# Music by Genre > Celtic, U.K., Nordic, Quebecois, European Folk >  Tremolo for Irish Trad?

## multidon

I tried to search the archives and came up empty, so please excuse my ignorance.

Is it proper to use tremolo in Irish Trad if you have to sustain a long note? If not, how do you sustain it? Or do you just let it die and count rests?

----------


## foldedpath

"Proper" is a tricky subject in Irish traditional music, especially when it comes to instruments that are relatively recent in the tradition like mandolin. 
 :Smile: 

I don't think there is any established rule or convention about this. At home you can do anything you want. If you go out to play in sessions, I would strongly advise feeling out how the other sessionistas feel about tremolo on mandolin, and avoid it if some consider it annoying. Ask first, before just diving in. 

My _personal_ take on tremolo is that I've tried it, and I don't think it works well in this music. For one thing, it's hard to avoid the association with other genres where mandolin tremolo is common like Classical, Italian, Country and Bluegrass. No other instrument in Irish trad uses this technique, only the mandolin. So it's tough to get away from that association with other genres. When I sit in with an Irish trad session, I don't want someone to think I'm playing Italian restaurant music (not that there's anything wrong with that, in the appropriate context!).

Slower tunes like "slow reels" and true airs are a problem for sustain on the mandolin, it's true. But personally I would rather just hit the main notes and let the rest of the sustaining instruments in a session carry it, or else sit the tune out and enjoy listening to the other musicians play the air. 

This music is wonderful. I feel it deserves a certain amount of respect for the traditions, which never included sustained plucked tremolo until the mandolin came along very recently. I don't feel a need to push that technique. As a great Irish fiddler (James Kelly) once told my fiddler S.O., you should bring your instrument to the music and not the other way around. 

Your mileage may vary on that, and others here on the forum might feel differently. It's just my opinion.

----------

DavidKOS, 

multidon

----------


## Gelsenbury

I haven't heard much tremolo at Irish sessions. Having said that, the other instruments are so much louder that a bit of tremolo will hardly disturb.

A mandolin with a bit of ring and sustain is an asset for Irish music.

----------

multidon

----------


## DavidKOS

> When I sit in with an Irish trad session, I don't want someone to think I'm playing Italian restaurant music (not that there's anything wrong with that, in the appropriate context!).
> 
> Slower tunes like "slow reels" and true airs are a problem for sustain on the mandolin, it's true. But personally I would rather just hit the main notes and let the rest of the sustaining instruments in a session carry it, or else sit the tune out and enjoy listening to the other musicians play the air. 
> 
> This music is wonderful. I feel it deserves a certain amount of respect for the traditions, which never included sustained plucked tremolo until the mandolin came along very recently. .


I think I'd agree. The banjo and mandolin seem to use pick triplets or such for ornaments and not any tremolo, as you say these are not as old as the fiddle and pipes, where most of the ornaments like rolls and cuts come from. But not tremolo, not even on the old wire-strung harp. Of course the accordion can play sustained notes.

----------

multidon

----------


## Dagger Gordon

https://youtu.be/uEKfAUInVS0

This is an old recording of The Dubliners playing Roisin Dubh. Barney MacKenna on mandolin.

----------

Carl Robin, 

DavidKOS, 

EdHanrahan, 

Hany Hayek, 

multidon

----------


## Shelagh Moore

There is no "proper" about it in my opinion and I will use tremelo where I think it suits the tune (mostly on slower pieces of course). Also I find the "very" recent comment slightly odd as I've been playing mandolin for at least 50 years, mostly in Irish sessions in the earlier days, and use of the mandolin predates that by quite some time. Never had a problem with tremelo in any of the sessions I've been involved in and I'd be wary of one where there were adverse comments.

----------

Carl Robin, 

DavidKOS, 

multidon

----------


## multidon

I guess if it's good enough for the Dubliners it's good enough for me!

The context is my folk music band, in which I am the only one playing mandolin. We only do Irish tunes for March concerts (go figure!) and we are rehearsing Irish tunes now. So there really isn't anyone to tell me I'm right or wrong. In fact, since I am the only one in the group with a music degree, they always assume that if I do it, it must be right. So the purpose of my question was just to make sure I wasn't straying too far from the norm. Thanks to all who responded.

