I've got a friend who is learning box and has a C melodeon. I know a D would be optimal, but if you've just got a C box for now, what are some good session tunes you can play with only a C row?
[what are some good session tunes you can play with only a C row?]
any session tune. you just have to put it into a key that will work in the name key of your single row.
but if you mean, playing in a regular concert-pitch session: very generally, the keys that work best on a single row melodeon are its name key (the I, in music-theory terms, which here is C) and its relative minor (the key of a-minor here), and those that in your name key only have one accidental (with C as the I, that will be the IV (F) and the V (G), and their relative minors (d minor and e minor)). in those keys, you tweak the setting a little to "arrange around" the missing accidentals. this is not hard to do if you are only missing one note. you can sometimes even pull it off with tunes that have two missing notes (on a C box, that would be D major and its relative minor, b minor, plus B-flat major and its relative minor, which is g minor).
there are not a slew of C major tunes played in C even in concert-pitch sessions. the steeplechase was already cited; there's also the Graf Spee.
but there are a slew of a-minor tunes, and your friend can pile up an avalanche of them and drive everyone crazy with a barrage of st. ruth's bush-meets-rainy day-meets-down the broom-meets-gatehouse maid-meets-corner house-meets....
PLUS....
all the d-minor tunes, just arrange around the b-flat.
all the G-major tunes, just arrange around the F-sharp.
all the e-minor tunes, just arrange around the F-sharp.
etc...
then of course, your friend will be in clover in a flat "C session," where (mostly): "D" tunes are in C, "G" tunes are in F, "e-minor" tunes are in d minor. "a-minor" tunes are in g-minor (actually, for a C row, you can play dandy in a-minor and kind of in g-minor).....here a couple of records that are loaded (not exclusively, but....) with tunes in this orientation...:
mary macnamara's three recordings----two solo, one duo with her brother andrew (not all tunes on all of these are C-oriented, but many are).
Kitty Hayes' solo cd and her duo cd with piper peter Laban....
@ceemonster - how many dm tunes do you know that feature a b flat?
As to the original question, if you're planning on playing a D melodeon at some point I'd think you'd be better off learning the tunes in C. Fiddlers can tune down, whistlers can play a C whistle, accomodations can be made.
That being said, two tunes which can work pretty well on the C row are Blackthorn Stick and Blarney Pilgrim. Also, Sporting Paddy should work nicely. These would be good practice for the B/C box, I suppose.
The Maids of Mitchelstown
The Walls of Liscarroll
The Peacock's Feather http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/663
The Porthole of the Kelp
Tuttle's Reel
The East Clare Reel
G mixolydian: Mullingar Lea (a couple of F#s to work around).
There are a great many tunes normally in D (and related modes) that are not difficult to transpose down a tone (without retuning) on fiddle/banjo/mandolin. Whether the other musicians in the session can do this spontaneously depends, of course, on their level of musicianship, but I should think it is within the capabilities of most moderately experienced players.
There are quite a few pentatonic (or nearly so) tunes that you can play in up to three keys on one row of a box. Tunes like the "Kerry Fling/Cuz Teehan's"...
For your friend, a good example of a session tune would be Willy Coleman's jig: this is easy enough to play in both G and A on a D-row, and hence in F and G on a C-row.
Any other G tune that can be played without Fs or Cs will work too - Blarney Pilgrim has been mentioned, Christmas Eve springs to mind as another one. I know there are loads of others but brain not working too well at this precise moment.
Have to say though, that taking a C melodeon to a D session will involve a lot of sitting out, which could be tiresome, or badgering people to play the same old few tunes that you can manage on the thing, which could soon get tiresome for everybody. .
I sense in the OP an aversion to learning any old tune that will fit on a 10-key melodeon. Why is this? Provided the particular tune doesn't run the keyboard out of notes on either end, there are hundreds of tunes which can be played on a melodeon in C. Rakes of Mallow isn't be out of bounds, either. Just don't play it in G.
I should underscore the above by adding once your friend learns to play enough tunes on the C melodeon, he can buy another in D, G or A and have the same repertoire immediately available. Otherwise he'll be starting all over again learning tunes in whatever key his next box happens to be in.
