Key signature: Dmajor
Submitted on October 11th 2001 by Jdharv.
This tune has been added to 105 tunebooks.
Also known as Gerry Beaver's Hat, Gerry's Beaver Hat, Jenny's Beaver Hat, Jerry's Beaver Hat, Johnny Pouring Guinness, Paddy Get Up, The Returned Yank, The Yank's Return.
Recordings of a tune by this name:
X: 1
T: Jerry Beaver's Hat
M: 6/8
L: 1/8
R: jig
K: Dmaj
D|DFA d2 e|fdB BAF|ABA dAF|EFE GFE|
DFA d2 e|fdB BAF|ABA dAF|DED D2 :||
d|dfa afd|gbg faf|dfa afd|cee ecA|
dfa afd|gbg faf|BdB AFA|DED D2 :||
Jerry's Otter coat
There's a very funny character who is a regular at one of the pubs I go to. He's a favorite of the session players (named Gerry) and in the winter, he comes cloaked from head to foot in an otter skin coat (he does have a matching hat by the way), and the players often launch into this very tune to herald his arrival.
# Posted on January 23rd 2002 by Kerri Brown
Hats off to Jerry
Since (really) the name of this jig is Jerry's Beaver Hat - the question has to asked (at least by a naïve American):
Are there Beavers in Ireland?
re
# Posted on June 25th 2004 by ralpheym
It's called "I Don't Know" on the "Champions of Ireland: Concertina" CD.
# Posted on April 3rd 2006 by PaddyCmusic
Irish beaver
I just identified this tune from a recording of a Randal Bays workshop, using the advanced abc search. I was beginning to think I might have to bug Dow, ceoloachan or Will again. Cheers, Jeremy!
Re: beavers in Ireland
)
(a response to ralpheym's 2-yr old query
Setting aside the American slang and obvious jokes for a moment, I can’t find any mention of beavers ever being native to Ireland. Archeology magazine recently ran an article about Castor fiber, the European beaver, in England, Wales and Scotland. It was hunted to extinction in Britain for its castoreum, an oily glandular secretion believed to have medicinal properties.
Giraldus Cambrensis (aka Gerald of Wales) c. 1146 – 1223, Norman Welsh churchman and historian, wrote in his Topographia Hibernica:
“Ireland has badgers but not beavers. In Wales beavers are to be found only in the Teifi river near Cardigan.”
That was in 1188.
Still, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn of beaver remains being discovered in a prehistoric midden somewhere in Ireland.
Bryony Coles argues in "Beavers in Britain's Past" that beavers vanished from human perception but did not become extinct on Great Britain until the later second millennium AD. By 1600 or so beaver survived only in place names, ie. Beverly.
From about 1550 until 1850, felt hats became fashionable (quite a run, that) Every properly dressed man for three hundred years wore a felt hat. Beaver fur was an excellent raw material. Beaver fur holds its shape under rough wear and successive wettings more than felt made from wool. By the late 1500's, the beaver was extinct in western Europe and was close to extinction in Scandinavia and Russia. The North American fur trade became a new source and kept the fashion going for another 200 years.
In October 2005, six European beavers were released in Gloucestershire, and there are plans for reintroductions in Scotland and Wales.
# Posted on August 14th 2007 by fidkid