I have only heard The Kesh Jig paired with The Leitrim Fancy, which I don’t really like. What other tunes would go with the Kesh Jig to make a good set?
~ Thornton
Thornton:
In the Houston session, we typically play Blarney Pilgrim/Kesh Jig back to back…And they play something else with kesh more rarely, but I can’t remember what off the top of my head…
Something I do when I’m working up a medly is play the song through, the Kesh, for instance, during a practice session and then pay attention to what I’m thinking as I finish it. What song pops into your mind? It’s not infallible, but it has worked for me.
Morrison’s. . .Kesh into Morrisons
Depends on if you mean before or after Kesh!
Try A minor tunes (Ten Penny Bit, Killiloe Boatman, My Love is in America etc)
E minor tunes (Swallowtail, Road to Lisdoonvarna, Gallagher’s Frolics etc)
Or D major tunes (My Darling Asleep, Connaughtman’s Rambles, Frost is all over etc) Years back when trad Irish musicians started to link tunes together, many would link tunes in the same key rather than go for the more dramatic key change (no wonder some people think there is only one Irish jig, one reel, one polka…
My friends and I make a set of (1) DonnyBrook Fair (2) Saddle the Pony, then (3) Kesh
We play DonnyBrook Fair once through very slowly with a sort of Scottish lilt, then play it again straight, but still quite slow. At the end of this we stop dead for one beat, then one instrument will break into Saddle the Pony at a reasonable tempo, but gradually getting faster as the others join in. By the time we get into Kesh it’s really pumping. We end on that high G in Kesh and stop it dead … no sustain at all … which makes a very dramatic ending which listeners love.
The Bothies put Give Us A Drink of Water after the Kesh, which is fun but a little tricky because Give Us… is a slip jig, and not a double jig like the Kesh. But it’s a classic.
Anything that suits you I would say, realising that won’t be very helpful. Try Fasten the leg in her.
The Bothy Band tune “Give us a Drink of Water” is supposedly misnamed on the cd. A self-annointed expert in my area says the tune is rightfully called The Swaggering Jig. I’ve always interpreted it as being in 6/8 time, not 9/8 (slip jig). I guess it’s where you put the emphasis; it would work either way, I suppose. (I know it works as 6/8)
Tony
Melbay’s “Celtic Back-up” book threads Blarney Pilgrim, Garret Barry’s and The Kesh into a 3 jig set. Its pretty effective.
Try this:
The Kesh
The Blackthorn Stick
Morrisons
The Kid on The Mountain
A long set but a great one
Cheers 
Gerry
On 2001-10-29 18:49, TonyHiggins wrote:
The Bothy Band tune “Give us a Drink of Water” is supposedly misnamed on the cd. A self-annointed expert in my area says the tune is rightfully called The Swaggering Jig. I’ve always interpreted it as being in 6/8 time, not 9/8 (slip jig). I guess it’s where you put the emphasis; it would work either way, I suppose. (I know it works as 6/8)
Tony
I am aware of the name confusion with Swaggering Jig. Now I have to go back and listen where they put the emphasis. 
The tune is in O Neill’s as the Swaggering jig. Give us a drink of water (for short the Drink of water)is a different tune. And the Bothy Band does play it as a slip jig, if a bit speedy one. I don’t believe 6/8 is a viable option for the tune. Haven’t tried though.
Well, call me crazy, but I tried Swaggering Jig in both 9/8 and 6/8 time. The way I play it, you can’t tell the difference. Hmm…
I’m wondering if the guitar player at our session was playing it as a slip jig while I whistled away in 6/8, neither of us knowing what the other was up to. Which reminds me of a song a friend of mine sang to me just to annoy me (to the tune of The Irish Washerwoman)So, I’ll annoy you with it:
“McGilvrie is dead and his brother don’t know it,
His brother is dead and McGilvrie don’t know it,
They’re both of them dead and they’re in the same bed,
And neither one knows that the other is dead.”
Tony
Clips](http://mchaffiewhistles.com/clipsnip/newspage.html%22%3EClips) and Snips Tunes
“When you make it to the top of the mountain, keep on climbing.” -Zen saying
[ This Message was edited by: TonyHiggins on 2001-10-30 23:53 ]
The ‘original’ Give us a drink of water was recorded by piper Patsy Touhey during the early years of the last century, coupled to Maid on the Green and Pay the reckoning (which he called Jackson’s), another change from 6/8 to 9/8. When you don’t realise you are actually making this change in rhythm it feel just that slight bit awkward, you can ‘iron out’ the differences between the two a certain extent.
I wonder if that is what you are doing as I can’t make the Swaggering jig work with any sense in 6/8 (I tried it by now)
The 9/8 starts BGG AGE DGG|BAG GFG A2|etc
Which is a clearly marked distinct phrase in 9/8, when played in 6/8 the accents start falling differently:
BGG AGE|DGG BAG|GFG A2d|BGG AGE|etc
The end of the phrase in the melody falls on the end of bar 3 but as the rhythm goes the end of the phrase should really fall at the end of bar 4 (or am I too stuck to projecting the double jig structure to the 6/8 rhythm?)which makes the end of the phrase fall on the first bar of the second phrase of the melody. . Thus you end up with an extremely awkward shift in rhythm and phrasing plus the fact you depart from the eight bar structure of the double jig.
Sorry, I just don’t see how to pull it off and still make sense of the tune or have I arrived I in full blown jibberish mode yet?
[ This Message was edited by: Peter Laban on 2001-10-31 06:30 ]
My personal favourite:
The Blackthorn Stick/Kesh/Calliope House
/Arto
You will get as many variations as there are people on the planet. My personal way to do it is to structure in key changes to make the unsuspecting publick go “mmmmmm”. Kesh (G) into Road to Lisdoonvarna (Eb) then, a two measure guitar modulation into Calliope House (D). Twists and turns, my friend, twists and turns.
Good luck.
Bob Pegritz
On 2001-11-01 09:01, Whistleworks wrote:
You will get as many variations as there are people on the planet. My personal way to do it is to structure in key changes to make the unsuspecting publick go “mmmmmm”. Kesh (G) into Road to Lisdoonvarna (Eb) then, a two measure guitar modulation into Calliope House (D). Twists and turns, my friend, twists and turns.Good luck.
Bob Pegritz
And how do you do that? Do you switch whistles to play Lisdoonvarna?
I’ve heard Kesh played a lot with Road to Lisdoonvarna and Morrison’s, however it may just be that I really like the two other tunes and therefor recognize them quicker.
Also Road to Lisdoonvarna is usually played in E Dorian or E minor which you can play on a D whistle, Never heard it played in Eb (E-flat).
Enjoy Your Music,
Lee Marsh
[ This Message was edited by: LeeMarsh on 2001-11-01 13:20 ]
Thornton,
The The Rose in the Heather, Connaught Man’s Ramble and Kesh Jig played on the Flute by Mike McGoldrick…I think?
The](http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/folk/acoustic_club/launch.shtml%22%3EThe) Virtual Session
There are some other great tune sets there as well, definitely worth a visit.
Dave.