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## crisscross

In his book "Fiddle tunes and Irish music for mandolin" Dan Gelo uses a tremolo sign above the longer notes of "Star of the County down" in 3/4, so I would guess, it's OK to tremolo  Irish waltzes.
Or is this more Irish pub music than Irish Trad? :Wink:

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## Dagger Gordon

I play a lot of slow airs - mostly Scottish admittedly. I guess I tend to use a sort of steady slowish tremolo.  And yes, my instrument has a lot of sustain.

Something like this:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3H9nfGxu3ao

----------

John Bertotti, 

multidon

----------


## foldedpath

> https://youtu.be/uEKfAUInVS0
> 
> This is an old recording of The Dubliners playing Roisin Dubh. Barney MacKenna on mandolin.


Interesting, but it doesn't sound idiomatically "Irish" to me, and I don't take the Dubliners as my personal inspiration for this music anyway. But again, it's just my opinion. I knew it might be a minority opinion, especially on a mandolin forum like this one.
 :Smile:

----------

multidon

----------


## foldedpath

Here's an example of why I don't feel the mandolin needs tremolo on a slow piece like an air. If you're playing alone at home or in a band performance, not trying to power your way through a slow air at a session, then all that's needed is a mandolin with good sustain between notes:




I was listening through examples of slower pieces on mandolin in my music library, and was reminded here of Simon Mayor's "New Celtic Mandolin" recording from back in 1998. There are several slow pieces on that album: "Little Molly-O," "Neil Gow's Lament for Abercarney," and this "The Dark and Slender Boy" piece at the beginning of the YouTube clip.

And regarding that Dubliner's clip of Roisin Dubh linked above, compare it to Joanie Madden playing the tune on whistle below. Having said that it's _possible_ to play slow pieces using just sustain between notes, I still feel a comparison between those clips illustrates why there are some tunes that should maybe be left for playing on other, more expressive instruments, so you don't murder the music:

----------

multidon

----------


## derbex

When I went to an irish banjo/mandolin class at the Working Men's College triplets were the rule, sort of, you didn't have to stop at three. Otherwise some sort of ornamentation, but that can go to mush if everyone is doing different ones.

I'm generally happy to tremolo, even on the OM.

----------

DavidKOS, 

multidon

----------


## Bertram Henze

> ...Or is this more Irish pub music than Irish Trad?


I'll say. Trad in the strict sense is dance tunes and maybe Sean Nos singing (i.e. unaccompanied). If someone does Molly Malone, all trad rules are lifted and you can play your octaventral heebeephone if you like.

----------

crisscross, 

Jill McAuley, 

multidon

----------


## mandroid

of course  8 notes to the measure  on a tune played fast will  seem like tremolo ,

 but  that is not quite  like a whole note  picked 8 times to fill the measure .. 

 generally   the Fiddler will fill that space better..

----------

multidon

----------


## JeffD

First, let me distinguish between playing traditional Irish in a performance, from playing in a session. There are many things different between the two.

I play in various sessions, of varying degrees of Irish orthodoxy. I don't perform.


I look to the fiddle in this. If a good Irish fiddler sees that a note is extended long enough to engage some tasteful vibrato, then I feel comfortable with my tremolo. Otherwise, no.

----------

multidon

----------


## catmandu2

> I'll say. Trad in the strict sense is dance tunes and maybe Sean Nos singing (i.e. unaccompanied).


For the record, there's more to 'trad' than session tunes - historical instrumental traditions go way back - pibrochs, airs, laments..

----------

crisscross, 

multidon

----------


## multidon

Well, I didn't mean to start an argument about what is Irish Trad or not. I'm sure that's been hashed out before.

I guess I just should have Irish music more in a looser sense. This is a concert, not a session. Yes, Molly Malone is on the playlist, along with Danny Boy. Yes, I know, trite as can be. But there are also some O'Carolan tunes as well as some jigs, reels, and horn pipes. We are doing the two above chestnuts because, in these parts, folks would be disappointed to attend an Irish concert that didn't include them. And those will be audience participation sing a longs. They like that. But we are also presenting some "real" Irish Trad (dance tunes anyway) and as far as I know the Irish Trad police will not be there to tell us what we can and cannot do. Heck, we have mountain dulcimers, for crying out loud. So obviously not a real Irish band. We like to educate and entertain our audiences. Plus, we just really enjoy playing Irish! It's fun!

