I really enjoy O’Carolan, and not just the Si Bheag/Irwin/Concerto “greatest hits” that seem to have the most currency nowadays. But I’m wondering how best to approach him from a performance practice perspective. His compositions obviously not straight-up trad (and I’m not even sure I’d call them “tunes” in that sense), but they’re not really “baroque” in the way most would play it. I’ve listened to a lot of different versions of his compositions, and I can’t really draw much of a conclusion. The majority are on harp (once you get past the aforementioned “greatest hits,” which show up on a ton of trad albums), and they all seem fairly different. Things like swing, whether/how to repeat parts, ornaments/embellishments, harmonization, tempi, and variations are all very different player to player. I don’t really even see any unifying characteristics or “schools,” so much as each performer’s personal styles.
So am I wrong to think that there is some way that I “should” be playing O’Carolan? Coming from a classical background (although more in opera/artsong) I feel like I should be trying to hew to a more “period” style, and I should be trying to play them as close as possible to how he might have heard them. Then again, there doesn’t seem to be much to go by, and maybe the fact that I’m playing them on whistle/piccolo in the 21st century is far enough away from his original vision (maybe not the best word for him…) that I shouldn’t trouble myself with this. The main recordings I’ve found with whistle are of Ceoltóirí Cualann, but I’m not sure how much Ó Riada is in there (I hope that makes sense), especially with the somewhat overpowering use of harpsichord.
I’m going to get the “Life and Times” book, so hopefully that’ll give me some info. But any thoughts, ideas, recordings to listen to, etc. would be greatly appreciated.
The the harping tradition was well dead by the start of the 19th century. There’s no real record of the stylistic niceties of the old harpers so it’s really anyone’s guess.
That said, hearing Carolan played simply on a small wire strung harp is an eye opener that gives that music life, depth and let’s it make sense to a degree no other instrument can.
On the whistle, any idea of real ‘authentic’ practice is a non flyer to begin with.
You can only do your best. Ignoring O’Riada is probably a good start.
A very perceptive and thought-provoking post there!
Indeed a fellow I used to play in an Irish band with, who had vast musical experience in other genres (having played with a number of major symphony orchestras in the USA, Italy, and Germany, and who “cut his teeth” playing folk and rock in the 1960s) loved Carolan and stressed Carolan’s uniqueness, saying that Carolan stands apart, being utterly unlike Irish Traditional Music as we now know it, and at the same time being quite distinct from Continental music of the same period.
It’s interesting to hear The Chieftans approach Carolan tunes more or less as if they were ITM, playing rolls and crans and so forth. An analogy that comes to mind is hearing jazz bands play pop tunes, Christmas tunes, and so forth and treating the melodies as they would any jazz standard, nativizing the tunes (if that’s even a word!)
A good whistle player I knew went further than the Chieftans, fully treating Carolan tunes as he would a Sean Nos air, with all the expressive devices, rubato, etc. The repeated High Bs of Give Me Your Hand he treated with an elegant and lovely flowing way, with cuts and pats etc.
But I’ve also heard Carolan well-served on Baroque recorder, perhaps more “authentic” than the ITM approach.
This seems to be the general consensus. I wonder how much of the “stylistic niceties” survive in pibroch and other genres that take tunes/influence from that tradition. I remember watching a presentation arguing that certain embellishments in pibroch are imitations of how harpists would have played, but it really is tough to tell going by ears and speculation.
At first I thought this, and it may still be true. But the harpists’ music, and certainly Carolan’s, seems to have made it onto other instruments even when the harp was still being played. The Neale collection is intended for violin, German (transverse, simple system) flute, and hautboy (oboe). This indicates that people were playing the music of the harpists on other instruments, and much of this would probably fall under the category of court or parlour music, played by amateurs as well as professional musicians. We also know that the harp was not just courtly tradition, and Carolan was certainly not a stranger to the pub scene. The whistle is known to have been around and played, and though it was not a high-class instrument, it would have made its way to the pub as well.
All that was to say that I’d be willing to bet that at least some of his compositions ended up being played on the whistle, as well as similar instruments such as flute and pipes, around his time. But the larger point is that we have little to no idea how they were played, so it’s sort of a moot point.
The argument could be made the whistle was at best used to play traditional music and would not have been in use among the circles the Neales (or for that matter Bunting etc) catered for. Carolan’s music was arguably not part of the traditional repertoire until O’Riada started playing around with it.
Point taken. The closest instrument to a whistle that his compositions were widely played on was probably the aforementioned “German flute,” but the whistle itself did not have much currency in the upper classes.
So beyond trying to make it sound “authentic,” anyone care to share their approaches to Carolan? Or do people not even play much of him on whistle, besides the usual tunes that show up on trad albums? I’ve heard Bach cello suites played on trombone, Handel sonatas played on guitar, etc., so even if we do think of Carolan more in Baroque terms, there is precedent for a change in instruments. And in those cases, the performers tend to still try to incorporate period aspects to their renditions.
You’ll find all sorts of approaches to Carolan, anything from solo harp, wirestrung or otherwise through traditional music approaches by various instrumentalists, accordion,. concertina, flute/whistle or pipes to Riada style ensembles right up to full baroque(-ish) takes from recorder ensembles to T.C Kelly’s orchestral Carolan Suite. Each I suppose with their own pros and cons and their own claim to validity. Sometimes they work (Jackie Daly’s treatment of Mr O Connor for example) at other times, I feel they’re just trying too hard.
As I hinted at above, for myself Carolan only really started to make sense when one night I sat down with Paul Dooley who played some Carolan on the wirestrung harp.
Mary Bergin recorded several Carolan pieces in a slightly more “Baroque” style as part of “Dordan”. By pure coincidence, I got the group’s 1st CD through eBay a few days ago, and was listening to it yesterday. I’m positive 1 or more of their CDs are available through “iTunes”, and you could buy the individual Carolan pieces without necessarily purchasing the complete albums [ although the ones I have heard are well worth having.]
Yes of course Give Me Your Hand was by Rory Dall, I’m quite aware of that. I’m using “Carolan” in the wider (and technically incorrect) sense of the output of the professional Gaelic harpers of that period.
Many of the tunes thought of as Carolan tunes may or may not have been composed by him; the “attributed” category.
Heck, there are many who believe that Toccata and Fugue in D minor was not by JS Bach, that Shakespeare did not write those plays.
(It’s hosted on a non-Youtube video site that seems to be in Vietnamese, for whatever reason it’s not on Youtube)
Interestingly, Beethoven seems to consider Carolan’s music “folk songs,” and his source was collector and publisher George Thomson of Edinburgh. And while his famous battle with Geminiani probably never happened, his music did get into the hands of a composer of slightly higher stature.
Here’s one of “Hugh Kelly,” with words by Thomson:
Beethoven’s folksong arrangements are, by the way, quite interesting and beautiful. I think most composers tend to overdo it with folk music, but his are quintessentially Beethoven while still retaining a folk-like air.
