Oh, like the A part of Dick Gossip, where you’ve got the GbAbGb idea? If I understand your description, you’re looking for tunes like Gravel Walk, Mountain Road, Floggin Reel, The Convenience, Boys of Ballysodare, High Reel, Glass of Beer, etc.
And yes, I just opened a tune book and looked through it, these aren’t off the top of my head.
Are you really looking for that specific a thing, or just the general pattern where you’ve got a pattern of notes which plays out against the same alternate note so that (if played properly) it’s almost like the alternate note is held throughout and the other notes are the melody? (Ack, that’s not a better way to say it, I afraid. Hope this makes sense.)
Because this is a very common pattern in Irish music, and there are lots of reels that demonstrate different forms of it. Like having a roll:
dGGG dGeG|dGGA
(that’s the opening of “Boys of Ballisodare”, the GGG pattern is usually rolled).
Or starting with a quarternote length on the pedal note:
G2BG dGBG
(which is the opening measure of about ten gazillion reels, but this time I’m thinking of “The Five Mile Chase”, which frequently follows the “Boys of Ballisodare” and also has a very nice FADA FADA pattern in it.)
I also think a nice variation is having the pedal note be higher, like in the B-part of “Down the Broom”:
g2dg egdg
Really, this sort of thing is dead common in Irish music, and if you look at any decent tunebook you’ll find dozens if not hundreds of examples.
I guess I’ve seen the term “pedal note” and the notes enough to understand what it means, but where does that term come from? Is it just a note that is repeated between notes that are changing, or is there more to it that I am missing?
That was quite helpful actually. I also looked up “drone” and I think I have the idea now. It seems odd that I didn’t connect this idea with a drone, but live and learn. It said that some classical composers, if they wanted to attain a sort of “rustic” effect, i.e the sound of a drone, would use pedal notes. Thank you! I guess I should have looked that up myself. You’re just so handy.