So I guess I asked my question because I try to stay as authentic as I can under the circumstances. Did not mean to start any arguments. Sorry.

----------

crisscross, 

DavidKOS

----------


## catmandu2

What argument?

The point is - if you're doing a style of Isles-based music in a rehearsed band performance or whatever - (_agreeing_ with Bertram), you're at liberty (for better or worse) to do it the way you want, I would think.  If you're doing slower tunes, like the popular ballads and songs - without reeds, winds, bowed-strings, or voice - you may need to use tremolo if mandolin is your lead melody instrument.  Which is why I mentioned that there are approaches/repertoire in trad other than session tunes..*

For my money - not at all a dialectic on 'what is trad' - but how to effectively convey the music you've chosen

*I was mulling over these differences this morning while getting on my nylon harp which I hadn't played in a month or so - its sound is much different than the sustaining wire harp I mostly play .. and some of my repertoire doesn't perform as well on nylon (and vice-versa), and was again dwelling on whether I could arrange a given (slow) piece for the (non-sustaining) nylon - when I saw this thread.

I began musing on old (and ancient, etc) repertoire, etc and how to carry it out on modern instruments (vis a vis nylon harp; mandolin)..which led me to be interested in elaborating on the 'trad' repertoire, etc in this thread .. not impugning Bertram.

----------

multidon

----------


## foldedpath

> So I guess I asked my question because I try to stay as authentic as I can under the circumstances. Did not mean to start any arguments. Sorry.


I see it as more healthy discussion than argument, no need to apologize! From the description of what you're doing in your band, it sounds to me like you're taking an audience-centric approach, and there's nothing wrong with that. 

As I said in a post up-thread, there aren't many long-established conventions on mandolin in this music, like there are with most of the "core" instruments like flute, fiddle, and pipes. About the only one we have is to avoid chopping Bluegrass-style on the off beat. And I've even heard _that_ used in a performance context as a brief expressive element, i.e. not a continual backbeat chop.

----------

multidon

----------


## mikeyes

I don't think that tremolo is used very much and the mandolin players I know seem to favor other techniques that work well with the music.  Here is a video of Marla playing a waltz using the natural sustain, use of space, and other techniques on her mandolin.

----------

John Bertotti, 

multidon, 

noah finn

----------


## Bertram Henze

> For the record, there's more to 'trad' than session tunes - historical instrumental traditions go way back - pibrochs, airs, laments..


piobearachd and lament are elements of Scottish music.

----------

multidon

----------


## Steve L

I think you're more likely to hear something approximating tremolo in songs by ballad groups in the 70's and 80's...bands like Barleycorn and The Dublin City Ramblers.   Your hear it a lot behind the singers and it seems to tend more toward slower tempo 16th notes with each attack distinct than the smooth, flowing technique we might more often think of.  I really never hear people playing tunes with it and I can't say I'm sorry.

----------

multidon

----------


## catmandu2

> piobearachd and lament are elements of Scottish music.


I think you're missing the point.

Here, I'll give you an example.  When I started playing Carolan I was only playing guitar - ergo, 'how to play harp music (effectively) on guitar?' 

Airs, planxtys, songs, ballads, whatever...if you're going to do it on a mandolin, there are some aspects to consider..

----------

multidon

----------


## Beanzy

I would wholeheartedly encourage players who are familiar with playing Irish trad to explore the appropriate use of tremolo. You'll need to understand he places where it will work before you try to give yourself any rules though. To quote Quintillian "For what can be more distressing than to be fettered by petty rules, like children who trace the letters of the alphabet which others have first written for them, or, as the Greeks say, insist on keeping the coat their mother gave them".  If you've explored the use of tremolo in a genre such as baroque music you'll have a good feel for what might work. Look out for possibilities of using it on the landing notes or maybe longer dotted notes. it can be very effective in a tune with a double long note (think the end of a hornpipe etc) if you use it on the first but not the second. But also don't use it instead of crans and trills etc. Treat it like a strong spice which can make or ruin a dish depending on how it is used.

