed me, there is an appreciable difference between the pinkie cut to the 3rd finger cut , that is if you actually press down hard enough to sound the note, some do, some dont. There is a modern trend not to sound the note but Brendan told me that it used not to be this way. Possibly the influence of Kevin Burke?
In Highland piping yed be skinned alive, hung drawn and quartered and salt rubbed in for good measure were you to substitute other notes instead of the ' correct ' way to use these graces! Cruanluath, GDE etc
Mind you if you study old texts these 'correct ' usages have changed a lot over the last 250 yrs. and I found it interesting to practice the old ways as an adjunct to the modern 'tradition' .
But they've no caught me yet fae the skinning, and sure it would take half a dozen to hold me down
Also Cape Breton Pipers, holding to the traditions of their forefathers used various combinations of graces as handed down by the refugees from the highland clearances. But sadly the modern competitive piping scene has done great damage to the old ways. Fortunately there are pipers reviving some of these and the last of the old guys were able to pass on some of these traditions, but cultural Imperialism did away with much of it.
Lets hope that the resurgence in different regional styles stops this from happening in trad and 'Euro-trad 'becoming the only accepted style.
It was great to listen to the Canadian links the other day, some real lively unaffected stuff .
I used to call a G grace note a G 'tip', since that was what my father and grandfather had always called it. I was disabused of the habit by my tutor, who insisted it be given its proper name. The D and E were always called grace notes.
That's exactly why highland piping is pretty much irrelevant to those who are more worried about creating music than about what "proper technique" is.
(not that I wouldn't agree that which finger you cut with does influence the sound, just that for the purpose it serves, you shouldn't be buggering about practicing and/or teaching it)
Yup! The difference is often used to imitate barking dogs, as for 'The Foxhunters' series, on winds, not just pipes. On the second octave you get some really drastic differences the further away you are from the note recieving the cut. On the whole the choices usually include the second, the note just above, the third and the fourth, rarely further away as control and a clean execution becomes more difficult. Similar choices are also possible and used on free reed instruments...
Thats interesting Gam, Seamus Ennis refers to 'clipping' in his Tutor as his term for the graces. I like the term, I might adopt it. Tipping....
@Tirno, I dont think youve been exposed to some of the finest pipers , Check out the late great PM Angus MacDonald, a veritable work of musical genius on the first of 'the worlds greatest pipers', Stunning stuff.
James Maclean ; Land of the bent grass, god there is a wealth of stuff out there;John D Burgess's albums on topic records around 1969 .. The art of the Highland bagpipes.... Total classics well worth hunting down .
But yes I agree there is a lot of modern piping that is technically perfect but somewhat ... mechanical. I have early recordings from 1898 and they are very different to a more modern approach.
But its all taste at the end of the day, some folk like it syrupy sweet, clinging and cloying, others like it sharp and edgy... all gradients between. Yes we know what we like, but that simply doesn't mean that what we dont like is therefore bad, or unmusical [though we might well think so! ] It could simply be we don't understand it and the cultural differences are to great for it to mean anything to us.
People condemn what they dont understand all the time, its typical. I have to plead guilty to this as well, there are certain types of musics that make me wish I was undergoing dental surgery with no anaesthetic than having to put up with that !!
Music is in the ear of the beholder after all!
Some players argue that the wide interval cuts are correct on winds, and that the 2nd or 3rd is too small an interval unless you have no other choices. They still call them cuts.
On (uilleann) pipes I do think it matters. I can cut into (or between) A notes with a B or C#, and the latter has a whole different feel and sound that I far prefer. Today I was playing with cutting into f# with c#, and it sounded pretty cool. I regularly cut into low D or E with A. And cutting into a B with back d rather than C# sounds nifty.
So I just think it depends on you ear. If it sounds good, do it. But that should be the only judge: the sound and feeling of it.
Interesting that pipers call them grace notes. I've read that. In 30 years of fiddling, I've never heard an Irish fiddler call cuts grace notes. In fact, they've gone to lengths to distinguish between cuts and grace notes, the prime difference being that cuts don't have pitch, unless you intend them to (which is rare), and actual grace notes are uncommon to rare in the dance tunes.
