The Session >> Tunes >> The Trip To Durrow (reel)

Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments

The Trip To Durrow

reel

Key signature: Dmajor

Submitted on August 13th 2002 by SPeak.

This tune has been added to 445 tunebooks.

Also known as A Trip To Durrow, Trip To Durrow, Turas Go Darmhagh, An.

Recordings of a tune by this name:

Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments

X: 1
T: Trip To Durrow, The
M: 4/4
L: 1/8
R: reel
K: Dmaj
D2DF ADFA|dfed B3c|dBBA dBBA|FADE FE E2|
D2DF ADFA|dfed B3c|dBBA FAdB|AFEG FD D2:|
|:dcde fefg|afdf gfed|(3Bcd ef gebe|gebe gfef|
d2de fefg|afdf gfed|(3Bcd ef gbag|fdec d2de|
fdec d2de|fded B3c|dBBA dBBA|FADE FE E2|
D2DF ADFA|dfed B3c|dBBA FAdB|AFEG FD D2:|

Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments
The Trip To Durrow sheetmusic
Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments

I couldn't believe this great tune wasn't on the site yet!

# Posted on August 13th 2002 by SPeak

How do people play this one where everyone else is? I've heard that Trip is also commonly played with the first part single, and sometimes with the B and C double.

Zina

# Posted on August 13th 2002 by Zina Lee

For a dance, you would play AAB. There actually is no C part to this tune.

# Posted on August 13th 2002 by SPeak

Trip to Durrow

I disagree with the last comment in that the final 8 bars are sufficiently different to be considered as a distinct C part. Most sessions I've been to play it as AABCBC. Although this may seem unconventional it sounds infinitely better than if played the predictable way of AABBCC - one of those anomalous tunes like the Sailor's Bonnet reel (ABBABB) ! Many thanks for posting it; it's a great tune.

# Posted on August 13th 2002 by Bannerman

Sorry, I should have said -- round here, we play it AABCBC as well, although I haven't heard this at every session in the city. But I have heard some players say that in "other places" it's played AABBCC, which I'm not really sure I like, but perhaps that's because I learned it the other way first. And lots of people don't treat the C part as a separate part from the B, I know, since they learned the thing aurally and have never seen the C part written as a different part...

zls

# Posted on August 13th 2002 by Zina Lee

Certainly, the AABCBC version seems to be the 'standard', but I've been in sessions where one or two musicians have been thrown off by the structure, probably because they are used to playing it another way. I have heard it played AABC and AABBCC, mostly by musicians form areas of Ireland which haven't been touched by the sort of pan-Irishism which dominates many sessions outside Ireland.

# Posted on August 13th 2002 by CreadurMawnOrganig

It's not a matter of opinion i

# Posted on August 14th 2002 by SPeak

Please disregard my last comment. My computer has been playing games. What I mean to say is that all the collections I've seen list this tune with an A and B part only. The "Portland Collection" lists the tune with an A and B part. Regardless of how it is played, the tunebooks speak for themselves. I've actually never heard this played with a so called C part.

# Posted on August 14th 2002 by SPeak

Well, I've never been at any sessions where Trip is played AABBCC either, but I do know that there are places in Ireland where the tune is played that way, and almost all of the more experienced players that I've heard talking about this tune mention that it *can* be played with the third part uncoupled from the second.

Tunebooks are a relatively new thing to Irish music (as are pub sessions, the "traditional" Daughter of Erin stepdancing costume, and the guitar as an accompaniment instrument, and the bodhran as well for good measure), and they usually only embody the settings of a tune that one person or a small group of people use for a tune, so I shouldn't place *too* much trust in them as fonts of all knowledge where the tunes are concerned... :)

Zina

# Posted on August 14th 2002 by Zina Lee

Tunebooks, in general, possess the body of a tune without all the lacings. In my opinion, this is the best way to learn. I don't mean learning from a tunebook. But I do mean learning a straightforward version of the tune. If you have someone who plays it the "Dublin" way and then you have someone who plays it the "Clare" way, that just adds for interesting conversation. If you have the brunt of the tune as "commonly" played, well, I've found this to be the "best" way.

# Posted on August 14th 2002 by SPeak

Noel Hill is the only person I've ever heard play this tune AABBCC.

# Posted on August 15th 2002 by milesnagopaleen

This version is from Noel Hill's "The Irish Concertina". Notice it is played AABB. I still maintain there is no C part. Although, I don't deny that it can played with one.

# Posted on August 15th 2002 by SPeak

Noel Hill

I wasn't talking about Noel Hill's album. I heard Noel playing this AABBCC in Ollie Conway's bar in Mullagh.

