Sceala 0 Chums nn Cheol Newslett e r of the Folk Music

Sa mhain 1978

C ONT ENTS :

Th e Eireann Society of Ireland

November

Annual General Meetin g 2 "The Sam Henry collecti on " 2 "Irish traditional music in the

markst- placs" 4 hecti ti on s re 6 Decen tralisation ot Hon.Treasurer 1 O'Farrell 1 "A phi losophical survey of the

South of I reland" 8 Paper chase 16 Sam Hen ry agsin 11 "Songs of the Wexfo~ coast" 18 Record reviews 19 Members' activi tiee 20

Sa turday 9 December at 8 p . m. Power' s Ho tel , 41 Kildare St , Dublin 2

ALL EN FELDMAN

"Ki tchen musi c : fiddling and fi ddlers in

South-Wes t Done gal "

AlIen Feldman is an Ameri can traditional mus­i cian who has been collec t ing fiddle music under the auspices of the Northern Ire land Ar ts Council. He has sdited a selec t ion of J ohnny Doherty' s music which will be pub­lished by Blackstaff Prese in the Ne .. ' Ye a r .

Recent me e tin gs

A NN U AL GENERAL MEETING

'fhe Annual General Meeting wae held on 10 June 1918 in the United .'i rt s Club , Upper Fi t zwilliam St , Dub­lin 2 . The fol lowing committee was elected: ' Ssoi r­s s Rodley Cha i rman, Tom .unnelly Hon . Treasurer ( ~ e e p . 1), Nichol as Carolan Hon. Secre t ary , Brean­dan Breathnach, Frank Harte , Al r Mac Lochl a inn, Proi ns ias 6 Conl us in, Hugh Shields , Ca i tl!n u1 Ei­geartai gh. J ohn Moulden (Port rusb , co. An t rim ) was co-opted t o the committee a t e. s ubsequent me et­ing.

After t he adopt ion of t he Tr easurer' s r eport and secretary ' s re port, dis cuesion centred on the ques­t ion of a venue for the meetings of t he comi ng s eas­on and a suitabl e prog r amme for the season. I t was decided to l eave the s ubscription r a t es at their pres ent level : (2 . 50 f or i ndi viduals, ( 3. 00 f or two individuals of one family , (1.50 f or f ull- t i me students, [5 cor porate membership.

The meeting was fo l lowed by an O{che Cheoil t o which members and their friends contri buted.

THE s , • HEN R Y CO LLEC T I O N

Between 1~23 and 1939 , the Coleraine weekly news­Paper The Nort he rn Constitution published a series of articles entitled ' Songs of t be People' wbich contAins. among other ma terial , the words and lDusi c of somf' €"f0 En glish-language folk s ongs from tradi­tional ~ ls ter sources with notes on thei r sources and hi s t ory . !"bout 500 of the se were collected and edited by g8m !1enr y, a Coleraine official of the In l an,~ ~t' venue a nd an enthu siast for Uls ter folk­lor f' , r h'" ini hator and prime mover of the series. Hi p; (".:-ll t' ~ ti on ccns ists of the news pa per fi l es of t he ~ e ~~n fs . t ogether with various lib rary co piss of t !; (' ~ t":-i es a nd his remainin g pers onal pa pers. Thep;e :~ ~, . 1000 s ides of pape r in all , include

-C e e l T { re , 1 )

un publi s hed s on gs, variants of published ones, cor­res pondence from intormants , and notes on singers and their re per tories.

) -John Moulden is in the process of sifting the en­

tire Henry coll ection and haS edited a first selec­tion of 100 songs from it, t o be published ea rly next year . At the Society's first meeting of the 1978-79 seaS on, held on 30 September in Buswell ' s Hotel, Moleswo'l'th s t, Dublin, he gave a work-in-progress report on the col l ection and il l us trated it with his own singing of some of the s ongs.

Henry first became interested in traditional song when work as an old-age- pension officer brought him into con t act with old singere in t he North Uls ter area. Hi s sociability and enthus iasm stimulated c on tributions and ths wide in t erest evoked by his column encouraged informants to kee p him supplied. He tri ed for songs that were I rish, ' of tbe old t ype ', and 'real' rather tha, sentimental. About a t hird of his songs are l ocal, a higher pr oportion tban i s usual in collecti ons, while another third are gener al Irish songs and t he remainder British or Am erican. The us ual song ty pes a re present with t he exoeption of politicsl and bawdy songs.

