I’ve learned (basic shape of) The Earl’s Chair recently, as it’s certainly one of the Top 40 session tunes around here. It’s also one that tends to be played at breakneck speed. My question is, What do y’all do with the fast same-pitch triplets that occur in it? I’d play rolls but I just can’t roll that fast–maybe my fingers are too old. I’d just like to know how others handle it.
If I’m on autopilot I roll 'em all. Except d, which I double cut or pseudo-cran.
To avoid rolls, get creative and/or simplify. E.g.
B2dB BAFA|B2dB BAFB|AFdF DFdF|AFdB ADFA|
B2dB BAFA|B2dB BAFB|AFAB defd|edef d3z:|
e3f d3f|e3f dBAf|e3f dcde|fedB ADFA|
egfd eBAB|gBAB defg|afbf afeg|fedB A3z:|
Or (B-part):
dJe-{a}ef dcdf|dJe-{a}ef dBAf| … etc.
Interesting suggestions. At sessions speeds those rolls just turn to slush, so I sometimes cheat and just throw in a…mordent, I guess. Feels inauthentic but until I can get the rolls to work it’s the best I can do. But your modification might sound better; I’ll experiment. I tried triple-tonguing but it sounds wrong; kinda like I’m trying to be Brian Finnegan but failing badly.
|AFdF DFdF
Wouldn’t it be easier, and possibly more idiomatic, to do something like AFFE DFFA BAdB BAF —
For the second part maybe something like deeB d2 (3Bcd edef dBA
Many ways to skin a cat I suppose. When I hear terms like ‘breakneck speed’ used, I tend to think you may just be going to the wrong type of session.
I just silently fingered through it and I don’t seem to be doing any triplets at all.
That’s always a choice, whether to go B > d straight or to play a B>c#>d triplet.
I really like this guy’s version. He has triplets all over the place in the 2nd part
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4ju_maYHFk
Not on whistle but on pipes, a video I did a while back showing various approaches to that tune. I pretty much play it the same on the whistle (up until I get to the staccato stuff!)
Have a listen to the Chris McMullen video that Pancelticpiper linked. That’s the speed I’m talking about, at one particular session, especially on this tune. Sometimes I get the feeling that tunes such as The Earl’s Chair and Cooley’s are so boring (due to familiarity) to the experienced players that the only way to make them interesting (to them) is to accelerate.
Anyway, at that speed, my rolls don’t make it out of the oven.
Fair enough, I think that was a bit on the fast side but maybe not all too extreme.
If the company’s only way to spruce up a tune to avoid ‘boredom’ is to accelerate (instead maybe of looking for real ‘lift’), I would still consider it time to move on. But maybe that’s just me. Overall it never good to play in company that drags you along beyond a point where you can still enjoy it.
Probably stupid question: Why play that fancy stuff at all then?
I think sometimes a plain quarter note sounds good, too… and not only when played because it’s too fast.
Like most things, the long note looses it’s impact when applied all the time. Variation is the spice of life.
Sure, why not. But I do like the way the d’s pop out in this figure, with a little push of the breath, if you have the right kind of whistle. 
Many, many solutions. It’s fun to explore melodic “paraphases”. And if I were playing this in session and deliberately trying to avoid rolls, and the other players were doing the canonical rolls, I very well might play something different every time through. The “clash” of different approaches to those long notes can, itself, be somewhat idiomatic.
Yes, he’s actually playing at around 116 bpm in that video. Which is, generally speaking, well within the normal range for reels.
Again, normal range. Hardly breakneck.
Yes, which is what I wrote in my ABCs above - plain dotted quarters. A little finger-waving vibrato on a held note can sometimes be as expressive as anything else you might do with it. The keyword being “sometimes”, as Gumby implies.
But thinking in terms of “fancy stuff” and, I guess, “non-fancy stuff” is wrong. You have an inventory or toolkit of various things you can do. And not rolling is just as fancy as rolling - IF it’s an artistic choice, and not simply a cop-out because you can’t manage to execute rolls.
Which raises the untouched OP point. Ubizmo, those F# rolls in the A part, and the e rolls in the B part, are among the very easiest rolls to execute. And if you can’t manage those at normal speed, your better solution is not to avoid them but to master them. And I’m not going to let you off the hook with the “old fingers” excuse. If you can execute mordents properly at speed, you have the chops for the rolls. Practice.