With the Highland Pipes, I've never ever heard any mention of a 'cut'. The rigidity of the style and approach was what led me to the uilleann pipes in the first place -- not just for the extra octave, but for the freedom to play what I wanted, rather than what was written in stone.
Another popular, as opposed to official, term we used, was the word 'grip' for the ornament which entails briefly closing all the holes, usually from a C or B, like this (grace notes in brackets):
C (gdg) C . The sound is like a little explosion, and is called a leumluath in pibroch. If you add the e gracenote as you return to the C, it becomes the much-employed taorluath.
I suppose the main difference with the highland pipes is that each grace note can be clearly heard and identified, hence the written-in-stone approach.
These days, players are introducing cross-fingering, which has been the bane of life for officialdom, I suppose, since the officials decided we shouldn't do it. e.g.
I gave a Highland piper a few lessons on the uilleann pipes and found he pretty much cut everything with the top C finger. He is a good Highland piper so I imagine this is the done thing on that instrument, hence the OP asking if there was any equivalent in Irish music.
Grace notes is also the standard expression in Irish Pipering has been since at least the time of Patsy Touhey.
@Gam, I knew Id heard the term tipping used before, Pat Mitchel uses it in reference to the Playing of Willie Clancy.
Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
If there is existing terminology, what would you call a cut, or strike, from an interval bigger than a 3rd? From a 4th, 5th or even an octave.
Is there some borrowed term from Highland piping that would apply?
Niles H
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by Niles H
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
On what instrument?
The way I've heard it, on whistle, flute, or fiddle, a cut is a cut. While it may make some difference which finger you use to produce it, and people do argue over that, it's still a cut.
In many cases the pitch isn't really audible, so the interval is irrelevant.
I'm curious how (and why) you would do large-interval cuts in the first place.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by Will Harmon
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
The interval isn't exactly irrelevant as the further away from the note being ornamented the cut is the greater its impact.
Cranns on uilleann pipes span at least a fourth, usually a fifth and sometimes even a sixth, if that's any help.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by zoukboy_2000
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
I should have agree with Will that the *pitch* of the note used for the cut is irrelevant.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by zoukboy_2000
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
I would just call that a grace note. 2nd/3rd/4th/5th and Will IMO is correct
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by celticturntable
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Grace notes are notes. Cuts aren't, really. They're interruptions in the sound. Blips.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by ethical blend
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Why? Because my ear may prefer to hear a wide-interval ornament on certain notes, or in certain tunes. Off the key root, a 4th or 5th sounds good to my ear. Even at a very fast speed (blips), the pitch is a still perceptible "tinting", although from the purely percussive standpoint "irrelevant".
Instruments: flute (Boehm system), mandolin, OM, TB etc.
How? On the mandos, there are multiple techniques. Hammer-ons or pull-offs from a higher neck position; raking from an adjacent string (which may may or may not be in the same position as the primary note), two-handed tapping, or a combination of several of the above for multiple highland pipe sounding "bits". (think Richard Thompson on electric guitar). On the flute, the instrument imposes limits (register shifts or fingerings); 4ths or 5ths in the keys of D/Dm and Em/E are doable.
I make no claim to play "authentic ITM"; I'm not Irish and have no Irish genetics. For me, sonic vocabulary drifts at will between the source instrument(s)/source player(s) and various instrument I may be playing, according to the way my mind/ear hears things. On certain type of tunes, the sound/phrasing might be ala Martin Carthy, or John Kirkpatrick or Swarbrick(fiddle) regardless of whether I'm playing a stringed instrument or flute. Flute ornamentation and phrasing drifts onto mandos. I just try to get close to whatever sounds "right" (to me) whether the effect is Billy Pigg, Annbjorg Lien, Paddy Carty, Peter Green, RT, Hendrix, clawhammer banjo, Flaco Jimenez, Tommy Peoples, Johnnny Almond, Sugarcane Harris or even Etta James (vocals). I subscribe to the Ry Cooder/David Lindley concept of "it's all one big instrument."