The collection is important mainly as a source of songs t o sing, but also as a record of the repertory of No rth Ulster singers in the early decades of this oen tury. It is not valuabl e, however, as a record of how the songs were sung. As a necessary conse­qu ence of newspaper publ icati on t he texts were col­lated and only skeletal versions of the airs are given. There are many typographical errors in t he ton ic solfa notation . The series is popul ar rather than scholarly.

Henry ' s aim was to put the old songs i nto the mouths of the people, an d t o s ome e~tent he succeed­ed. Cut ti ngs fr om the Paper functioned like ballad sbeets in the locality an d versions that s eem to de ri ve fr om them a re still sung . When Henry died

, R e c e n t m eetin g s

25 years ago he was bitter at hi s f ailu r e to have his songs published in book form. But in recent years recognition of the collection's importance has come as singers and scholars mine it for mat er­ial, and more of his songs will be returning t o cir­cUlation as a result of John Moulden's work.

I R ISH TRA D ITIONAL M U SIC

I N THE M ARK E T P LAC E

There ie always professiona l as well aB non-profess­ional i nvolvement 1n traditional music. While the no~ profesaional' s r9"'8rd i s his own per sonal satis­faction in musi~making and it a rscogni ticn by the community , the professional also seeks the more tan­g ible reward of money or payment in kind. The ef­fect tha t this has on the nature and development of Irish traditional music was the subject of a panel discussion at a meet in~ 'n 11 November in Bus.ell's Hotel, Dublin. Breandar, Breat hnach, Ri obard Mac Gorain of Ga el-Linn and Ciar~ Ma c Ma thUna of RTE discussed the whole conne ct ion b s two sn c ommerce and Irish folk music.

Breandan Breathnach deal t with historical aSpectS . An elevent~century des cription of an as sembly at Carman includes mention of professional mUsicians : people of inferi or status whose function ill society was to provide music. The more they pleased their Patrons, the higher wes their reward. The harpers et the Gaelic court s were in the same tradit i on as these, although wi th the seventeenth-century disap­pearanca of the system of aristocratic patronage they had to turn to more popular forms of music. In the eighteenth an d early ninet eenth cent uries every country district had its Own profe s t ional piper playing in the open air on Sundays and holydays. Music was an honourable profession for th e blind or the lame. Players were pai d at the end of eve ry da nce or at t he en d of 8 night, and som e time:: at t he end of a s eri es of dance s . Dancing-m<,s ters

C e 0 1 T ! re , 1 3

were accompanied by t heir pipers or fiddlers gnd sh'l red their fees with them. In t he l(! te nilletf'ent h celltury many traditional mus icians made g' onrl livings on the American stage. This period saw t~e rise in Parts pf the country of ' maypoles' t dancing- booths owned by local ent re preneurs to whi ch adm i ss ion wss charged . These in time evolved into the commercial da nce halls.

«iobard Mac C~rain spoke on recor ding traditi onal music and its ancillary a ctivities . ",,'hen GRel-Li nn started publishing r ecords in the early 1950s the response was small , but a growth in sales came in the urban a reas with a growth of interest, largely as a result of the work of Sean 6 Riada. Irish re­cor d sales are small 1 1,200 is a break- even point for the normal LP and the t otal annual turnover i s abou t £10 million. Tradi t i onal LPe sell s t eadily but slowly and generally cover costs in 2-5 years . They comprise under five per cent of the t otal mark­et, and it i s therefore hard to ge t shops to give them prominence . A phen omenon of r ecen t yesr e i s the full-t ime traditional musician who derives bis incoms from records, r adiO , television and concerts , a perfectly honourable way of life in keeping with earlie r Irish traditions . Mus ic must grow or de­cli ne , and if it 1s to grow then ful l- time playere ere needed. They must sell their records abroad and must be seen l ive there fo r their records to sell. This foreign pr omotion Cannot be handled by the smal l Iri sh companies and there is a danger tha t foreign promoters will put preseure on musi­cians to change their sty lea. If more support i s given to profesaionals in this country t hey will be enab led t o resist corruption and deve lop the mu­sic with integrity.

Ciar~n ~ac WathUn a ta lked about the collec ti ng of traditional music for broadcasting. The mus i­ci an playing f or others has a lways been a person apa r t , rewarded in different ways. The first r~Q.

iO col l ectors , for legal r easons, had to P3Y musi-

6 .j ecent me etings

---------------~-Cians a t leas t a n:lminal cash fee . Later t hey were allowed to offer on-the-spot hosPitality, and t h i s is t he f orm of reward most app reciated . With tel e­viSion, fees were hi gher and closer to those of the commercial musician. To an extent, bro~dcaa ting has spoiled the scene for other collectors . Some musicians feel that they have a product for sale and hold out for large fees. Thie is es pecially so sin ce the foreign media took an in terest in Irish folk music. In the early days , broadcasting forced conformity to non-traditional standards . For exam­ple , fiddlers had to have piano accompaniment. RTE are abou t to publish on record some of their archive material , possibly through one of the existing com­panies.