Touché! 
Oh well, yes. The OP said they can’t play certain ornaments at the speed they play the tune. So I suggested simply not to play them, which can sound good as well. Maybe “fiddly” would be a better word than “fancy”, though.
Try AFF2 DFF2 with a cut between the FF until the rolls come to you, would be more natural to the reel pattern
MTGuru is 100% right that those (we’re talking about bar 3 in the tune, right?) are among the easiest rolls to play. And what he didn’t say was that basic pattern is very common in reels.
So, when I read this thread and realized what bit of the tune we were talking about, my initial response was that I pack all my variation into the first two bars and then run the third bar with the rolls on autopilot. Then I snuck off into a far corner of the house to try it and discovered instantly that I tend to play it A~F3 DFzF, with a breath on the rest and the last F as the pickup into the next measure.
Thank you for all the suggestions, which reaffirm my belief that there is something wrong with my execution of these rolls. I agree that the roll on F# is one of the easiest to play, so it’s something in my timing that’s causing problems.
Yes, it’s the third measure of The Earl’s Chair. Without ornamentation, the notes are AFFFDFFF, in eighth note rhythm. The way I try to play it is rolling the 2nd and 3rd Fs, making a triplet instead of an eighth note pair.
Question: Do you tongue the cut that starts the roll, on the 2nd F? I tend to do so; maybe it’s slowing me down?
A couple comments were made which imply things counter to my experience with playing this music.
One suggests that rolls are difficult to execute at full speed, another that rolls are ‘fancy stuff’ of questionable value in reels played at full speed.
For sure speed comes with practice! Once rolls are under your belt, though, and can be executed automatically on any note, I think they make it easier to play fast!
Because a long roll is happening where the melody is parking on a note for the duration of a dotted quarternote. The more of these parking spots there are, the easier the tune is to play up to speed, for myself anyhow.
Rolls aren’t ornaments or fancy stuff in my opinion, but rather the gears which keep pushing the rhythm forward when the melody is pausing on long notes.
Seems that for many people rolls that divvy up the work between the two hands are easier to do up to speed, rolls on E, F#, and G where the cut can be done with the upper hand and the pat with the lower hand.
A and B rolls require more practice with many learners because all the work must be done by the same hand.
That passage AF’F,F DF’F,F is as easy as it gets, right in the wheelhouse of the whistleplayer or fluteplayer or piper. (I put in ’ for a cut and , for a pat.)
As you’re obviously referring to my earlier post: I did not at all say or imply that rolls are of questionable value.
If you’re objecting to my cheeky choice of words, I just want to clarify that this was not meant to suggest a valuation.
I guess I misunderstood.
“Why play all that fancy stuff then?”
Assuming the question isn’t rhetorical, and is literally asking the ‘why’ of playing rolls, it’s because rolls are integral to the tunes, and are the gears that churn and keep the tunes moving along.
Actually, I’d like to be able to play the rolls in The Earl’s Chair. I was asking what others here do, because I’m experiencing a problem playing them correctly at tempo. I now have some suggestions about substituting less challenging ornamentation, or simply doing without ornamentation in those passages. Those suggestions are appreciated. In fact, my own workaround of playing a mordent instead of a roll is at least passable. But really, I think the rolls sound great there, and it feels as if the tune was created with the intention of rolls being played there.
Now, I just need to discover what’s going wrong in my execution of the rolls. I think this tune is unmasking something that I need to work on, but I’m not yet clear on what it is.
Incidentally, I realized that I experience the exact same difficulty in another tune, “The Burning of the Piper’s Hut,” in which the B part is the same as the A part, except for the addition of some rolls on E.
I can’t thing of any jigs where I have a problem executing rolls, so it may just be that it’s the rhythm of the reel that’s throwing me off, for some reason.
Not whistle, but flute – Jack Coen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvdMD5UDoOM
A lot of fancy stuff here, but virtually no rolls… and still some good lift.
Sort of interesting he’s quite literally doing a Micho Russell there. Nothing I would consider particularly fancy in it though. Pleasantly simple and rhythmic I’d say.
I was thinking about Coen (at least I think it was him) earlier as he was quite particular about the Earls Chair and how it should be played correctly.