I went to my first session last week and a number of people were playing tunes from a book. (The fiddler’s fake book by Matt Cranitch) I mostly play by ear but I’d like to have a book or two for reference. I did some research on the net and got overwhelmed with the possibilities. We play guitar, low whistle, fiddle and flute so I’d like a book with tunes and guitar chords. I’m not that interested in the non-Celtic tunes. I’d like a book with LOTS of tunes - a book with CDs would be nice but not necessary…Any reccomendations?
(Edit: Err, on second thought, disregard this. There’s no guitar chords involved in
these materials. I don’t know where you would find that.)
For tunes and CDs, I’d get L.E. McCullough’s 121 Favorite Irish Session Tunes.
For a -lot- of tunes, I’d get O’Neill’s Music of Ireland (Eighteen Hundred and Fifty Melodies).
There’s more than one O’Neill’s book out there, noteably the 1001 (re)arranged for fiddle. I like the original 1850 just to have as a reference.
Of course, most any tune you could name is available on thesession.org.
However, if in your particular location, everyone is using book X, you might want to also have book X, just to have the -same- version of the tune, though if you usually learn by ear, I suppose adapting shouldn’t be that hard, in most cases.
Actually 121 Favorite Irish Session Tunes added chords in the second edition. (The one that had CDs instead of tapes.)
There’s a series of books by Ossian, The Red Book, The Blue Book, the Orange Book, and the Green Book , of Irish Session Tunes.
I have all four books now, and two CDs. I haven’t actually found the CDs for the other two books (Red & Green) but hope to pick them up at Willie Clancy Week this year.
The CDs have the tunes played by Sheila Garry & Brid Cranitch.
The tunes are arranged in sets of two or three tunes per page, mostly reels and jigs, with polkas, hornpipes, slipjigs and slides too, but less common, as they would be in sessions.
Not sure if they have the Chords, but I can check tonight.
Four from Dave Mallinson publications:
100 Essential Session Tunes
100 Enduring Session Tunes
100 Evergreen Session Tunes
100 Irish Polkas
Irish Traditional Session Tunes, books 1-3 from Tony Sullivan (Halshaw Music)
All have guitar chords. Just remember, the written-down tune is just the beginning…
Cheers!
Steve
Here’s one I just recently bought… even though it’s in C, a lot of the music is still playable.. just get the right whistle in your collection. 
This book is made for “C” instruments meaning that you can have a very accurate guitarist with you, without tuning it or whatever, etc. 
Just a caution that the whole subject of putting chords to ITM is so subjective and changeable that its possible that you may find some chord adaptions very unacceptable. I know that the goal is just to play the music but I swear, 'tis a can of worms.
I heard several accompanists at our SF Tionol this weekend. At the wrap-up concert, a young feller was playing exceptional accompaniments to the tunes. It made me realize that the style has become a nearly polyphonic, ever changing addition to the tune, for better or worse.
In simpler terms, instead of hearing strummed chords at predictable places, these musicians are constantly moving, never playing the same thing twice. There are occasional chords, but its something different, and somehow in-between traditional chords, a moving bass line, and an actual countermelody (the melody moving about half the speed or less of the original tune, tho).
The answer, if there is one, is to get your guitarist to listen to some of the finer accompanists on a tune that you do have the music to already. It may start an interesting journey, if he/she like the style, into alternate tunings and a very satisfying way to use the guitar.
Not an easy answer, but I have crossed out many chords in many sheets over the years for the other Weekender to play. Developed some of my own, then after a while, erased them out and changed 'em more. Definitely a process.
I like the 121 Session tune book by L.E McCullough too. Works well with whistle and fiddle. If you get it, go thru a 'used seller ’ at Amazon: cheaper price unless Amazon has knocked the price down of late. The used one I got was new though, it’ll tell you if it is or not on the site page.
Like colomon had mentioned also does have the chord names along with 4 cds. -mike
Good stuff. I speak as a non-guitarist melody player. It’s very tempting to view all potential guitar accompanists with suspicion, and this is well-founded in many cases, but assuming we accept that (a) they’re here (b) they aren’t going to go away (c) some may have a great deal to contribute that’s good, then there are things we can do other than sitting back and letting them “sort out the chords” themselves as if that were nothing to do with the melody players. Guitarists have egos like the rest of us and the last thing they want to be doing in the session is to feel that they they are sitting in the background all night while the fiddles, flutes and boxes hog the limelight. The best accompanists often play another instrument as well, and it’s pretty good when they dump the guitar for the odd set and we can all just bang out 
the tunes with just the occasional double-stop here and there to suggest the harmony in the mind’s ear. I love that sort of session-playing. I think too that the melody-players should take an intelligent, constructive interest in what the guitarist is doing - at the very least be able to discuss chords and alternatives so that the end result feels like a collaboration to all parties. It’s not good enough to sit there and try to ignore inappropriate chords or, worse, glare at the guitarist when a clanger is dropped (guilty on both counts :roll: ). And, as you say, get the guitarist to listen to the really good accompanists on recordings. I love to hear Arty McGlynn tripping lightly yet giving a solid rhythmic foundation on the earlier Patrick Street albums or on The Fire Aflame - we’re definitely not talking chord-strumming there - but there’s a place for the “less subtle” stuff too, a la Bothy Band or Molloy-Brady-Peoples. Whatever the approach, the melody players should have an intelligent involvement in the harmony just as much as the accompanist should appreciate the nuances of the tunes. It’s an education for all the protagonists.
