Irish Flute Tunes

Here’s a good reel.  I must try excavating my Matt Molloy record which has this tune living in its groove.

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More potatoes

(I was trying to remember this last night and then I saw it on the Chiff and Fipple site: http://chiffboard.mati.ca/viewtopic.php?t=50746 - Fipple & Chips)

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Here’s a very common jig. The “Walsh” seems fairly interchangeable with “Welsh”. The “Tatter Jack” bit refers to “An tAthair Jack”, i.e. Father Jack.

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Here’s a popular tune which is handy on most instruments. Judging from this recording the flute mightn’t be one of them but that’s just my fault. It sounds grand on the flute when other people play it. I had a bit of bother at the end (more Fermoy Losses than Lasses) as I heard the potatoes boiling over in the kitchen when I was nearly done. There should be enough of the tune intact up to that point to be able to get the idea of it.

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Here’s today’s carbohydrate ration in a reel.

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I usually can’t remember which order the parts go in this tune.  They sort of go round and round.  Hopefully they’re OKish here.

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Here’s a reel which I think I remember being on an LP of Julia and Billy Clifford.  I just stole it from O’Neill’s 1001.  Only about another 987 to go.

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Here’s a good reel.  That’s the main thing.

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Here’s Gregg’s / Craig’s / Greig’s pipes. Surely Greig’s ones were on a church organ.

It’s a good noise making opportunity for flute players. I know there’s more to music that raucous rackets. I approach subtlety as I mature. I feel a bit of ageing in my water. I’m not sure how I feel about that feeling.

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I don’t know whether this could refer to the young Tom Ennis.

I’m starting to steal tunes from O’Neill tunes.  (158 / 1001 in this case).  I’m not nicking ones I don’t know at all but I’m having to give my memory a kick in the backside the odd time.  Sometimes this can be a fairly risk-laden manoeuvre.

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Here’s a nice jig named after a by now fairly aged Tom Ennis.

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Tunes like this used to be two-a-penny.  I think they’re now 7.1096488 a Euro.

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Here’s a nice jig.  I can’t tell you a whole pile else about it.

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Here’s a popular jig.  I’m sure I heard it on a well known record of a very recognizable musician but my memory seems to have fled my head.

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Here’s another request.  I’m afraid I don’t know it too well and I just nicked it from the notes on the net.

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I’m just after finding this mp3 file in my list.  I can’t remember anything about it.  Going by the law of averages I’ll call it Ríl Gan Ainm although I’m not 100% sure whether it’s a reel really.  When I have access to a way of listening back to it (ears and all that kind of stuff) I’ll check that I have even identified its species properly or whether I’m specifying this species speciously.

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Here’s one I was asked to play.

It sounds like Martin wins here but it sounds very unlikely that I will.  I’m a bit rusty on this tune so I looked it up.  I wouldn’t swear by this version, or at it, I hope.

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Here’s a popular tune.  It might be called “Molloy’s Favourite” but I know at least one other reel with that name but a different set of notes.  It’s probably really got the same set of notes but in a different scatter pattern.

I’m probably sounding as if I’m playing the flute with a mouthful of spiders (both in mine and the flute’s mouth).  I hope the tune is discernible amongst all the effey hisses.  Is that in Turkey?

Maybe someone can come up with a reliable name.

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This is a good insistent sort of sounding reel.

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Here’s the commonest reel of them all. I managed to make a Mess McLeod’s out of it towards the end but there are hopefully enough intact bits left to cobble a tune out of.

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This is a nice tune for the flute without too many twiddly bits. There’s a version if it in Ceol Rince na hÉireann 5, number 192.

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Here’s a very melodic jig. Mr. Jackson never let the midday pass him without his brush and his breeze.

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Here’s a good reel from the Donegal fiddle playing repertoire.

P.S. I’m sorry I’ve nothing to write about this batch of tunes. I recorded them all early this afternoon and was full of inspiration and of comments. The site was down at my time of greatest need and now, on my and its return, I’m just full of pints of stout and without a word in me to get out of me.

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Here’s a great flute tune.  There’s a version of it in Ceol Rince na hÉireann vol 5, No. (# - I hope I didn’t make a hash of my attempt to be trans Atlantic) 197.

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Here’s a tune with a great name.

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Here’s a tune I was asked to record. I looked up its name on the internet and found on www.thesession.org. I don’t know it and I’m sort of rubbish at reading music but here’s an attempt. It’s on a Kevin Crawford CD so maybe that’s a good place to go to hear it if you don’t trust this version (I wouldn’t trust me at all). I’m fairly poorly stocked in the flute CD department but I’ll maybe go out and get that one myself.

I hope this effort is of some use.

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Here’s a good standard reel which is kind to flute players.

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Here’s a jig which is found on a lot of old recordings. I doesn’t seem just as common now. I’ve yet to hear it on anything more recent than the latest Iron Maiden CD. (They made a great job of it).

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I prefer mine in a sandwich.

Here’s a nice traditional sort of tune.

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Here’s a popular three part reel. I don’t know much about it but believe it to be named after a city in the eastern part of Ireland.

I’m meant to be doing something else at the moment and so had better go and attend to that thing.

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