----------

Carl Robin, 

derbex, 

Jess L., 

multidon, 

Steve VandeWater

----------


## catmandu2

Quite agree Beanzy.  Every instrument is different and unique - we use their aspects to our advantage and 'compromise' where we must

----------

multidon

----------


## mikeyes

I don't see that there is a prohibition against tremolo in Irish music for mandolinists.  There are so few (mandolinists, that is) to begin with and you can't hear them in a session (where the majority are) so it is probably a moot point.  I think that judicious use adds a lot to the music, especially in a band situation, but it is a limited technique that a lot of payers can't do well.

That being said, there is no reason not to use it and see if it makes your playing more musical. I think that most of the time there are better choices when trying to play a sustained note that works better with the tradition but it has worked for other styles.

There don't seem to be many mandolin police out there and mandolin is in an early phase of development for Irish music (more advanced for Scottish, it seems) with a lot of exciting stuff ahead.  Tremolo deserves a try.

----------

Jess L., 

multidon

----------


## JeffD

> I would wholeheartedly encourage players who are familiar with playing Irish trad to explore the appropriate use of tremolo. You'll need to understand he places where it will work before you try to give yourself any rules though. To quote Quintillian "For what can be more distressing than to be fettered by petty rules, like children who trace the letters of the alphabet which others have first written for them, or, as the Greeks say, insist on keeping the coat their mother gave them".  If you've explored the use of tremolo in a genre such as baroque music you'll have a good feel for what might work. Look out for possibilities of using it on the landing notes or maybe longer dotted notes. it can be very effective in a tune with a double long note (think the end of a hornpipe etc) if you use it on the first but not the second. But also don't use it instead of crans and trills etc. Treat it like a strong spice which can make or ruin a dish depending on how it is used.


What a great post. Spot on in every respect. And well said.

----------

multidon

----------


## Randi Gormley

There is a distinction between performance and session -- for performance, especially in March when people expect what they expect -- whatever works is what I've done. I've used tremolo behind a singer, f'rinstance, and I've used it when playing some of the slow O'Carolan pieces. In session, when the expectation of a slow piece is pretty rare, it so seldom comes up that if I drop into tremolo once or twice a year, nobody cares. So, yeah, situational. When you're performing and it's your gig, you can do whatever you want. Chances are the audience doesn't know the difference anyway, they just like to hear the melodies and harmonies (if you do harmonies).

----------

Jess L., 

multidon

----------


## Dave Hanson

Find on youTube, ' Se Fath Mo  Bhuartha ' by The Dubliners, then you will understand how good a mandolin played tremlo can sound.
 But then again Barney McKenna was a very exceptional musician.

Dave H

----------

Jill McAuley, 

multidon

----------


## Bertram Henze

> I think you're missing the point.


Maybe. "traditional" in the widest sense is, of course much more than just Irish or even Celtic music (everything that has been played before and mimicked later is calling itself traditional at some point); there is no danger of violating anything for the OP there, because whatever new style you play will become traditional after a while.
But "Irish Trad" as defined by the common use of the word is exactly what I said, and even within this realm there are hardline purists with smaller realms, along the lines of "if it doesn't sound like Michael Coleman it's not traditional" (talking about Seamus Tansey) - this is where the minefield lurks...

----------

multidon

----------


## multidon

This has turned into a great discussion. One of the very best threads I think I have participated in. My heartfelt thanks to all who chimed in to help me. 

I am not one of the greatest players of all time, but I do feel reasonably comfortable with tremolo. The band will be rehearsing today and I will look for places where it will sound musical. My favorite quote came from Beanzy, the line about it being a strong spice that came make or ruin a dish, depending on how it's used. I think that is a great metaphor.

Our band as I said is not what we traditionally think of as Irish instruments. We do have a guitar and mandolin but also mountain dulcimers. So if we perform Irish music we should be thinking of ways to make it our own in a way that will please our audiences.

----------

Jess L.