A long discussion well supported from the floor ranged over such topics as the effect of recorded music on the living tradition, t be deter ioration in Playing by professionals, the neglect of vocal mus­ic, audiences with no understanding of the tradi­tion, the lose of the traditional environment as a result of demographic and social change , the over­exposure of the music, and the non-commercial re­vival in set-dancing.

Nicbolas Carolan

PRACTITIONERS

Ballad singers have the honest est trade in the world for they always deal with ready money. It is also an anc ient a nd honourable call ing . Homer himself was one of the business . - Royal Iri sh Academy 12 B' 18, Dundalk chapbook, 1800 .

He played all,at that time, what you ",,'ould say was t he dance music ••• That would have been eigh­teen and •.. t ..... ixt eighty and ninety ••. And he W<l S

i n a good mood for fiddling ti 11 about two 0 '

clock. And if there were no more whisky coming up , then he broke a string. No more fiddling. -Co . De rry 106q .

-C e 0 1 1 } 7

DECE NT RALIS A TION OF H 0 N TREASURER

Tom and Annette Munnelly moved to West Clare in Sep­tember, where they have set up house in Flag Road , Miltown Malbay . The documents and files of the Hon . Treasurer will by now have caught up on Tom there, and members who have still a current subscription to Psy are invited to send it to him at the above ad­dress.

Anyone who prefers to continue handing over cash in person can do so by finding the Hon. Secretar y Nicholas Carol an after a meeting . A reminder of Ni cholas' s address may be ussfull 157 Claremont Court, Glasnevin, Dublin 11.

We wish the Munnellys much happiness in tbeir new home, in an area to whicb tb(lY are no strangers .

We also look forward to he~ring from Tom at a not­too-distant meeting , as well a s from another migrant to the West l Pat Mitcbell, now established in Gal­way, will address the society in the New Year on the cyl inder recordings of Patsy Tuohey's Piping made early in the century .

Tom Munnelly has sent us some extracts from an eigh teenth-century writer on traditional Irish mus­ic which we give on pp . 8-16 below.

O'Farrell : an Irish music exporter , c. 1800.

8 A phi 1 0 sop hie a 1 B U l' v e y

A PH I L OS 0 PHI C A L SURVEY

I RELAND o F THE sou T H o F

i n a series of lett ers to John Wa t klnson , M. D.

L ondon: Strand.

Prin ted for W. Strahan and T. Cadel! in the MDC CLXXVII .

Tipperary, september 20 , 1775 . Since my last , I have spent Borne days most agreeably at Mr. Macarty ' s of Springbl11j where hospitality was dis played in its best manner, dives t ed of those qualities, whioh of old tarnished the lustre of that virtue in Ireland. There was no constraint in the article of wine, nor indeed in any otber •••

Here we were at meals , even on sunday, regaled with the b ag-pipe, which, to my Wlcultlvated ear, is not an instrument 9 0 unpleasant &8 the lovers of I~ alian music represent it •• •

Mallow-Kil1arney road, October 16, 1715 . ••• On thi s road I met an Irish funeral, one or two of which I had seen before , but tbis one might have proved fatal to me , for I met it unexpectedly in turning a corner, and no aooner did the mourners see me, t han t hey set up a yell which frightened my horse not a little. The cry. however, \\'hich bad been ori ginally raised on my account, ceased at s ight of my danger; but the girls, who set it up, could not help l a ughing at my situation.

It is the custom of this country to conduct their dead to the grave in all the parade they can display; and as they Pas s through any town, or meet any re­markable person, they se t up their bowl. A gentle­man and his servant were, it s eems, thought to de­se rve thi s compliment .

B-ei ng no1\' out of danger, I Can calmly en quire in to the antiquity of this custom. Spencer, so of ten

C e 0 1 T ! re, 1 ) 9

mention ed, says that it is heathenish, and proceeds from a despair of salvation. But, whether the cus­t om originates from hope or desPair, it is certain­ly very antient , and has been practised by the He­brews, Greeks , and Romans . "Call for the mourning women, that they may come," - "man goeth to his long bome, and the mourners go about the etreete," - "we have mourned unto you, but ye have not la­

mented," Bay the inspired wri ters.