# Posted on August 16th 2002 by milesnagopaleen

We often play this after Saint Anne's (listed on the session), and usually play CABCBC AABCBC AABCBC which gives a lovely changeover from Saint Anne's - Try it !

# Posted on August 18th 2002 by Enob

I like following it up with Earl's Chair.

Zina

# Posted on September 11th 2002 by Zina Lee

Trip to Durrow

Thanks to Will Harman for letting me know the name of this tune that I've called "Reel in D" for years (Discussions, 11th sep02).
As regards the C part, I always treated it as a variation of the A part played only when the tune is repeated as in AABB:CABB etc. I like it that way 'cos it kind of brings the tune back full circle in a less predictable way.
I originally learned it this way from Sid Cassidy (of Wexford) in a Carlisle session and have played it like that ever since. Maybe I just heard it wrong (horrors) and have been mucking it up since then! I haven't noticed too many frowning faces mind you (maybe Scotsmen aren't expected to know).
Anyway, seems to me that it just feels like a variation that can be treated as the player pleases and that whatever session will have a way they do it.
Does the AABB:CABB thing make sense to anyone else?

# Posted on September 11th 2002 by Kenn

Is the second part played once or twice?

# Posted on September 12th 2002 by Eimear

I would say, given the foregoing discussions, Eimear, that the answer is "yes". :) No, seriously, check with a muso at your local to see how they play it there. The way I've heard it most often is AABCBC (the way SPeak has it written, AABB), but obviously players play it differently.

Zina

# Posted on September 12th 2002 by Zina Lee

You're right Zina, I'm liking it AABCBC now, only thing is it doesn't slide nicely into over the moors to Maggie any more.
Guess I'll have to find another tune, maybe A Cup of Tea....

# Posted on September 13th 2002 by Kenn

James Kelly

James plays it AABBCC. I'ver heard him play it that way anyway. I like it that way better myself. Everybody else around here plays it AABCBC so i just switch when i'm playing with another melody player.

# Posted on April 19th 2003 by pchaffee

Tunebooks are Good Sources

PS Irish Trad. tune collections have been around for much longer than anyone now living or any recording--they're perfectly good sources for tune validation, but like dictionaries, they don't necessarily determine what is correct. But even if they hadn't been around that long, i don't see why they wouldn't be just as valid a source as any player.

# Posted on April 19th 2003 by pchaffee

Well, I tend to think of them as basically *being* another player, pchaffee! As said above, tune collections have to come from somewhere, somebody obviously put them together. Tune collections just tending to be seen as having more permanence and sometimes even more authority than a player sitting next to you saying, "well, we play it like *this*...". (Castle Kelly always catches me out at new sessions -- first part single or repeated? -- and last night I discovered that some players play Bunker Hill as a single reel, which I'd never heard before.)

# Posted on April 20th 2003 by Zina Lee

"The Trip to Durrow" ~ double, single and hornpipe

Well, I first learned this as notated here in Dublin and played it that way at a number of sessions around town in the 70's, including The Culturlann in Monkstown, CCE's heaquarters, but that don't make it necessarily 'official'. Latter I came across it also as a hornpipe. Then, playing with some other folks in the countryside I found it being played as a 'sing'e reel', meaning as given here but without the repeats. If you take it as folks are breaking it up and calling it A-B-C, instead of AABCBC or AABBCC, we played it just ABC... So, more grist for the mill, and not forgetting it as a hornpipe...

# Posted on February 25th 2006 by ceolachan

"The Trip to Durrow" ~ Swung

Unsure where the cut off is for 'different', I'm putting this in the 'comments', where I've resided since losing trust in my own assumptions. Anyway, I tried to remember this as I'd learned it as what I was thinking and had noted 'hornpipe', probably just in reference to it being swung, because now that I play it that way again it feels more like a set dance, what with the 8 bar A-part and 16 bar B-part. Anyway, here it is in that form, with some few variations given. You could also use the notes as given in the original reel versions available. So, for your fun and enjoyment, hopefully, here it is swung in the style of a hornpipe or set dance. I also play it without the 'lead-ins', just laying on a final 'D' in each final measure ~ F>D D2 :| ~

K: D Major
|: (3AGF |
D2 D>F A>DF>A | d>fe>d B>^AB>c | d>B (BBB d>B (3BBB | (3AAA D>E F>E (3EEE |
D>A (3DEF A>D (3FGA | d>ce>d B3 c | d>BF>A d>BA>F | A>D (3EFG F>D :|
|: D>c |
d>cd>e f>ef>g | a>f (3def g>fe>d | (3Bcd e>f g>eB>e | g>eb>e g>fe>f |
d2 d>e f2 f>g | a>fd>f g>fe>d | (3Bcd e>f g>ba>g | f>de>c d>cd>e |
f>de>c d3 e | f>de>d B3 c | d>B (3BBB d>BF>B | A>FD>E F>EA>F |
D2 D>F A>D (3FGA | d>fe>d B>^AB>c | (3dcd B>A d>BA>F | (3AGF E>G F>D :|

# Posted on February 26th 2006 by ceolachan

I've heard the second bar (and 6th and 22nd) played like:
|defd B3c|
instead of:
|dfed B3c|
I like it better.

