New publication: a second supplement to British Dance & Song essay

English, Scotch, and Irish Dance and Song: Supplement 2 was just published on Texas Scholar Works. Here is the link: supplement 2. And here is the abstract:

Another supplement to the essay English, Scotch, and Irish Dance and Song, which is primarily a documentation of rising cadence figures in dances, fiddle tunes, and songs from late eighteenth and early nineteenth century published sources. Gathered here are an additional 70 examples taken from files downloaded in May and June 2017.

New essay published: supplement to British Isles essay

I have published a new essay on Texas Scholar Works: English, Scotch, and Irish Dance and Song: Supplement. Link.

Here is the abstract:

A supplement to the essay English, Scotch, and Irish Dance and Song, which is primarily a documentation of rising cadence figures in dances, fiddle tunes, and songs. Gathered here are another 50 examples found in files downloaded on 2 May 2017. These were the coincidental result of a search for more information on Nathaniel Gow, the son of the famous Scottish fiddler Niel Gow.

Essay on British Isles Dance and Song

I have published an essay titled English, Scotch, and Irish Dance and Song: On Cadence Gestures and Figures. It can be found on Texas Scholar Works: link.

Here is the abstract:

This is a documentation of ascending cadence gestures in some 260 songs and dances from the British Isles, taken from eighteenth and nineteenth century sources, with some emphasis on collections for practical use published between about 1770 and 1820 and on the later ethnographic collections of P. W. Joyce and the anthology of Francis O’Neill.

Celtic series, part 3

This post continues the small sampling of items from a documentary essay I am now preparing and hope to publish by end of the month.

I've established four categories to discuss here. They are: (1) simple examples of rising lines, with appropriate focal tones; (2) play of registers common in—and congenial to—the violin; (3) "long" cadences where the lower and upper registers are connected by a stepwise sequence; (4) modal tunes, or tunes showing a modal heritage.

Today's topic is category (3), or "long cadences," though topic (2) also plays an important role in each of the tunes below.

Two versions of "Lady Binning" differ in a number of details. At (a) the Scotch snap rhythm puts equal emphasis on C#5 and E5, but the first phrase (that is, bars 1-2; the strathspey, recall, is played in a slow tempo) clearly focuses on C# (as ^3). In the consequent, however, the same gesture at (b) gives an opportunity to change focus to ^5 and engenders the rising cadence figure.
The registral pairing of lower, then upper, is reversed in the B-section--see (c) and (d)--and this time a simple third-line C#5-B4-A4 concludes the theme (see the fourth box in the third system). But the real point of interest for this post is the variant at (e), which charts either a rising octave scale (starting at A4) or, if you wish to begin with C#, a sixth.

In this version from another source, C#4 as focal note in the first section is even more obvious (box in bar 1 shows the variant that's responsible), but note the two endings: the first in the lower octave, where one might even imagine an implied B4 (as ^2), the second being the same in the first version above. The B-section is essentially the same.

From a mid-19th century source, two versions of the same tune, cast in a slow-fast pair (strathspey-reel). Here again, a strong emphasis on the two registers--upper, then lower--in the B-section ends with a charting through the entire octave. Note also the "one-too-far" stretch to B5, corrected with the Scotch snap, at the very end.

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Celtic series, part 2

Recently I began a series based on a small sampling of items from a documentary essay I am now preparing and hope to publish by end of the month.

The four categories for this series are: (1) simple examples of rising lines, with appropriate focal tones; (2) play of registers common in—and congenial to—the violin; (3) "long" cadences where the lower and upper registers are connected by a stepwise sequence; (4) modal tunes, or tunes showing a modal heritage.

Here I continue with tunes that mix categories (1) and (2).

"The Runaway Bride." A jig. This may be a good moment to note that, as with the many old English and French country dances, titles usually have little if any obvious relation to their music (unless texted, of course). At (a) a simple line creates focus on B4 (^3) but the register jumps upward at (b) in the violinistic pattern I describe in the first post. In the consequent phrase (a) is repeated but (b) is transformed at (c) into a simple rising cadence. The same registral pattern is repeated at (d) and (e).

"Donald Dow." Here I can thank the Highland Music Trust (link) for making available a number of collections transcribed via music notation programs (link to free downloads page). "Donald Dow" is a strathspey that could be nothing other than a violin tune. I have parsed the registers in this initial example (thicker rectangles with downward or upward pointing arrows).

As in "The Runaway Bride," the upper register follows and enables a rising cadence gesture. The strong "violin fifth"—though F4-C5 here, not open strings—with its repeated neighbor D5 (at (a) below) creates a focal tone C5 and so what I call a "primitive rising line" ^5-^7-^8, as C5-E5-F5 (beamed).

As in "David Grady's Reel" (see the first post in the series), every phrase ends with this cadence. Phrases 3 & 4, however, alter the earlier part of the phrase to make a space of the triad—at (b) and (c)—or A4-C5-F5, and by this means F5 becomes the focal note. An interesting moment at (d) brings a bit more emphasis to the bottom of the triad, so that one can hear—and in some variation a player might very well literally generate—a subsidiary line A4-G4-F4. See my small added notes in parentheses at (e).