It was formerly usual to have a bard to write the elegy of the deceased , which contained an enumera­tion of his good qualities , his genealogy, bis rich­es, &c. the burden being, 0 why did he die? Aa thus, 0, wby did he die! who was so wortby to live? He who sprung from the noble blood of H~ber, the son of Gallwn , that gallant cb1ef~ - 0 wily did he die who waS blessed with a wife, fairest of the daugh­ters of Scota, a wife who lives only to deplore his loes ~ 0 why did he die b efore he could see his sons glorious in the field, and his daughters happy in t he i r loves~ 0 why did he die who had every means of life ; whose numerous beeves browsed on the lawn, and whose s heep whitened the hille~ 0 why did he die who was lord of the golden vale! 0 ye, the ob­jects of his bounty, his vassals loving and beloved, why - why did ye not snatch him from death , who so oft en led you to glory, and brought you home laurell­ed by the hand of victory : &c . &c. The women then took up the rueful ditty, an d sung it with lament­able accente, wbicb, from imitation of the sounds , are sometimes called Oghunano, and Hullaloo, and from the repetition of Oh why did he die, Ogh-agus (~s signifying and). It is also called Keenaght but for what reason I do not know .

Aa tbese elegies are now composed by unlettered men, t hey must appear ridiculous enough. Though the band of criers which I heard , made no very mu s­ica l dirge of it, it waS certainly calculated t o in spire melancholy . That the custom may be ennobled

1 0 A p ~ 1 I 0 sop h i c a I surve y

------------------------~~-by a ll'.ore e levat e:! s t!'a1n , the las t book of Homer mus t evinc e; where , we see a round the corpss of Hect or, ili s 'Nife , his mother, and his sist er , who, as the natu r al mourners, alternately speak his s everal praises , whi le ths artificial mou rn­srs act the s econd part .

A.lD~1?-~oJl !=h~:.1tte_~ ... !O¥~, ~,:_ " ~ W ith, p\~rlti~e {~~I . ,~'1d: 11J~~, $ rotclnf .fou~~. Alt.ct-?Itly tb~ ling. ~ah~r~:att flow" " . - _

: Thiobid1ent '("it~ mdOdioiit-' in the)rwoe~ l

'W hi ledCCSpu fottmpn rrJ:m '!lIlCh-.(tjll bear.t9,

AIld.l1:atlU".t: ,~1-.t,c rFtf PAIj~ ~ ~rt. ' ~" :-

The conclamatio among t he Romans coincides with the Irish Cry. The mulieree praeficae exactly correspond with the women who lead t he Irish band , and who make an outcry too outrageous t o be the effect of real grief;

Ut qui conduB:i plorant in runerc, dicunt Et_ !Olc iu nt propc plu ra dolcntibu, ex animo--

That this custom was Phoenician, we may learn from Virgil, who was very correct in the coe tume of hia cha r ac ters. The conclamatio ovs r the Phoe­nician Dido, as described by him, is s i mila r to the Irish cry. , _ '

!.amtotis gmituquc Et ra:mincq ululatll .Teda (ierrllint.-.:.... . I., ,

The ver y word ulul atus , or hulluloo, and the Greek word, of the same import, have all a strong affinity t o each other.

The s sries of ceremonies used on the night, or nigh t s , tha t the corpse remains unburied, ie what they call a wake. At thsse wakes, the Cri ere, or Ksonaghers, sit round the corpse , which i s s tretched on a bed or board, covered wit h whit e lin en ; a plate of salt being placed over the heart. The salt , I suppose , they cons i der as t he emblem of t he i ncorruptible part, the body itself being the type of co rru pt i on .

-= C e 0 I T { re, 1 3 1 1

-These wakes are meetin GS of merri men t and festi­

vity, to which they re 80 r t from f 3.r and near . The old people amuse themse lves in ~moki n g tobacco, drinking whiskey, and t ~ lling stories in the room with the corpse; whilst the young men, in the barn , or some separa te apartment , exhibit feats of activi­ty; or , inspired by the i r sweethearts , dance away the night to the melodious pleasing of a bagpipe ; -thus enj oying as solid pleasures as their betters at courtly balle or midnight masquerades. I am , how­ever, sorry to add, that such is their Passion for carousals, on these occasions , that the survivors bave been sometimee beggared by the expence.

