The Maids Of Castlebar

reel

Key signature: Dmajor

Submitted on September 5th 2003 by lazyhound.

This tune has been added to 97 tunebooks.

Also known as Girls Of Castlebar, The Lasses Of Castlebar, MacFarley's, The Maid Of Castlebar, The Maid Of The Castle, Maids Of Castelbar, Maids Of Castlebar, Mc Farley's, McFarley's.

Recordings of a tune by this name:

30 Years A-Greying - Disc 2 by The Dubliners
ALive by Kúla
All In Good Time by Patrick Street
Bimis Ag Ol by Ronan Le Bars
Ceol Tire by Various Artists
Chasing The Bear by John Hicks
Clear The Dresser And Take The Floor by Emerald Ceili Band
Craic'd! by Atlantic Wave
Fiddle Sticks, Irish Traditional Music From Donegal by Various Artists
Folktrax 174 - Michael Gorman (fiddle) With Margaret Barry (banjo) by Michael Gorman
Fonnchaoi by Verena Commins And Julie Langan
From Ballymote To Brooklyn by Paddy Killoran and James Morrison
From Leitrim To London by Brian Rooney
Harvest Storm by Altan
In Full Spate by Paddy Glackin
John Bowe And Mary Conroy by John Bowe
Lifescapes Celtic Fiddle by Various Artists
Live-Disc 1 by Natalie MacMaster
Live-Disc 2 by Natalie MacMaster
Mapless Journey by Kathy Buys
Music Of Dreams by Noel Hill And Tony MacMahon With Iarla O Lionaird
Music Of Dreams by Tony Mac Mahon, Iarla Ó Lionáird, Noel Hill
My Roots Are Showing by Natalie MacMaster
Nice To Meet You by Kaitlin Hahn
Northern Lights by Kevin And Seamus Glackin
O' Bheal Go Beal by Marcas O'Murchu
Plays The Irish Tenor Banjo by Kieran Hanrahan
Ring The Bell ... Run Like Hell by Midnight Court
Sheridan's Guesthouse by Dave Sheridan
Sixty Years Of Sean Maguire by Sean Maguire
Slán Le Loch Eirne by Seamus Quinn And Gary Hastings
Sugrú by Eilish O'Connor
Sundry by Shane Cook
Temple House 2 by Temple House Ceili Band
The Best Of Patrick Street by Patrick Street
The Boston Edge by Joe Derrane, Seamus Connolly And John McGann
The Celebrated Recordings by John Doherty
The Killaville Sessions by Ceoltoiri Coleman
The More That's Said The Less The Better by Craobh Rua
The Plain Of Jars by Brian Kelly
Trad by Colcannon
Traditional Fiddle Music From Donegal by Con Cassidy
With Eugene O'Donnell by Mick Moloney
Within A Mile Of Kilty by Various Artists

Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments

Maids of Castlebar (reel)

Learned this tune from John McEvilly at Clonmel in August 2003.
Trevor

# Posted on September 5th 2003 by lazyhound

Maids of Castlebar

I should perhaps mention that John played the tune at least three times during the workshop so that we could record it. Each time he would play it slowly and then straight into full speed. The slow speed invariably included all the ornaments and the swing of the music, and the full-speed was a real performance in which he might slightly modify the ornaments or series of notes in the spirit of the moment. The ABC you see here is my transcription of one of his "slow" play-throughs, modified by what he did in the full-speed immediately following.
Trevor

# Posted on September 5th 2003 by lazyhound

Maids of Castlebar (reel)

The swing John McEvilly puts into this reel, as he also did with most of the other reels he played at Clonmel, pushes the tune towards hornpipe (but not quite). He played the g# at the very beginning of the B-part as a fast slide to the high a.
Trevor

# Posted on September 5th 2003 by lazyhound

Maids of Castlebar

Thanks Trevor - a lovely reel. In the past I've steered away from it because I had a problem with the similarity between the "B" part of the tune and that of the "Maid Behind the Bar". However, it's such a good tune that it's worth making the effort to differentiate between them and I'll persevere with the practice until I get it sorted!

# Posted on September 5th 2003 by Bannerman

Maids of Castlebar

Yes, Bannerman, there is a close resemblance between the first 4 bars of the B-part of the two tunes, and the resemblance of the B-parts is even slightly closer if you look at a version of the "Maids" on J-C's website. However, what John McEvilley does is to emphasise the g#-a slide at the beginning of the B-part, and this tends to steer your ear away from Maid Behind the Bar, and in the last-but-one bar of the B-part he does that startling brief excursion into A-major, which again emphasises the difference between the tunes. That A-major bar does not occur in the J-C version, which sits firmly in D-major at that point.
The tune goes well with The Pretty Girls of Mayo, which he taught us and which I'm going to transcribe and post in the next few days.
BTW, John McEvilley was taught by Paddy Ryan. He is a young man (early 20's?) from Co Mayo. A name to keep an eye on.
Trevor

# Posted on September 5th 2003 by lazyhound

Maids of Castlebar (reel)

For comparison, here are other versions of this tune from Henrik Norbeck's collection:

X:471
T:McFarley's
R:reel
H:See also "The Girls of Castlebar", #597
D:Paddy Glackin: In Full Spate
D:Altan: Harvest Storm
Z:id:hn-reel-471
M:4/4
L:1/8
K:D
dD~D2 EDB,E|D2FA BAFA|dDcD BDAD|EDFA BAFA|
dD~D2 EDB,E|D2FA BAFA|(3Bcd ec dBAF|1 EDEF DFAc:|2 EDEF D2ag||
|:fgab afde|fd~d2 bdad|efga ge=cd|e=c~c2 acge|
fgaf bfaf|gfeg fdB^c|defd ecdB|1 AFEF D2ag:|2 AFEF D2 (3ABc||
"Version 2:"
|:dD~D2 EDB,D|D2FA BAFA|dDcD BDAD|EDAD BAFA|
[1 dD~D2 EDB,D|D2FA BAFA|(3Bcd ec dBAF|EDEF D2 (3ABc:|
[2 "also F3D E3F" DEFD EDB,D|D2FA BAFA|(3Bcd ec dBAF|EDEF D2ag||
|:fgab afde|fdad bdad|efga ge=cd|e=cgc acge|
fgaf bfaf|gfeg fdB^c|defd ecdB|1 AFEF D2ag:|2 AFEF D2 (3ABc||

and,

Trevor

# Posted on September 9th 2003 by lazyhound

X: 1
S: As played by Martin Ruane (1894 - 1986)
M: 4/4
L: 1/8
K: D
(3Abc | d2 D2 (3FED B,A, | D2 FA BAFA | dB{d}BA BAFD | GE{G}ED EDB,D |
| FDDF EDCE | D2 FA BAFA | df{a}fe dcdB | AFEG FDD2 |
|D2 (3DDD (3FED B,A, | D2 FA BAFA | dB{d}BA BAFD | GE{G}ED EDB,D |
| [F4A4] [E4A4] | D2 FA BAFA | df{a}fe dcdB | AFEG FDD2 ||
|: a2 ^ga fddd | fdad fddd | gebe geee | gebe gfeg |
| fddd Addd | face dcBA | Bcde (3faf ec |1 dBAG FDD2 :|2 dBAG FD (3ABc ||

# Posted on March 4th 2004 by Will CPT

Just learnt this tune from Kieran Hanrahan's album. Great swing in it. The beginning few bars remind of "Hand me Down the Tackle" (except this tune is based around the low octave, not the high octave).

# Posted on August 1st 2006 by PaddyCmusic