Irish Flute Tunes

The Wren Hornpipe

Here's another tune from O'Neill's Dance Music of Ireland. I hadn't noticed it before, despite its being there since 1907. I don't remember ever seeing a wren either. Maybe because they're so small.

 

Peter Wyper’s Hornpipe

Here's a tune called Peter Wyper's hornpipe.  It is named after one of the Brothers Wyper who is pictured above.   I had intended posting a smaller brace of Wypers but couldn't find the shrink button to resize the photo.  You could look at the photo on a smartphone screen to make it small but I think the text would go all exiguous at the same time.

The Humours of Ballyconnell (hornpipe)

Here's a new post after a very long gap.  I couldn't remember where I left the internet.  I was sent an mp3 file of someone playing this tune far better that it is played here.  I know that Séan Keane recorded it at some stage and hear it from time to time in sessions but I can't remember exactly how it goes.  I found a transcription in the bit of the internet referred to below.  I'm afraid I've lost / mis-ordered a few notes during the eye to mouth process but here's an approximation - hopefully enough to get a more accurate and diciplined person started learning the tune. http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/2748

The Home Ruler (hornpipe)

Here's another request from long ago.  I don't think the tune's title refers to a domestic measuring tool.

Higgins’ Hornpipe

I've just been asked to play this tune so here it is.  I'm not too sure how reliable this version is but it is maybe a bit closer to the version common in Ireland than the version on another website near you.  I think it mightn't originally be an Irish tune so maybe the funny version is the normal version where the funny version comes from and the normal version is maybe ... etc. This is also known as "The Cliff Hornpipe".  Whether that's the Cliff of "Summer Holiday" fame, I don't know.

Mulqueeny’s Hornpipe

Here's one I wasn't asked to play.  I wasn't asked not to play it either so as it doesn't seem to be here already I thought I'd give it a go.  I think I was half the age I am now when I last played this tune and if I live to be twice the age I am now I'll either have too few teeth or too much sense to play it again. There's a touch of a farting in the bath sound about it.  Maybe it's more of a windpipe than a hornpipe.

Johnny Cope (hornpipe)

Here a very long hornpipe which I've been asked to play.  I maybe played it a bit too fast the second time around but as it has so many parts I had to rush to finish it before the shops shut. (This version is vaguely like the one in Ceol Rince na hÉireann Vol. 3 - No. 208)

The Little Stack of Wheat (hornpipe)

Here's a tune I've been asked to play.  I think there are various cereal crops piled up in hornpipe names.  In these straitened times maybe a little stack is the most appropriate choice for the days that are in it ... innit'?

The Mathematician (hornpipe)

1 + 1 = ????? Never could add up (or hit a high 'A' - worried about hiatus and all that stuff).

The Sunset (hornpipe-ish)

Here's a tune from a list of ones I was asked to play. I learned it years ago as the "Flying Rockets" / "Robert Emmett's Flying Spaceship". As is the case with sunsets (I think they require the sun to be in the sky at the start of the setting process), I haven't heared tell of this tune for a long time.  I hope I've remembered most of the notes.

The Stack of Barley (hornpipe)

Here's a very common hornpipe. I'm sorry about the sound. I listened back to it (I normally don't) and it sounds as if I recorded it in a particularly cavernous public lavatory. May it was the same one in which some 1970s record companies used to record their traditional music LPs.

The Stage Hornpipe

I've been asked to try this one.  Well, at least I tried.  I sort of learned it once off a Michael Coleman record but I don't have that record any more so I'm relying on memory; never a wise move in my case.