I have heard of an old woman , who , having gathered a few guineas , chose to beg rather than break in up­on this sum, which she had hoarded up, in order, as she expressed it , to have herself buried decen t ly. This decency for which she was so anxious , waS , t hat the neighbours might be rega},ld, with plenty of " whiskey and tobacco. So muc h for the Irish cryl • • •

Dublin • •• • it is not necessary to recur t o dubious author i­ties for proof t hat t he Irish were, in a very early period , addicted to music , The f ect is supported by the mos t unexceptionable evidence; a sketch of which I cannot refrain from giving you, though I must confess that I never so much as learned the ga­mut. I shall not t herefore pretend to write ae a music ian, but as an antiquarian ; and you will allow me to be, like 80me othe r antiquari ans , very f ond of what I do not understand.

We have already seen that the Druids, Ba rds , Musi­cians, &c. of Ireland had portions of land assigned to them for their maintenance. It may be well sup­posed that the musicians had this legal estab l i s~ rn ent, not only as they ,,"ere office r s of the court, but as they were ministers in the public worship of t he Gods . The high honours and emoluments, attend­ant on this art, must na t urally have pr oduced emi-

1 2 A philosophical survey

nence in many of its numerous profes sors. Accord­ingly, Cambrenais , who scarcely allows the I rish any ot her good quality, con f esses their transcenden­cy in music . He strains his style to such a pi tch, in order to express this peculiar excellence, that it is almost impossible t o translate him. In musi­cia solum, &0. 'I can only praise their excellence in i nstrumental musi c , in which they are skilled inoomparably above any other na tion I have seen. -Their instrument s are t he harp, the pipe, and the t imbrel.' Polydore Virgil holds the same language, Hiberni aunt musicae peritisslml. And the Welch chronicles affirm, tbat ' Griffit h AP-Conan, King of Nortb Wales, being of Irish lineage by bis mother, and also born in Ireland, carried with him from thence divers cunning musicians into Wales, who de­vised, in a manner, all t he instrumental mu s i o used there. Whicb appears a s well by the books written in the same , as also by t he names of the t unes and meas ures used among the: to this day . '

Tbe I think , alLow that Ireland is a Ellen-a-Roon has always been es­

teemed as one of the finest melodies of any country, Langolee and Kin-du-Deelas are of the same cast. Pasquali used to play the first of these with vari­ations; whicb, they say , only weakened its origin­al force. Though nothing can be more lively than their common jig tunee, their fin est airs are of a plaintive turn , and supposed to have been those set to the elegies for ren owned warriors, of to the sighs of complaining lovers. Of the latter sort are those I have named, as is evident from the tit­les·; and in the same line is that cha rming melody , Molly-a- Stoar; for whi ch Mr. Ogle , kn ight of the shire for the county of Wexford , bas written some beautiful stanzaS .

They talk of a wonderful mn"ter t hey had of l ate, called Carolan, who , like Homer , waS blin d, and

. Kin do- Deelas, t he-lo~el; Ins !I wit h the r a :;;n locks.

C e 0 1 T i re , 1 J 1 1

li ke him, "'lent about s inSing and Play in g his rhap­sodies. His poetry 'A'as in Irish, an d not much praised , but his musi c i" celebrated . From an ear ly disappointment i n love he i s said to have attuned his harp to the e leg i a c strain . I ha ve hear'd one of thess compositions played , and to me t he soun ds were a s expressive of such a s ituation of mind , as the word s of a love-sick elegy. The history of one of hi s famous compositions . called· Ti ama- Mayo, -whi ch was somewha t in the dirge style , - is Said to be this: The musician had offended Lord Mayo by some witty sarcasms, of which he is reported to have been very liberal, and was forbid his house. After some time he prevailed to be heard, and he sang this palinode in concert with his harp at d i nner, wi t h which, Orpheu~1ike, he so cha rmed the powers of re­sentment , that he was presently restored to his Lord­shipts favour. I have heard divers others of his tunes called Planxtiea, whic t are in the convivial atrain, and evidently calcul a i ed to inspire good humour, and heighten the jollity of the festive hour. They go by the name of t hose gentlemen, for whose entert ainments t hey were composed, as Planxty­Connor, Planxty-Jobnston , Planxt;y-Jones , &c . The last of these has been dignified by better words tban those of the Bar d , by Mr. Da wson , l ate Baron of the Exchequer, and is now called Bumper Squire Jooes .

They tell me, that in his latter days be never composed without the inspiration of whiskey, of whi ch, at that critical hour, he always took care to have a bottle beside him.

