Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments

Alston Flower Show

hornpipe

Key signature: Gmajor

Submitted on April 4th 2004 by Dow.

This tune has been added to 15 tunebooks.

Also known as The Alston Flower Show.

Recordings of a tune by this name:

Borderlands by Kathryn Tickell
Northumberland Rant by Various Artists
The Northumbrian Small Pipes by Various Artists
The Wild Hills O'Wannie: The Small Pipes Of Northumbria by Various Artists

Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments

Details ABC Sheetmusic Comments

Alston Flower Show

One of my favourite hornpipes. I don't think there are any other transcriptions of this on the net which is a shame because it's a lovely tune that deserves to be played more. My setting is based on a recording of Joe Hutton.

# Posted on April 4th 2004 by Dow

Alston Flower Show

Another North-eastern cracker from Dow. Keepupthe good work!

This was Joe Hutton's signature tune and piece with which he one more than one open championship on the Northumbrian Small-pipes. Alston is the highest town in England and is now in Cumbria. Its a fair way off Joe's usual patch.

It makes a nice contrast with another North-eastern hornpipe, Little Jenny, and the two are often played together in sessions up here.
NoelJackson
Angels of the North

# Posted on April 13th 2004 by noelbats

Setting from Joe Hutton

This version is from a recording:

# Posted on September 17th 2004 by Dow

Possible composer

From the Fiddler's Companion:

"The tune is attributed to Robert Whinham (1814-1893), a musician, teacher, composer, dancing master and fiddler originally from Morpeth, Northumberland. Dixon (1995) says there is no direct evidence linking the tune to Whinham, but older Northumbrian musicians maintain that it is Whinham’s work. Supposedly Whinham composed it while staying at the farm of a man named Armstrong, at Slaggyford, south of Alston, when the annual Flower Show was in progress, says Dixon".

# Posted on September 17th 2004 by Dow

Alston: Northumberland once, Cumbria now, miles from anywhere always..

I think I'm right in saying that Alston was in Northumberland till after the 1715 Jacobite rebellion, when that particular area was assigned to Cumberland. James Radcliffe, 3rd Earl of Derwentwiter and a prominent Northumberland Jacobite, owned the profitable lead mining area round Alston and also mines in the Lake District: following his execution in 1716, the Crown took over these mineral rights and attached the Alston area to Cumberland for, I assume, administrative convenience.

Alston's like nowhere else: isolated by high hills and long roads from anywhere else of any size at all, it seems to exist in some forgotten kingdom of its own rather than to belong to one or other of the main regions of the area. (They're altogether too far away, down the valley or over the hills..)

Before climate change, the idea of Alston having a flower show was only a little less preposterous than the idea of Spitzbergen having one.(That's a silly remark but I couldn't help making it!..) If they had it at Slaggyford it would have made sense as that's a bit further down the South Tyne valley and presumably a little more sheltered. But Slaggyford is North of Alston, not South, as a previous post suggests: South of Alston there is only the village of Garrigill and the high watershed of the South Tyne and its tributaries.

# Posted on September 13th 2006 by nicholas

I misspelt the Earl's title in the above post: it's "Derwentwiter".

# Posted on September 14th 2006 by nicholas

Got it wrong again! - it's "Derwentwiter".

# Posted on September 14th 2006 by nicholas

Something in my computer's knackered up. 4th letter from end of name is "a", not "i".

# Posted on September 14th 2006 by nicholas

Haha, it's because the moderator doesn't want you to say the word 'tw@t" even if those letters come in that order in the middle of a completely harmless word.

# Posted on March 1st 2007 by Dow

Now that's funny!

# Posted on March 1st 2007 by Conán McDonnell

"The Alston Flower Show" ~ attributed to Robert Whinham

Another transcription, with variations, courtesy of Matt Seattle, can be found here:

"Remember Me: The Fiddle Music of Robert Whinham"
Compiled and edited by Graham Dixon
Wallace Music, 1995
ISBN: 0-9511572-1-3

Page 64: "Alston Flower Show"

Here's one short example of Matt's variations as given in the book, a taster, the second time through the tune, A-part, bars 1-4 ~

# Posted on January 21st 2008 by ceolachan

More on Alston can be found here, & tunes ~

"The Alston Hornpipe"
Key signature: F Major
Submitted on January 20th 2008 by you.
http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/8165
http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/8165/comments

"The Flowers Of Alston"
Key signature: D Major
Submitted on January 20th 2008 by you.
http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/8163
http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/8163/comments

# Posted on January 21st 2008 by ceolachan

Whinham in Alston

Whinham was staying in Alston at the time of the 1891 census - lodging with someone called Elizabeth Tyndall in what might be Prout Street. (I can't read the street name).

# Posted on April 10th 2008 by LowProfile