# Posted on April 6th 2007 by Pere

Composer

There is a known composer to this tune according to Eddie Mongey from annaliviafm's "Bothar a tsleibhte". It was composed by an Offaly musician (I think from Tullamore) and his name escapes me at the moment. He played with the Ballinamere Ceili Band and he was a fiddler and piper. It was something like Denis Carey (but its not because he is a piano with the Brock Maguire band). If anyone can shoot names out I could confirm.

# Posted on October 6th 2007 by 52Paddy

2nd tune in this set:

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=MWosPa3SuNM&feature=rec-HM-fresh+div

# Posted on December 1st 2008 by davydd

By the numbers

I think it (personally of course *wink*) sounds better AABCBC. AABBCC works, but sounds odd to me, doesn't have the same flow you know. Each to their own I guess...

# Posted on June 12th 2009 by tin_whistler

Well even though Noel was playing it wrong it was a joy to listen to. :-)

# Posted on December 27th 2010 by No Cause For Alarm

Trip to Durrow by Dan Cleary

I believe the musician that 52Paddy was trying to recall was Dan Cleary (fiddler/piper/whistler/accordionist) from Ballinamere, Co. Offaly.

The Fiddler's Companion credits him with the tune and there is a website set up in memory of him that has the tune there in full:

http://www.dancleary.info/Homepage.html

http://www.dancleary.info/SlideShow_assets/SlideShow.html?lang=en

Hopefully this should also go some way to settling the debate on how the tune should be played. For what it is worth, in Glasgow it is played as written on Dan Cleary's website - with a 2nd part that is twice the normal length and is repeated.

# Posted on December 28th 2010 by No Cause For Alarm

Ach the slideshow link doesn't work.

http://www.dancleary.info/Photos.html

Photo 11

# Posted on December 28th 2010 by No Cause For Alarm

Coincidence....

http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/3860
I posted this recording just 3 weeks ago - see comments, where Dan Cleary is listed as one of the fiddle players. One of the tunes on that recording is a composition of John Brady's called "Dan Cleary's Ireland", named in honour of Dan Cleary.
I'm delighted that the composer of this fine reel has been identified. I first heard the tune played by Paddy Moloney [ and a fine job he made of it, too ] on the first "Drones And Chanters" LP record released in the 1970s. I have often wondered if that was the first ever recording of "The Trip To Durrow". Mick Moloney recorded it around the same time, but I think Paddy was first.

# Posted on December 29th 2010 by Kenny

PS....

It's also one of very few tunes in the Irish tradition which seems to only have one name.

# Posted on December 29th 2010 by Kenny

First recording ?

This was recorded by "The Johnstons" in 1969 - Mick Moloney on banjo - making it the earliest recording of the tune that I am aware of, and not Paddy Moloney, as I had thought. [ see above ].

# Posted on October 23rd 2011 by Kenny

Trip to Durrow

Breandán Breathnach got the tune from John Potts, well before any of these recordings. It is also much associated with the piping of Tommy Reck and recordings of Tommy playign it exist from well before the ones above.

I have a sketchy recollection of Breandán B. saying the tune was a two parter but when writing it down his informant (my recollection is that it was Reck but it actually was Potts) suggested he had heard it with an alternative first part , Breandán added that part as a third part for publication in CRE1.

In the notes to te tune in CRE1 he says :

'The third part is an alternative version of the first part which John Potts heard from some flute player. '

# Posted on October 23rd 2011 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski

Thanks for that information, Prof - by the way, I've got an LP record to post to you, will do so tomorrow morning :)

# Posted on October 23rd 2011 by Kenny

Trip to Durrow

Looking forward to it Kenny.

Al three part versions of the tune go back to the publication in CRE1. I couldn't find a date on when Breandán received the tune from old John Potts but I think it's safe to assume the tune must have been in circulation by the late fifties.

# Posted on October 24th 2011 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski

Trip to Durrow

Just to add here I have a recording from oct 1964 of Tommy Potts playing the tune.

# Posted on October 26th 2011 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski

Moloney's solo setting is distinct from the run-of-the-mill; beats me where that came from. It's not Rowsome's, who wrote out two parts, which are basically the usual, IIRC.

# Posted on October 26th 2011 by KLR

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