Ennius ipfe pater, nunquam nifi potu$, ad anna

Profilu;t diccnda-

Hi s ear was so exquisite, and his memo ry so tena­cious, tha t he has been known to play off, at first hearing, some of the most difficult pieces of Ital-

·Lord h'ayo',

1 • P b i 1 0 so p hie a 1 s u rvey

ian mu s ic, to t he astonishment of Geminiani.

The name of ~r . Poeckridge ought not to b e lost t o the lovers of harmony, a s be has enri ched the art by the invent i on of tbe musical glasses, now im­proved into the harmonics ; an instrument , if not of the greatest f orce, yet certainly of the sweetes t tones in the com pas s of melody . He WaB born to a good es t a te in the county of Monaghan, but more at­tached to music than oeconomy, he , like many other men of genius, ou tlived the possession of it, and 'I'a8 obliged , in his old age , to make out a precari­ous subsis tence by the exercies of hie art: be los t his life but a few years Since , in an accidental fire i n Cornbill.

From what haS been now observed relative to the distinguished excellence of the Irish musicians , Particularly in ancient times, comPared with what has been proved, in former letters, that Ireland was the old Scotie, it will not, I flatter myself , be difficult to trace the origin of what is now called, and jus tly enough, the Scots music. We have eeen that there is proof positive , from their own chron i cles , that the Welch received their instrumsnt­al music from Ireland, let us now see whether there be not proof presumpt ive, the strongest whicb the nature of tbe thing is caPable of, that t he British Scots borrowed tbeir music also from the same quart-or.

It is in vain to s ay, as ie generally said , thst David Ri~~io was autbor of tbe Scots music. There is an internal evidence aga inst eucb a supposition: the wild and pastoral singularity of the Scots melo­dies i s inco~patible with the g r ave and learned com­pos itions of Italy. And there is an external evi­dence ~ ti l 1 more s trong : Rizzio waS Secrets ry , not Musician, to the Queen of Scotland . His father hed been a xu ~ ician by profession, but we do not find t ha t he W;'lS one hims elf . That he might , however ,

C e 0 1 'I' f r e 1 3 1 5

--have plf,y .! d , improved, RlI d c oll ec t ed the Scots a i rs, is v e ry probabl e ; but t.ha t a young di s s i Pated Ital­illn, - bus i ed in the intrigues of a court , an d at­tendance on a Que en so ~air , and so c ondescending as Mary , - c ould in a f ew years have disseminated such multifa rious compoaitions through a nation, which de­s pi sed his "mnne r s , a nd hated hi s person, is utterly incredibJ e .

Nor can t hi.s invention be ascribed to the Abbey of Melros s . For where is the likelihood that a set of cloistered monks should either invent or ,proPagate a na tiona l music? The most that could be expected from such a la zy tribe would have been a jubilate on the n a tivity of the ir founder, or some ascet ick of their order . For what have such places ever produced, but meagre annals of the c hurch , s uperstit ious lives of ficti ti ous saints, or some wretched La tin rhimes? Monas te ries have , to be sure , been the conservators of literatur e , but rarely t h~ inventors of any thing laudable .

No r is it to be believed, wha t is still more cred­ible , that James the Firs t of Scotla nd was the auth­or of the Scots tunes, though Buchanan does say, ' that he excelled in music more than beca me a King ,' and thou gh Tassoni relates that he composed sacred bynms , in which he waS imita ted by a prince of Veno­sa . AS well might we s u ppose, that his de~cendant, Jam es the Sixth , waS aut hor of the l i terature of England , because he waS a very learned clerk, a nd wrot e the Basilikon Doron.

The honour then of inventing the Scots music must be g iven to this c ountry , the antient Scotia, so re­nowned for music in old times ; from whence, as YI'e have incontrovertibly proved, the present Scotia de­rived her name , her extracti on , her langUa ge, her poetry , &c. I have said incontrovertibly; but wha t wi l l not be controverted , as we ll as ad vance d? Mr . Guthri e, the geog ra pher, among other excellencies of his native country, would persuade us that it waS of

1 6 phi 1 0 sop h ie a 1 survey

old f3mous for cookery , for this reason , that minced col lops is a Scotch di sh . The learned writer, how­ever , must have forgot that ~acbeth had said , when he found that Fleance w~ s fled and Banquo still a­live ,

\-Ve h ;we ft ,t,;xd the fn ake, not killed him .

The word scotch is, to thi s daY, in uni versal use in Ireland for that opera tion of mincing or bruising their flax, whereby they separate the pith from the s talk; and for whicb, I am told, t hey have scotch­ing mills. We may, t herefore, venture to restore tha t savoury dish of scotch ' d collops to Old Eng­land , and the Scots tunes , as well as the songs of Oasian, to Old-rreIand . But farewell I hope stil l to eat my Christmas pye with you , &c.