Steve
Yeah, I was going to mention Arty McGlynn! I bet others on Forum could compile a list of best guitarists in this style.
Artie McGlynn is fantastic. I also like John Doyle, Zan Mcleod and Dennis Cahill.
Tom
Paul de Grae
I try to be a sensitive accompanist, but almost invariably there’s been another guitarist at the session trying to fit all the tunes, including the minor key ones, into G, C, and D major chords, bashing out endless boomchuck rhythms that drown me out, and I am left feeling unable to contribute anything. :roll:
I found myself, a guitarist, resenting guitarists. So, I took up octave mandolin and now flute/whistle (though I’m not ready to take winds to sessions) and generally stick to melody unless there’s no other accompanist present, in which case I’ll switch back and forth depending on what I think the tune needs. I like playing backup as much as melody, but it’s very easy and detrimental to have too many cooks in the kitchen.
Monkey 587 wrote:
<<..found myself, a guitarist, resenting guitarists. So, I took up octave mandolin and now flute/whistle (though I’m not ready to take winds to sessions) and generally stick to melody unless there’s no other accompanist present, in which case I’ll switch back and forth depending on what I think the tune needs. I like playing backup as much as melody, but it’s very easy and detrimental to have too many cooks in the kitchen.>>
You’re one of the good guys, mate - like hens’ teeth, I’d say! I wish all guitarists were as sensitive.
Cheers!
Steve
I know Tony McManus gets mentioned a lot (deservedly!), but for a marvellous album that shows his accompaniment skills at their very best check out “Return to Kintail” on the Culburnie label, featuring his guitar and Alasdair Fraser’s fiddle (it’s basically Scottish but there’s a bit of Irish on there, and the whole thing’s definitely up our alley!).
Cheers
Steve
Monkey: I agree completely with what you said. But even if you have someone who is doing the style of accompaniment I describe ( not just folk chords), you can still have cross-purposes. At the Tionol, I was jammin’ with a zoukist and an excellent tenor guitar player (tuned DGAD). They kept running into each other and really had different ideas about a running background.
I have played guitar for the last 37 years but I am very lukewarm about using it for trad, except to do vocal songs.
Well, yeah, that’s what I meant about too many cooks in the kitchen.
I’m in San Jose, btw. I wanted to go to the Tionol to buy a whistle from Burke but didn’t have time and didn’t want to pay $50 to find out where I could buy a $130 whistle…
Well, in fairness, it was only $30 for just the Sunday. I signed up for it all and am glad I did. I knew it was the whole experience that would matter and I only missed the Friday night party. I don’t go to sessions because they are at the worst times for a person who works and has children at home (our Berkeley one begins at 9 pm on Sunday) and I don’t have the budget to go to lots of concerts, so this event was well worth the initial offering. I met and listened to exceptional pipers, got an earful of trad lore (mostly from Patrick Sky and about Seamus Ennis, Tommy Reck, Liam OFlynn and the early days of Sky’s collecting of recordings). And even if the pipers didn’t necessarily want to be my best friend, they were friendly and welcoming.
I was a little surprised that more about this didn’t come up, except on the UP Forum, but for me, meeting Mike Burke and listening to his talk on how he makes the whistles, or more properly, how they work, answered many questions that have come up here. I already knew he was a nice enough guy but his command of the physics is formidable and remind me very much of a great guitar builder friend of mine.
Unfortunately and unlike a computer show, he did not have SPECIAL pricing, so I had to ante up the full amount for a very sweet little brass Eb that I selected from a bunch. That was worth a lot. I tried four, found an almost perfect one but which had two problems. So he took another one and did something to it (he calls it “re-voicing”) overnight and gave me the choice. This is something you can’t do thru the mail realistically.
I sang praises on the UP Forum so I won’t repeat myself but plan on being at the next Tionol, Feb. 2007. And come to DanaCroms party on March 19 in San Jose. There will be plenty of Burkes to try as well as Sindts, Oriordans, and so on and so forth. Some of us can even play a bit.