Whenever possible, using "existing" descriptive terminology for sonic/playing techniques seems to be common sense, rather than (re)coining a term. Maybe the ornaments may be nameless or not used in ITM, but may in some other genre: Scottish, Breton, Gallicia.....
NH
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by Niles H
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Well if you're not trying to play Irish traditional (genetics has nothing to do with it), then how you sound your cuts is wide open to personal interpretation.
Is there a term for fat interval cuts? Not that I'm aware, at least not in this tradition. But it won't surprise me if someone else knows....
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by Will Harmon
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
No the pitch of a grace note is not Irrelevant, not at all, Completely wrong. They all have subtle differences but that are quickly apparent to the educated ear. If you doubt that ring up your local pipe band and ask them! By the way, they are called grace notes within the Piping traditions. I gather the classical bods use grace notes in a different sense [ of meaning] so that would explain any confusion if your from a classical background originally.
Though as James Kelly showed me there are a few ways to imitate the effect.
Cruanluath, GDE etc 
Cuts , although as Ben EB says , are blips but they are pitched blips, certainly on pipes and whistle. To demonstrate try the various cranns , for whistle/pipes/flute , fiddlers cant do cranns
From D cut with A F G in succession, then try cuts with FGA trhen GAF and then AGF, . all with the D between each note.
They each have a slightly different tang, flavour.
I tend to use the first and last crann, but I practice the others for luck.
Even with fiddle, if the note is sounded then , as Brendan Mulkere showed me, there is an appreciable difference between the pinkie cut to the 3rd finger cut , that is if you actually press down hard enough to sound the note, some do, some dont. There is a modern trend not to sound the note but Brendan told me that it used not to be this way. Possibly the influence of Kevin Burke?
In Highland piping yed be skinned alive, hung drawn and quartered and salt rubbed in for good measure were you to substitute other notes instead of the ' correct ' way to use these graces!
Mind you if you study old texts these 'correct ' usages have changed a lot over the last 250 yrs. and I found it interesting to practice the old ways as an adjunct to the modern 'tradition' .
But they've no caught me yet fae the skinning, and sure it would take half a dozen to hold me down
Also Cape Breton Pipers, holding to the traditions of their forefathers used various combinations of graces as handed down by the refugees from the highland clearances. But sadly the modern competitive piping scene has done great damage to the old ways. Fortunately there are pipers reviving some of these and the last of the old guys were able to pass on some of these traditions, but cultural Imperialism did away with much of it.
Lets hope that the resurgence in different regional styles stops this from happening in trad and 'Euro-trad 'becoming the only accepted style.
It was great to listen to the Canadian links the other day, some real lively unaffected stuff .
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by piobagusfidil
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
I used to call a G grace note a G 'tip', since that was what my father and grandfather had always called it. I was disabused of the habit by my tutor, who insisted it be given its proper name. The D and E were always called grace notes.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by gam
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
That's exactly why highland piping is pretty much irrelevant to those who are more worried about creating music than about what "proper technique" is.
(not that I wouldn't agree that which finger you cut with does influence the sound, just that for the purpose it serves, you shouldn't be buggering about practicing and/or teaching it)
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by Tirno
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
" what would you call a cut, or strike, from an interval bigger than a 3rd? From a 4th, 5th or even an octave."
A cut with attitude.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by Weejie
Cuts with attitude ~
Yup! The difference is often used to imitate barking dogs, as for 'The Foxhunters' series, on winds, not just pipes. On the second octave you get some really drastic differences the further away you are from the note recieving the cut. On the whole the choices usually include the second, the note just above, the third and the fourth, rarely further away as control and a clean execution becomes more difficult. Similar choices are also possible and used on free reed instruments...
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by ceolachan
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Thats interesting Gam, Seamus Ennis refers to 'clipping' in his Tutor as his term for the graces. I like the term, I might adopt it. Tipping....
@Tirno, I dont think youve been exposed to some of the finest pipers , Check out the late great PM Angus MacDonald, a veritable work of musical genius on the first of 'the worlds greatest pipers', Stunning stuff.