The author who so r oundly dismissed the descend­ants of Cambrensis and made minced collops of the Scot s was no Br .... tish visitor , but the Rev. Thomas Campbell, na l ve of Tyrone and Chancellor of St Nacartin's, Clogher . Among banalities and mieconceptions characteristic of his daY, he gives a few gli mpses into the traditional mus i c­al practice of eighteenth-century Ireland. The extracts are from pp. 140 , 141, 206-211 , 448-56 .

PAP E R C H A 5 E

Professor James Porter , a member whom we see l ess often than we would like in Dubli n, he being Scots and empl oyed in California , writes of a recent visit to Hungary and the afte rmath of a conference: 'I hea r d some woderful music ••• an excit i ng "coun t ry" gypsy band in SW Hunga ry, playing cheek- by-jowl with a folk band . Gypsy music is not by any means of the uniform kin d one f inds in Bud apes t or t he bi e t owns . On the t rain back , I got i r. tOll' (here he s eems to have fallen in with a dubi ou!\ Cen tral European t r >l.vell­i ng companiol1) ""h o drarp"ed me off to the b,·ff p ' 'It Li nz and the train l eft wi t hou t 'U3 , luggage and a l l . 50 t ax­is across half of " us tri a t o r ecover '/rly preci c _ pa pers. '

-C e 0 I T ! r e , 1 3

5 A • HEN R Y A G A I N

Mrs Ca l C. Herrmann of Tint on Falls , Ne w J e rsey, wr i tes to t he Secretary :

1 7

You may be i nterested to know t ha t an American schola r , Mr Gale Hunt i ng ton of Martha ' s Vin e­yard, Massachusetts , has edited f or publ i ca­t i on t he rema r kable coll ection made by ~am Hen­r y of Cole ra ine which i s known as 'Songs of the People' •• . •

Mr Huntingt on fi r st learned of t he col l ecti on wbile be was amassi ng his f i rst ant hol ogy of s a i l ing and whal i ng s ongs , Son gs the whalemen sang, which has become a c l assic source of t hes e songs. He and his wife visited Ireland in the fall of 1910 and not only obt a ined copies of t he collect i on deposited at the National Li brar y in Dublin but also visited Mr Henry ' s daughter , Mrs Craig, and obtained her permission and t hat of the publisher of the Northern Conetitution t o prepare t he co11ec 1,ion for publication.

Mr Huntington's work has involved t wo ma j or areas: t r anscription into standard musical na­tati on of the tunes originally published in sol­fa, and t he scholarly task of amassing and orga~ izing re l ated materia l s (references, s i mi lar texts and tunes) .

DesPi te di fficu l t ies of publ i shing so la r ge a col­l ection , h!r Huntington hopes i t may soon a ppear, perhaPs un der t he impr in t of Fol k-Le gacy Re cords , Sha ron , Conneoticut. He al s o i n t end s to pre sent hi s manusc ri pt to the Folk Song Archive of t he Li­br a r y of Congres s, where a copy of his inde x to t he collec t ion haS a l r eady been de posited .

1 8 S a m H enr y ag ain

-----------~-.. ~ o th e r ac t i vit i es

Henry was f or years a f requen t contri butor to the Nor t hern Cons tituti on out s ide hi s own co lumn of songs . From time t o ti me the newsPa per r e por t s hi s activities in the encou r agement of fol~song

entries a t t he Col era i ne Mus ica l ~est i va 1 , to wbich bi s col league Ja mes Moore , now l i vi ng in Be l­fa s t , al so ma de a big contribut i cn . We read too of Sam Hen r y ' s early r adi o b r oadcasts , hi s 's onorous voice ' gi ving f orth , for exam ple , t he Poi nt maid (a Nort b Derry song , no 42 of bi s ser i es ) as he ac­compa ni ed hi mself on the f i ddle - 6 J une 1925. Most i nt eresti ng a re bis news pape r items drawn from l oca l popular tradi t i on , r anging f rom sayings

I n Glar Ell i s , in Claey none is; In f oor (fir ) t ar is, in Ock None i s .

