Are there tunes that are specifically “fiddle tunes” or “for pipers only, all others will be towed”? I was thinking for example of tunes with crans in them. I am told that crans have come into tin whistle playing from piping so it would seem like these tunes were not traditionally played on the tin whistle.
Comments?
Well, I don’t know, but just cuz a tune gots a cran doesn’t mean a fiddle or box or whatever can’t play it. They just might play something other than a cran in that spot.
I was under the impression that pretty much all whistle ornaments
are from the piping tradition, since the pipes were around way
before the whistle as we know it today.
There are certainly tunes that lie better on the flute than on the
fiddle and vice versa, but they don’t exclude those instruments,
they’re just more of a challenge.
I do know that there are certain recordings for me that, when dominated by an instrument I do not play, can sometimes be difficult for me to transfer to the whistle quickly when learning by ear. A good example of this is accordion tunes. The instruments have such unique inherent characteristics to the way they operate and speak. I would imagine that if a tune was written by an accordion player, or someone who just thought of the music in terms of the accordion, that it would not be as natural for a whistler to pick it up as, say, a tune written by a flute player. I do know that there are certain tunes that I just like better when played by a fiddler, piper, what-have-you, although I can’t think of any specific examples at the moment. Fiddles are one of the easiest instruments for me to play along with and that may just be because, outside of the instruments I play, it is the instument I’m the most acquainted with and have been around the most. I have definitely known tunes that were (technically speaking) easy to play on the fiddle but more challenging on the whistle in terms of phrasing and finding natural spots to breathe. There have also been times at the academy that I suggested tunes for a new whistle player to play because they were easy to start with and had the fiddlers say “are you serious, that one’s a bugger to play!”
I wish I knew enough tunes to say.
But when I’m learning a new tune, I pick it on guitar first. Some tunes pick easier than others. I’ve just had a go with Willafjord and Spootiskerry, and, because the fingering is so natural on the guitar, I’m inclined to say they’re fiddle tunes. Because the top four guitar strings are tuned the same as a fiddle. They play nicely on the whistle, but they seem like fiddle tunes to me.
Recently learned The Home Ruler and The Glenbeigh which didn’t seem quite so natural on the guitar - in fact, The Glenbeigh does nicely up the fretboard, but I don’t know how you’d fiddle that. So they seem more like pipe/whistle tunes to me.
Then again, there are tunes which seemed to fit more naturally to the whistle, and while I was pondering that, I came across variations which were “fit” for fiddle. Let’s face it, if there’s tune that catches my ear and I can’t play it the way the fiddler plays it, I’ll tweak the tune just so I can play something like it. And if the dots go where the whistle won’t, then I’ll wing it with whatever sounds closest.
So yes, there are tunes which seem “fiddle” tunes and “whistle” tunes - but there are always variations. “Two sides to every story and eleven versions of every tune.”
You have them tuned in fifths? GDAE? What are the bottom two strings?
Mu
Because of the intensive regulator work, I believe “The Fox Chase” is a tune generally regarded as 'Pipes Only, all others need not apply."
In my mind I tend to see “Colonel Fraser’s” as a tune that can be played on other intruments, but just sounds the absolute best on the pipes. I’ve heard Niall Vallely play it on the 'Tina, and it just didn’t sound to me like the Colonel Fraser’s I’m used to.
Maybe I’m tuning my fiddle wrong…
…that would explain a lot…
Fox Chase is designed to keep the pipers occupied while the musicians who can easily put down their instruments take a restroom/smoke/pint break.
“Top” is a relative thing.
crans are ornaments. ornamentation is strictly a personal thing. they have nothing to do with whether a tune is written/designed for the pipes or whistle or fiddle. your basic ornamentation is pretty much universal across most ITM instruments: cuts, rolls, triplets, etc. ornamentation is no way to tell if a tune favors one instrument over another.
some tunes just sit better on a certain instrument. some tunes sit equally well. And some tunes are no doubt played on a certain instrument by tradition, and have nothing to do with ease/difficulty.
There are many fiddle tunes in the key of A. Whistles, flutes, and pipes tuned in D have a hard time playing those G sharps. An example would be The Foxhunters Reel in A.
-Casey
Thanks Chiffed- you’ve hit it. It’s obvious I don’t play the fiddle, but I do have one, and tune it. Mainly I have the bow for the mountain dulcimer. But I like to keep the fiddle in tune. It was my mother’s.
of course, there are also a lot of tunes that are Scottish bagpipe tunes in A. many of those made their way over to Ireland and became fiddle tunes. Traditional bagpipe tune from one country played as traditional fiddle tunes in another country. Although the key of A is not the fiddle-friendliest key, either. G, D, and their relative minors are easiest, just like the whistle. C and its relative minors isn’t too bad, either, then A, followed by the flat keys.
One could say that the Bb tunes are traditionally played on a Bb whistle. You have to compare the same tune played in the same key but on different instruments. Can’t compare apples to oranges.
I love fiddle tunes in A major.
Plenty of room for double stops and octave stuff..not to mention that you get the chance to streeeeeeech out your pinkie on the high B.
The Masons Apron, and Colonel Rodney are two that spring to mind.
Slan,
D.
Mason’s Apron? For me, at least, I’d classify that in Highland Pipe tunes. I’ve heard fiddles play it, and I’ve heard GHBs play it, and I must say that on the GHB it sounds more natural, at least past the first part. The first iteration of Mason’s Apron sounds acceptable on most any instrument, however in my mind it takes a GHB, with its more pronounced lower hand and “hornpipe-strike” embellishments that really hammer those 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and sometimes, 5th, 6th, and 7th parts down.
Lexxicos,
Have you ever heard Seán McGuire play “The Mason’s Apron” on the fiddle, by any chance?
Blasphemously, I’ve heard that the Mason’s Apron may have started life as an English tune.
There are certain tunes that simply scream out “pipes!” like mad in Irish Traditional Music–particularly with very old tunes like Fraher’s Jig and Humours of Ballyloughlin where you’ve got a D mixolydian scale and that flat seventh really, really is prominent. My opinion is that old jigs like those and a handful of others likely contain elements of compositions that were originally intended for the piob mhór and/or the harp as they have very clear parallels–the cranning on D at the end of each part being very similar to the echoing beat on A found at the end of a line in the ùrlar of a ceòl mór piece. Also with a lot of these early tunes, (say, late-18th century or so) uilleann pipes were perhaps the instrument of choice as the standard of fiddle playing in the pre-Famine era was not thought to be generally all that high.
A lot of tunes in keys like Bb and G minor are thought of as definite fiddle tunes, but at least a few of them came about from fiddle players hearing pipers playing on flat sets and rather than retuning the fiddle, just learning the tune in whatever key it sounded in.
At any rate, there are certain tunes that sit more comfortably on certain instruments than others or provide greater scope for certain characteristics (i.e., cranning, double stops, really honky diaphragm pulsing on the flute) but an adventurous piper or flute player can take a fiddle or box tune and put a unique piping stamp on it and vice versa.
Do you have any examples of these tunes? 