[@ceemonster - how many dm tunes do you know that feature a b flat?]
perhaps this person does not yet know enough basic theory to have a handle on how to quickly figure out what keys are amenable on a given one-row, and most importantly, why.
perhaps this person will be using sheet music at least at first, and may be confused by the flat in the signature.
or perhaps this person will be playing other folk genres on their melodeon, including the many genres such as eastern european, where the key of d minor plays an, er, major role.
but for heaven's sake, let's be as literal as we can:
d-minor: just arrange around the b-flat, if the tune has one. while the key of d-minor, like its relative major, F, has one flat, a b-flat, many irish tunes in d-minor do not even feature the b-flat as part of the melody. [in large part, this is because much irish music is modal rather than straight minor or major. many "d minor" irish tunes are really in one or another modal keys which are minor-ISH rather than true minor. this will be to your advantage, because you won't even have to "arrange around" anything.]
"I sense in the OP an aversion to learning any old tune that will fit on a 10-key melodeon. Why is this?"
Because the OP doesn't want their friend to turn up to their first session, only to find that nobody will play with them because they all know the tunes in a different key.
...but, in princple, I'm all for playing any tune in whatever key you like - just don't expect me, or anyone else to join you. (Actually, I'd welcome the challenge of playing D tunes in C but, when it comes to keys like B or Eb, I'd rather save myself the embarassment of fluffing before the end of the first bar.)
The C melodeon is widely played in East Anglia and there are a lot of tunes in this key in "Before the night was out" which is a colllection of music of the area. Good stuff too.
Good tunes for C melodeon
Good tunes for C melodeon
I've got a friend who is learning box and has a C melodeon. I know a D would be optimal, but if you've just got a C box for now, what are some good session tunes you can play with only a C row?
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by Zazzaliss
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
red haired boy
julia delaney
steeplechase
lilting banshee
brenda stubbert's
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by mellow_bellows
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
[what are some good session tunes you can play with only a C row?]
any session tune. you just have to put it into a key that will work in the name key of your single row.
but if you mean, playing in a regular concert-pitch session: very generally, the keys that work best on a single row melodeon are its name key (the I, in music-theory terms, which here is C) and its relative minor (the key of a-minor here), and those that in your name key only have one accidental (with C as the I, that will be the IV (F) and the V (G), and their relative minors (d minor and e minor)). in those keys, you tweak the setting a little to "arrange around" the missing accidentals. this is not hard to do if you are only missing one note. you can sometimes even pull it off with tunes that have two missing notes (on a C box, that would be D major and its relative minor, b minor, plus B-flat major and its relative minor, which is g minor).
there are not a slew of C major tunes played in C even in concert-pitch sessions. the steeplechase was already cited; there's also the Graf Spee.
but there are a slew of a-minor tunes, and your friend can pile up an avalanche of them and drive everyone crazy with a barrage of st. ruth's bush-meets-rainy day-meets-down the broom-meets-gatehouse maid-meets-corner house-meets....
PLUS....
all the d-minor tunes, just arrange around the b-flat.
all the G-major tunes, just arrange around the F-sharp.
all the e-minor tunes, just arrange around the F-sharp.
etc...
then of course, your friend will be in clover in a flat "C session," where (mostly): "D" tunes are in C, "G" tunes are in F, "e-minor" tunes are in d minor. "a-minor" tunes are in g-minor (actually, for a C row, you can play dandy in a-minor and kind of in g-minor).....here a couple of records that are loaded (not exclusively, but....) with tunes in this orientation...:
mary macnamara's three recordings----two solo, one duo with her brother andrew (not all tunes on all of these are C-oriented, but many are).
Kitty Hayes' solo cd and her duo cd with piper peter Laban....
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by ceemonster
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
@ceemonster - how many dm tunes do you know that feature a b flat?
As to the original question, if you're planning on playing a D melodeon at some point I'd think you'd be better off learning the tunes in C. Fiddlers can tune down, whistlers can play a C whistle, accomodations can be made.
That being said, two tunes which can work pretty well on the C row are Blackthorn Stick and Blarney Pilgrim. Also, Sporting Paddy should work nicely. These would be good practice for the B/C box, I suppose.
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by Jon Kiparsky
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
This Paddy Fahy jig in C is a good one http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/2667 . It does have some F#s in the B-part, but there are ways around them.