_ 16 Feb . 1924, f rom a commonplace book of t he eighteen t h- cen t ur y , pr obabl y the Bame that be me n­t i ons els ewhe r e as a sou r ce of Pr esbyterian choir rhyms s - t o in f orma t i on abou t Midsumme r cus t ome

The ceremony [p. t Monsygr a n , n r Kilrea . Darr y] i s in the cus t ody of a f amily named W' Grat h, whos e ancestors ha ve kept the cus t om goi ng from t ime i mmemorial . On e of them sounds a 'buf falo ' born t o Ca ll t he peopl e [ phot o of a man doi ng t hi s] ; i n older t imes i t was bl own t o war d off t he svil s pi rite .

- 21 May 1938. ' Par a- musical ' activities like thi s deserve a t tenti on, and i n the domain of lOcal po pular cultur s , not much escaped tbe at t enti on of t hi s eager col l ector.

Hugh Shi e l ds

Ava i l abl e fr om the Coun t y Mus eum , The Cas tls , ENNISC ORTHY . co. We x­f ord : Fr . Jos eph Ranson ' s Songe of the Wexfor d coas t ( l 911 8) r e­pr inted 197 5 . Pr i ce U pb . & pos t­age .

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REC O R D REV I E W S

1 J OHN NY DOOGHT Y. ROUND RYE BAY FOR ~ORE . Traditional 30ngs of the Sussex COast. Topic 12TS324 , London 1977 . 2 TIfE LING FA MIL Y. Singing traditions of a Suffolk family. Topic 12TS292, London 1977 .

I believe that there is no tradit ion without a contin­ual ren ewa l of i t , a re-making of the old forms to suit the t imes and technology. Although continuity requires that we should mainta in contact with the Past, we do the tradition no good if we look a lways backwards. ~or this reaeon the wor st thing I can Say sbout this record is that I don't like the pictures on the cover. Not that they affect the quality of the performances but they do gi ve a wrong impression. They are charming, evidently band- coloured picture postcards of scenes such as this singer, Jobnny Doughty , a 74-year-old inshore fisherman, mi r ht have been part of in bis prime . They are old-fash ior d and bave a deep but insidioue attraction for the l a;·ge number of us who would r eplace the bustling times we live in with some­thing slower and sufficiently re s tricted for us to feel a definite identity and stability. However , ~e must avoid giv ing the impression that folk music and song are t hings of the past. Without a bel ief in its future all our activity has no point, and tbis belief is not aided by nostal gic peeps a t yeeteryear.

To get to the songs and the s inger: Johnny Doughty is an ebullient performer much admired in English folk clubs and at festivals. However I find him sadly lack­ing in the qual i ties whi ch made Phil Tanner, George Maynard or Harry Cox memorable l he l acks commitment to hi s songs , they seem r a t her to be a vehicl e for hie personality, and he has, PerhaPS as a result , very little style . He does though have sorr.e interesting songs including a set of the ~n Vanity . WiAe Ys te s , writer of the record notes , regard Doughty as 'one of t he mos t exciting folksingers to ha ve been discovered in the las t fe'tl· yea r s' . Exciting, yes ; in an 9lttro-

, 0 ~ em bers ' act i v i tie s

vert fasbion , but tha t do es not make him or his record very significant except as a documen t.

In the context of an impoveri shed tradition singers like the ones on disc 2 have their place as s ong Carr­iers . But bein g an Iri shman and li vin~ in an a r ea where g ood s inging i s to b e found quite eaSily , 1 doub t whether I will be able to force myself t o li s ten to this rec ord agsin. Is it really a sexvies to folk music to publish such s tyle-less and boring stuff?

John Moulden

M E MBE R S I ACT I V I TIE S

r-"-_-.-.-~-_--~--, Virgini a Ble.nkenhorn .. ri tea with enthusiasm s bout her new job in

, -nomenon, to judge r ecord reviewer s .

t he School of Scot tish Studies, where she l s working on the transcription of songs in Gaelic. As Virginia Stevens sbe r ecorded recently 8 disc of Connemara 8ongs ~ Tiocfaidh an samhradh, Sr utban LUNA3321 a r emarkable and evidently embarrassing phe­

from the curi ous ret i cence of most

Nancy Calthorpe has had two collections of songs with harp accompaniment, in her ar rangements, published in Dublin this yea r : A Celtic bouquet . Solos and songs . with Iri s h harp , 'A"slton, and Ocht namhran le tionlacan crui te , An GUm .

Ilarie-Jeanne Ra veneau, of Orleans, is a French muai­col oe is t who recently joined t he Society , having become interested in thll ornamented melodies of Irish secular song an j Scotti sh rsalm t unes . She is at preeent en­gaged on research in this field , and visited the 'Rest of Ireland this sum~er in pursuance of her research .

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