----------


## catmandu2

> Trad in the strict sense is dance tunes and maybe Sean Nos singing...
> 
> ...
> 
> "Irish Trad" as defined by the common use of the word is exactly what I said..


With all due respect, there are many who would disagree.

Here's a recent thread, for example (discussing whether people should play airs at a session, but that airs are part of [Irish traditional music] seems well accepted): https://thesession.org/discussions/38329#comment778654

----------


## Bertram Henze

Airs are a part and accepted, but they are few and far between in a session -  the exception, not the rule. Also, like with Sean Nos singing, the timing is not rigid, i.e. unless several players have practised this together you're supposed to play it alone, with everybody else listening. No thinner ice there is for a mandolin player to go skating on.  :Chicken:

----------


## catmandu2

> Airs are a part and accepted...


And laments, songs, ballads...

My point (and I'm sorry for indulging in multidon's reservations) is that there is more to trad than dance tunes, and imo a rather significant aspect.  As a harper (playing lots of airs, Carolan laments and the rest .. and on a _traditional_ _Irish_  [wire] harp - itself somewhat atavistic - deriving from a time before there was an 'Ireland'), it's simply de rigueur for me to engage on this topic (sorry).  Of course I like session/dance tunes too, but it's a big, deep well..that I feel is worthy of addressing.  Thanks

*If we look far enough into 'tradition' we find much more.  When were the session tunes 'written'? (rhetorically)

----------


## Jill McAuley

> Find on youTube, ' Se Fath Mo  Bhuartha ' by The Dubliners, then you will understand how good a mandolin played tremlo can sound.
>  But then again Barney McKenna was a very exceptional musician.
> 
> Dave H


I used to use some tremolo when playing "The Marino Waltz", as it seemed to fit, and was in the spirit of Barney and all that. Switched to just letting the notes ring out mainly for more accuracy in the timing of it as my tremolo technique was wobbly. Haven't played it in ages, must have a go again...

----------

mikeyes

----------


## foldedpath

> And laments, songs, ballads...
> 
> My point (and I'm sorry for indulging in multidon's reservations) is that there is more to trad than dance tunes, and imo a rather significant aspect.  As a harper (playing lots of airs, Carolan laments and the rest .. and on a _traditional_ _Irish_  [wire] harp - itself somewhat atavistic - deriving from a time before there was an 'Ireland'), it's simply de rigueur for me to engage on this topic (sorry).  Of course I like session/dance tunes too, but it's a big, deep well..that I feel is worthy of addressing.


I take your point, but how wide do we cast that net before we get into things like traditional slow airs, that are not exactly a comfortable fit on our little plucked instruments? I think that is what Bertram is getting at, at least in part. The session environment may not encompass the entirety of the tradition, but it covers a heck of a lot that's relevant to mandolin playing. 

There might also be some confusion about what the term "air" or "slow air" means in this discussion. There are many tunes we play in a slow tempo but a steady meter, like Sí Bheag, Sí Mhór from the Carolan repertoire. That's not an air, as I understand it. Airs are almost always unaccompanied solo performances, with variable tempo and frequent pauses for emphasis. Like that Joanie Madden playing of Roisin Dubh I posted above. That's why they're impossible to play in a group setting like a session, like Bertram mentioned. 

I'm not sure many of us here on the Cafe actually attempt to play these things. It's considered something of a high art. One recent commenter over in that thesession.org thread said that they don't play airs because they're not old enough yet (the player, not the tune!). You're supposed to be pretty deep down the well of the music to pull it off as a singer or instrumentalist, and they don't sit comfortably on non-sustaining instruments. 

I mean, what is the point of entry for a mandolin player with an air like this one below? Does anyone think this would work on mandolin, just by powering your way through it with tremolo?





Now, if we're going to talk about how to play the slower tunes with steady meter like "slow reels," slower marches, "Irish waltzes" and such, that's a different discussion about pros and cons of tremolo (IMO). The playing of true slow airs like this can be safely ignored by most of us, I think, while still appreciating the beauty of the tune and the playing on more appropriate instruments.

----------

catmandu2, 

Jess L.