James Maclean ; Land of the bent grass, god there is a wealth of stuff out there;John D Burgess's albums on topic records around 1969 .. The art of the Highland bagpipes.... Total classics well worth hunting down .
But yes I agree there is a lot of modern piping that is technically perfect but somewhat ... mechanical. I have early recordings from 1898 and they are very different to a more modern approach.
But its all taste at the end of the day, some folk like it syrupy sweet, clinging and cloying, others like it sharp and edgy... all gradients between. Yes we know what we like, but that simply doesn't mean that what we dont like is therefore bad, or unmusical [though we might well think so! ] It could simply be we don't understand it and the cultural differences are to great for it to mean anything to us.
People condemn what they dont understand all the time, its typical. I have to plead guilty to this as well, there are certain types of musics that make me wish I was undergoing dental surgery with no anaesthetic than having to put up with that !!
Music is in the ear of the beholder after all!
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by piobagusfidil
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Some players argue that the wide interval cuts are correct on winds, and that the 2nd or 3rd is too small an interval unless you have no other choices. They still call them cuts.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by ElaineT
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
On (uilleann) pipes I do think it matters. I can cut into (or between) A notes with a B or C#, and the latter has a whole different feel and sound that I far prefer. Today I was playing with cutting into f# with c#, and it sounded pretty cool. I regularly cut into low D or E with A. And cutting into a B with back d rather than C# sounds nifty.
So I just think it depends on you ear. If it sounds good, do it. But that should be the only judge: the sound and feeling of it.
Cuts are short, but you can hear the note.
# Posted on May 23rd 2011 by Marc C
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
A twiddle
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by Hup
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Interesting that pipers call them grace notes. I've read that. In 30 years of fiddling, I've never heard an Irish fiddler call cuts grace notes. In fact, they've gone to lengths to distinguish between cuts and grace notes, the prime difference being that cuts don't have pitch, unless you intend them to (which is rare), and actual grace notes are uncommon to rare in the dance tunes.
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by Will Harmon
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
That's exactly as I've always had it, Will (H).
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by ethical blend
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
With the Highland Pipes, I've never ever heard any mention of a 'cut'. The rigidity of the style and approach was what led me to the uilleann pipes in the first place -- not just for the extra octave, but for the freedom to play what I wanted, rather than what was written in stone.
Another popular, as opposed to official, term we used, was the word 'grip' for the ornament which entails briefly closing all the holes, usually from a C or B, like this (grace notes in brackets):
C (gdg) C . The sound is like a little explosion, and is called a leumluath in pibroch. If you add the e gracenote as you return to the C, it becomes the much-employed taorluath.
I suppose the main difference with the highland pipes is that each grace note can be clearly heard and identified, hence the written-in-stone approach.
These days, players are introducing cross-fingering, which has been the bane of life for officialdom, I suppose, since the officials decided we shouldn't do it. e.g.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9uVyf0D8eM&playnext=1&list=PL8E4668E1FB8F3D87
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by gam
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
"These days, players are introducing cross-fingering, which has been the bane of life for officialdom"
All the more reason to do it!
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by Weejie
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
"I suppose the main difference with the highland pipes is that each grace note can be clearly heard and identified,"
From about 5 miles in my experiance
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by bazouki dave
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
I gave a Highland piper a few lessons on the uilleann pipes and found he pretty much cut everything with the top C finger. He is a good Highland piper so I imagine this is the done thing on that instrument, hence the OP asking if there was any equivalent in Irish music.
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by DrSilverSpear
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
Grace notes is also the standard expression in Irish Pipering has been since at least the time of Patsy Touhey.
@Gam, I knew Id heard the term tipping used before, Pat Mitchel uses it in reference to the Playing of Willie Clancy.
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by piobagusfidil
Re: Term(s) for wide interval ornaments
@TheSilverSpear -- Yes, the top C finger is the equivalent of the G in the highland pipes. It usually marks out the beat in a regular fashion, as seen here:-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTW_dt0oMGg&feature=fvst
# Posted on May 24th 2011 by gam