Rather than highjack a thread, I thought it would be best to start a new thread to follow up this idea:
Working on breath control by playing tunes with leaps between the octaves
How about a few suggestions for good examples?
I’ll kick off with Ian Mackintosh of Pine House (jig)
The Belfast Polka
The Winding Road (which I know better as The Cordial Jig)
The Lisburn Lasses
The Magic Slipper
Not sure how good these would be as exercises, but they all have octave jumps in them.
To be honest, I find shorter jumps can be more demanding.
Examples?
Crested Hens
Cooley’s
O’Rourke’s
Johnny Mickey Barry’s
Bottom of the punch bowl? The first part has a couple of octave changes.
http://www.folktunefinder.com/tune.php?id=12282
Grumbling old woman with an octave fold?
https://forums.chiffandfipple.com/t/can-this-tune-be-made-whistle-friendly/62437/1
Very sorry to those who read my first post and know Ian Mackintosh of Pine House - they must think I’m mad.
I actually meant a different jig in the same set I sometimes try & play: The Family Pride.
to add a few more:
Jigs:
The Pentland Jig
Patricia Ann Douglas
Reels:
Hurlock’s Reel
Mrs Monair of Bruach
Leveneep Head
Strathspeys:
Lady Charlotte Campbell
Link Him Doddie
The above are I think all Scottish; others are posting Irish tunes so here are a couple of Tyneside hornpipes:
The Marquis of Waterford’s
The Old Church Hornpipe
Of course not all octave jumps are equally difficult; it depends on the context. I find octave down harder than octave up, especially if the note you’re coming down from is near the top of the range.
shorter leaps are harder for me too.
Reconciliation
Mooncoin jig
Dick Gossips
Dusty Windowsill
Toss the Feathers
I like Dusty Windowsills cause of the roll into the octave jump. I think it’s my favorite section of any song.
The Gravel Walks
I actually use the octave jump in Dusty Windowsills as a test with any whistle I’m trying for the first time. That’s likely my own shortcomings as a player, but if I can’t play that part relatively easily, I don’t consider the whistle a good match for me.
Mason’s Apron, for the starting notes… it’s simple, even if you do the full octave leap and not some filler notes, but it’s easy to screw up too. the jumps in the second part can be challenging too.
“Pipe Major George Allan” - “Glasgow City Police Pipers” - both by PM Donald McLeod.
“The Clumsy Lover” - by Neil Dickie.
Very common in Scottish pipe tunes, especially some of the recent compositions.
“Jenny’s Chickens” - “Musical Priest”.
Tam Lin has lots of octave leaping, as well as The Gravel Walks and Farewell to Erin.
Musical priest is a personal favorite, but I never thought of the octave jumps as difficult.
The Glass of Beer is interesting because of the octave jumps with legato tonguing (that’s what I prefer) which makes it a bit more difficult still.
Philo
‘The old grey cat’ is a beauty. Octave jump (or should that be drop?) from second octave E down to bottom E in the first phrase of the tune then a drop from middle D to bottom D.
There is a great little ascending run in the B part that goes E B F# B G B A , or even better, here’s a gif of the tune;
http://trillian.mit.edu/~jc/cgi/abc/tuneget?F=GIF&U=/~jc/music/abc/mirror/kirby98.fsnet.co.uk/ol/Old_Grey_Cat_1.abc&X=1&T=OLDGREYCAT
Edit; oops, forgot to add midi as well:
http://trillian.mit.edu/~jc/cgi/abc/tuneget?F=MIDI&U=/~jc/music/abc/mirror/kirby98.fsnet.co.uk/ol/Old_Grey_Cat_1.abc&X=1&T=OLDGREYCAT
You may have to expound on that.
What do you mean by “legato tonguing”?
If you tongue the first notes in the eighth note pairings, you’ll get a staccatto feel in the tune that seems out of place; rather tonguing the down beat eighth notes (the b notes) will retain a legato feel that works better (IMO). Look at the first measure - tongue only the last two first octave b notes, for example.
Philo
The idea of this thread wasn’t just to seek out difficulty, but to identify and work on tunes with a common factor. I’m very grateful for the suggestions made and have already worked on some new (to me) tunes.
An octave leap may actually be very easy, but still be an important part of a tune’s character, and offer the player a choice of tonguing, simply overblowing (letting the high note ‘grow’ out of the low one), or decorating with a grace note - or maybe doing something different on each repeat. I was going to paste an image here, but haven’t worked out how to do that.
Lliw Lili Ymysg y Drain (posted on the adjacent St David’s Day thread) is a beautiful tune where the octave fall is in no sense difficult but forms a key part of the tune’s appeal. How to play it most effectively is worth working on.