----------


## Dagger Gordon

> Now, if we're going to talk about how to play the slower tunes with steady meter like "slow reels," slower marches, "Irish waltzes" and such, that's a different discussion about pros and cons of tremolo (IMO). The playing of true slow airs like this can be safely ignored by most of us, I think, while still appreciating the beauty of the tune and the playing on more appropriate instruments.


So are you saying that Irish slow airs don't work at all on the mandolin - or just that you don't think tremolo works?
Also I would make a distinction between a waltz and an air.

----------

catmandu2

----------


## foldedpath

Yes, I'm saying that an Irish slow air like the one above (Pórt Na BPúcaí) doesn't work at all on mandolin. With or without tremolo. It's just in a completely different world of expression, designed to be played on sustaining instruments of a certain type. Or sung by the human voice, which is where most of them started in the first place. 

For one thing, we can't bend notes! I know airs are sometimes played on fixed pitch instruments like button accordion too. There is that classic YouTube clip of Tony MacMahon playing the tune on box. But with an instrument that can bend notes like the pipes, flute or whistle, you get that plaintive "cry" in the sound. Not possible on mandolin.

I also don't think tremolo works as well as just using sustain between the notes on a mandolin when playing slow tunes that aren't actually airs like that -- the "slow reels," slower marches, waltzes, and so on. But that's probably more arguable, and in my case a personal preference to avoid tremolo. With actual slow airs, I think the limitation is more self-evident.

----------

catmandu2

----------


## catmandu2

Only can just skim now, but from the points I just saw until I can read all later - "how to play the music, etc .." is an interesting aspect, and one id like to engage thanks - it's what I was beginning with when I saw this thread - 'interpreting the music on (modern-[ish] - if you will) instruments' .. a large broad dissicussion with lots of relevance .. interpreting and playing in the tradition ...

- - - Updated - - -




> But with an instrument that can bend notes like the pipes, flute or whistle, you get that plaintive "cry" in the sound. Not possible on mandolin.


Yah - great question.  How to treat the music.  How _does_ one play these tunes , on mando (a la multidon's OP, etc...   :Smile:   That's what I was asking myself yesterday when I sat with the nylon harp to play Caniad Llywelyn Delynior -

----------


## multidon

Well, just got home from my rehearsal, and I am happy to report back.

For a while now I was using tremolo on just about anything longer than a half note, because I just felt I HAD to in order to sustain the note. Today I re-thought everything and started to just let the note sustain through the count much more often. The result was, to me, a cleaner, more pure sound. On the other hand there were still a few places where it just seemed right. But, generally speaking, it would seem that I was drastically over using it. 

I am thankful to everyone who participated here who helped me get my head straight about tremolo in Irish music. I shall let musicality decide when I should use it, and I will use it with great restraint. But I am still happy that I have it in my tool box if needed.

I guess the whole problem started with me because I use primarily F hole instruments and I just didn't think there was enough sustain and I had to use the tremolo. Today proved me wrong. There as plenty of sustain most of the time to carry though the notes.

----------

Jess L.

----------


## Beanzy

Sounds like a great result for a first rethink.
I often think we're a bit like pianists without the sustain pedal and much of what we do is inferred, suggested and hinted at rather than just delivered & the spaces between the notes are so important to making it musical.

----------

catmandu2

----------


## catmandu2

@ F-path re post #36 - 

Right, I hadn't commented on all that (its relative appropriateness or inappropriateness in a session).  What I am/was getting at was that - _slow music_ (be it airs, laments, song, whatever...) is part of Irish trad.  Sounded to me that Bertram was explicitly excluding it.

And relative to multidon's OP - how do we treat _slow music_ (be it Danny Boy, Sí Bheag, Sí Mhór, or Dear Irish Boy..) in the tradition, effectively with a mandolin?  (or other similarly challenging instrument for 'slow music,' etc).

Personally, the way I've solved this for myself is with clarsach and hammered dulcimer - where simply the resonance of the instrument provides for this type of (slow) music effectively   :Wink:   .

----------


## brunello97

> I play a lot of slow airs - mostly Scottish admittedly. I guess I tend to use a sort of steady slowish tremolo.  And yes, my instrument has a lot of sustain.
> 
> Something like this:
> 
> https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3H9nfGxu3ao


Lovely playing, Dagger, fair play to you.  

