Can anyone help me transcribe John McSherry’s whistle solos on this performance of Steve Earle’s Galway Girl. He plays so many ornaments (which I wish to learn too) that I find it hard to figure out. Thanks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7-PM_4aeE4
Nothing too unusual going on there is there?
Depends on how experienced you are at playing/listening.
I suppose but it’s a very simple little melody line that you should be able to get if you ignore the rolls initially. You can put them in once you have the notes. Separating the whistle from the other instruments is probably the worst of it. It’s a good exercise to tackle if you sit down with a little e flat whistle and just do it.
You mean those bridges? Seems like he simply plays the same melody as the fiddle, maybe with one or two extra notes and an occasional roll here and there. The fiddle plays it more straightforward, so this should be easier to figure out.
Or are you asking for a transcription including every single cut- and tap-note?
Edit: x-post
There’s a dots only transcription on The Session under Galway Girl, you’ll have to work out the ornamentation yourself.
Can’t say how accurate it is though.
Best wishes for 2014
Iain
Thanks everyone. I’ll check out The Session when it’s up and running again. Maybe it’ll have the bridge section. From there maybe I can work out the ornaments from slowing the video down. Happy New year!
At 1:21?
As Gumby says, standard straightforward stuff.
With Irish whistle, flute, and uilleann pipes you learn cuts and pats, and then put them together to make rolls, short and long.
Then when you’re playing something like this (a pop song) you just throw those things in wherever they fit. Any experienced whistleplayer would do it automatically, more or less.
In places where the melody has repeated notes these can be articulated with cuts and pats instead of with tonguing, in many cases creating rolls.
Or, if the melody has a dotted eighth, or a dotted quarter, you can throw in a long roll which subdivides the dotted eighth into three eighthnotes, or the dotted quarter into three quarternotes. (The note values depend on how the song in question was written out.)
If there’s a quarternote you can subdivide it into two eighths with a cut or pat, or play a short roll (a cut on the first eighth, a pat to subdivide).
I wonder, though, what the idea of having a Texan warble an Irish song (quasi-Irish song?) is, on a programme of Irish music.
I wonder, though, what the idea of having a Texan warble an Irish song (quasi-Irish song?) is, on a programme of Irish music.
Maybe because they enjoy playing it and also because it is/was wildly popular in Ireland, first by Steve Earle, later again by Mundy and then by everybody else.
If those are the only criteria (the musicians enjoy playing it, it’s popular) then the programme can include hip hop, rap, American country music, heavy metal, and any other genre.
My point was that the programme was purporting to be an Irish thing.
I understand that. For years the song was probably the most popular song in the country, which is probably easily underestimated if you’re not here, made popular (at least partly) by the playing of Irish musicians like Sharon Shannon. As such many Irish would even consider it an Irish song.
Thanks guys.