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
A few Dm/dorian tunes:
The Maids of Mitchelstown
The Walls of Liscarroll
The Peacock's Feather http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/663
The Porthole of the Kelp
Tuttle's Reel
The East Clare Reel
G mixolydian: Mullingar Lea (a couple of F#s to work around).
There are a great many tunes normally in D (and related modes) that are not difficult to transpose down a tone (without retuning) on fiddle/banjo/mandolin. Whether the other musicians in the session can do this spontaneously depends, of course, on their level of musicianship, but I should think it is within the capabilities of most moderately experienced players.
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
There are quite a few pentatonic (or nearly so) tunes that you can play in up to three keys on one row of a box. Tunes like the "Kerry Fling/Cuz Teehan's"...
For your friend, a good example of a session tune would be Willy Coleman's jig: this is easy enough to play in both G and A on a D-row, and hence in F and G on a C-row.
Any other G tune that can be played without Fs or Cs will work too - Blarney Pilgrim has been mentioned, Christmas Eve springs to mind as another one. I know there are loads of others but brain not working too well at this precise moment.
Have to say though, that taking a C melodeon to a D session will involve a lot of sitting out, which could be tiresome, or badgering people to play the same old few tunes that you can manage on the thing, which could soon get tiresome for everybody. .
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by Jeeves Tones
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
Larry O'Gaff, rakes of mallow
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by zippydw
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
"rakes of mallow"
In its usual key of G, The Rakes of Mallow contains F#s that are pretty much unavoidable, without significantly altering the tune.
# Posted on January 13th 2012 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
I sense in the OP an aversion to learning any old tune that will fit on a 10-key melodeon. Why is this? Provided the particular tune doesn't run the keyboard out of notes on either end, there are hundreds of tunes which can be played on a melodeon in C. Rakes of Mallow isn't be out of bounds, either. Just don't play it in G.
# Posted on January 14th 2012 by gravelwalks
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
I should underscore the above by adding once your friend learns to play enough tunes on the C melodeon, he can buy another in D, G or A and have the same repertoire immediately available. Otherwise he'll be starting all over again learning tunes in whatever key his next box happens to be in.
# Posted on January 14th 2012 by gravelwalks
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
"...isn't be out of bounds."
Listen to me. Posting from work again. Pathetic.
# Posted on January 14th 2012 by gravelwalks
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
[@ceemonster - how many dm tunes do you know that feature a b flat?]
perhaps this person does not yet know enough basic theory to have a handle on how to quickly figure out what keys are amenable on a given one-row, and most importantly, why.
perhaps this person will be using sheet music at least at first, and may be confused by the flat in the signature.
or perhaps this person will be playing other folk genres on their melodeon, including the many genres such as eastern european, where the key of d minor plays an, er, major role.
but for heaven's sake, let's be as literal as we can:
d-minor: just arrange around the b-flat, if the tune has one. while the key of d-minor, like its relative major, F, has one flat, a b-flat, many irish tunes in d-minor do not even feature the b-flat as part of the melody. [in large part, this is because much irish music is modal rather than straight minor or major. many "d minor" irish tunes are really in one or another modal keys which are minor-ISH rather than true minor. this will be to your advantage, because you won't even have to "arrange around" anything.]
# Posted on January 14th 2012 by ceemonster
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
Tell your buddy to get this CD:
http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/2397
All the tunes are played on a C melodeon by Johnny Connolly.
# Posted on January 14th 2012 by pennhorse
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
"I sense in the OP an aversion to learning any old tune that will fit on a 10-key melodeon. Why is this?"
Because the OP doesn't want their friend to turn up to their first session, only to find that nobody will play with them because they all know the tunes in a different key.
# Posted on January 14th 2012 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
...but, in princple, I'm all for playing any tune in whatever key you like - just don't expect me, or anyone else to join you. (Actually, I'd welcome the challenge of playing D tunes in C but, when it comes to keys like B or Eb, I'd rather save myself the embarassment of fluffing before the end of the first bar.)
# Posted on January 14th 2012 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Good tunes for C melodeon
The C melodeon is widely played in East Anglia and there are a lot of tunes in this key in "Before the night was out" which is a colllection of music of the area. Good stuff too.
# Posted on January 16th 2012 by Ebor_fiddler