I'm Irish, well Scots-Irish actually, but mostly play Italian music. Right or wrong, try as I might,  I can hardly _not_ play tremolo when I'm digging in the homegrown stuff. I'm just Texas Jackeen, though.  :Wink: 

Wouldn't seem natural if it didn't start a barney of some kind.  It's a Family Affair.

Mick

----------

Dagger Gordon

----------


## catmandu2

> I often think we're a bit like pianists without the sustain pedal and much of what we do is inferred, suggested and hinted at rather than just delivered & *the spaces between the notes are so important* to making it musical.


So important.

When you get really slow, you can shape notes with ever subtle and nuanced gestures.  Some that I employ: ornaments take on different character, value - and we can use them with more variation too; with more elastic time, space and meter are ever more present and we can employ more variation there; with intervals taking on more distinct value/presence, we can of course employ more variety there - create greater depth, contrast, tension, resolve, et al; any weighting or lightening translates into rhythmic and/or harmonic interplay - notes can be 'examined' - and there is great opportunity for expressive phrasing .. and so on.. in a word - _color_ the music/color the sound.  I love time, so I enjoy forms which provide more opportunity for play there.  In essence, the sound is more vivid or can be rendered with great clarity - so there are opportunities .. I've noticed - it's often as much about what I leave _out_ - and what Beanzy said then - playing with space.  I concede that, generally the more expressive your instrument the 'easier' this is to achieve..

*Oh, I remember one I often played on mandolin using lots of tremolo - one of my favorite sets to play on HD, fiddle, or mando/cbom - 'Mountain Aire/Washington's March/Bonaparte's Retreat' as I learned it from the Tim O recording.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaWUf59QZvA

----------


## Dagger Gordon

For what it's worth, one of the few people I ever heard play the mandolin who was much older than me was a friend of my father - a man called Ian Aird. He used to play the banjo/mandolin and indeed was the leader of a local dance band. This fellow would have been well over 100 years old were he still alive.

He hadn't played much for quite a while but was in the house once and had a tune on what was probably my own first mandolin. I'm pretty sure he played Danny Boy, for which I think he used quite a lot of tremolo. 
Actually that tune (and yes, I do understand that you may think it's corny etc) DOES suit tremolo in a way that Cillian Valley's pipe air (post 36) may not. In the same way as Barney MacKenna played Roisin Dubh, I would say that early 'Celtic' mandolin players (remembering of course that no-one called it Celtic music then!) certainly did use tremolo, and I doubt if many people would have had a problem with it - indeed I should think that would have been what they would have expected it to sound like.

Everyone knows that tremolo is a technique used a lot on the mandolin. I don't see why you shouldn't use it if you think it works in a tune. If you think that the instrument itself doesn't suit slow Irish airs - well that's maybe another matter. I can only say that it's been a big part of my own playing ever since I started and I think it works pretty well.

----------

catmandu2

----------


## Bertram Henze

> What I am/was getting at was that - _slow music_ (be it airs, laments, song, whatever...) is part of Irish trad.  Sounded to me that Bertram was explicitly excluding it.


There maybe a misunderstanding. It started at post #13, where I tended to exclude bawdy Dublin street ditties (Molly Malone, I'll Tell Me Ma, Maggie in the Woods etc) from the center of Irish Trad. The capital is hardly ever the country.

Airs are dance music in my mind, simply because they are listed in O'Neill's Dance Music of Ireland; you don't exactly dance to them on your feet, but in your mind out of time and space (airs are the Tai Chi counterpart of reels and jigs). Also O'Carolan pieces are listed there, and they are a category of their own but still an integral part of what is known as Irish Trad. I define Irish Trad by "what hits your mind first when you hear the words Irish Trad?", and it is far from having a sharp border. I think 80/20, not 100/0. Dance music and Sean Nos are the center of gravity of Irish Trad, but there's lots of satellites circling.

----------


## catmandu2

> ... in a word - _color_ the music/color the sound.


