A couple of days ago, I got “Old Irish Folk Music and Songs,” by P. W. Joyce. It’s a c. 1900 book consisting of four collections, two of Joyce’s own, and the Pigot and Forde collections, both from the mid-1800’s. It’s got 842 sings, dances, and airs. I’m absolutely blown away by how much I like the collection. It wouldn’t be as useful for the session player as O’Neill’s, but I like it much better than O’Neill’s or Ryan’s, both due to the broader range of music and the larger print.
It was the greatest source for the Baltimore Consort’s “Mad Buckgoat,” which is why I bought it. I also recently got John and William Neal’s collection on interlibrary loan (it’s impossible to find, even on the web), but found it rather disappointing. It was a straight facsimile edition of a mid-1700’s book (a lot of it’s impossible to read), plus a lot of it is O’Carolan, which I already have, and a lot of it is also in whistle-unfriendly keys. Much of Joyce is in D, G, and C, which I can read slowly.
It’s out of print, I got a 1965 edition from a bookseller in Tampa. There were several other copies listed in Alibris and other rare/OP online shops. It ain’t cheap, but it’s really cool.