Yeah, I guess I wasn’t quite right when I said that I’ve seen descriptions of jigs and reels but not “planxties”.
I guess what I meant more clearly (I hope) was, I’ve seen in various beginner resources descriptions of the rhythmic types of songs, but not so much the other kinds of categories, such as laments, “planxties” etc.
I’m just a beginner. I’ve had a whistle now for 2.5 weeks and enjoy it a lot, although I’m learning that I’m having a heck of a time hearing things right and an even harder time making my fingers do what I can barely hear! And just when I think maybe I’m getting it, I hear more stuff in the song that I missed and have to start all over! I’m trying to learn Planxty Irwin.
Another source for the word Planxty just for the hell of it:
From the liner notes the Chieftains album The Celtic Harp: (my favorite of the Chieftain collection)
“The term “planxty” as used by Carolan [Turlough O’Carolan, (1670,-1738). the last of the great itinerant harper-composers], is thought to be based on Latin and its exact meaning has mystified the scholars, some of whom think it to be a form of salute.”
I’ve always wanted to know about the origon/meaning of planxty as well. Very interesting…
I’ve decided you can throw any two numbers together and call it a time signature- 12/8, 5/9, 3/4, 4/3, 9/8, ect…
Unfortunatly, there are rules for makingp time signatures. things like “5/9” are somewhat “not musically correct” as far as I know. But I’ve been wrong before…
Ordinarily, yes, but there are other world traditions that can be very strange to the western ear indeed. Some Eastern music as well as African rhythms can go places we are not used to.
I’m kinda drifting here, but about the time signature issue. In Western music, the top number can be anything (technically) other than zero. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it go past 17 or 18. The bottom number can be 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, or 256 (I’m seeing a pattern here). I guess it could also be 512 or 1024, but I don’t think I could do the math to play it.
I think pretty much anything of time signnutures is possible, i have a book of odd meter etudes, and some of them are very odd. I think that there there a quite a few jigs that are in different times as well.
Quote:
so is a planxty similar to a lament?
Not sure how you mean that, if you mean are they slow and solemn, no they’re not, they’re usually -for want of a better word - quite jolly.
no by that I meant that they are both written for a reason, or for someone, as the deffiniton that someone had, a salute, so I guess if you want to write a song for someone, and its not for a sad reason, it could be a planxty?