Er, I mean - dynamics (that's the word I was looking for  :Wink:   )

----------


## BlueMt.

Wonderful discussion.  My love of slow airs, laments and etc. is what led me to take up the fiddle and low whistle; I was never quite happy with what I could do on mandolin and I quickly realized the Uilleann pipes were beyond my grasp.

----------


## foldedpath

> My love of slow airs, laments and etc. is what led me to take up the fiddle and low whistle; I was never quite happy with what I could do on mandolin and I quickly realized the Uilleann pipes were beyond my grasp.


I took a similar path a couple years ago in starting to learn "Irish" flute (simple system, conical bore wooden flute). It wasn't for the airs, but more to explore articulation on the sustained tone, and figure out what all that mysterious stuff like cuts, rolls, and crans were all about. Being able to play slow airs would be a nice bonus if I ever get good enough to pull it off, but that's probably years away if I live long enough.

But I still play mandolin! There are some interesting partial harmonization options that don't exist to the same degree on the sustaining instruments. Aside from that, the mandolin is just pure fun to play. The flute is more like very hard work, but there are moments of fun that sneak in here and there.

----------

Canoedad

----------


## BlueMt.

> I took a similar path a couple years ago in starting to learn "Irish" flute (simple system, conical bore wooden flute). It wasn't for the airs, but more to explore articulation on the sustained tone, and figure out what all that mysterious stuff like cuts, rolls, and crans were all about. Being able to play slow airs would be a nice bonus if I ever get good enough to pull it off, but that's probably years away if I live long enough.
> 
> But I still play mandolin! There are some interesting partial harmonization options that don't exist to the same degree on the sustaining instruments. Aside from that, the mandolin is just pure fun to play. The flute is more like very hard work, but there are moments of fun that sneak in here and there.


I also still play mandolin, but not as much as I used to.  You're right about the fun factor; when the fiddle starts driving me crazy, I pick up the mandolin and have some fun.

----------


## catmandu2

> Being able to play slow airs would be a nice bonus if I ever get good enough to pull it off, but that's probably years away if I live long enough.


Flutes/whistles are quite challenging for slow music, IME.  In fact, I don't play any airs and such on flute, I don't think - even though I've been blowing on wind instruments for 45 years.  Rather than build my wind for slow tunes on flute, I've opted for the easier (and fun) sook & blaw approach to airs with wind instruments; these are superbly expressive, and (imo) profoundly easier than other instruments for slow music - of course, expression and articulation are entirely another matter - not saying that any of _this_ is 'easy.'  But, for cranking out air, well, it or a gurdy or a bag are the bit.  If you want to play airs, try picking up a box - you might get into it much quicker than working up your 'air' on a flute .. unless you've good lungs!  They're a bit of a poorman's pipe ..

*But ya, now that I think - ah the flute _does_ legato well.  It's a keen instrument does legato and diddly quite well .. with all the bells and whistles of other instruments I often forget and feel guilty for not playing it more.

----------


## foldedpath

> Flutes/whistles are quite challenging for slow music, IME.  In fact, I don't play any airs and such on flute, I don't think - even though I've been blowing on wind instruments for 45 years.


Yeah, even fiddlers eventually run out of room on the bow with a sustained note, but at least they don't have to take a breath. Pipes do have the advantage there. My fiddler S.O. hangs out with pipers (mostly the Scottish variety) and I know she'd love it if I took up the pipes, but I'm just not young enough. Or dedicated enough.

What I _can_ do on flute is the slower stuff that isn't really a slow air and has a steady meter like Braes of Lochiel, or Farewell to Uist. Also reels when they're played as "slow reels" like the Bothy Band version of Maids of Mitchelstown. Brilliant tune on flute. Now if I could just half-hole those F-naturals cleanly... 




> If you want to play airs, try picking up a box - you might get into it much quicker than working up your 'air' (  ) on a flute .. unless you've good lungs!  I think they're a bit of a poorman's pipe ..


Box was in the running a couple of years ago as something to learn, instead of flute. Sometimes I wonder if I should have tried that instead, but what killed the idea was a combination of things that pointed to flute instead. 

First thing, a decent button accordion is a *lot* more expensive than a decent keyless Irish flute, and very few stores or repair shops to choose from here in the USA hinterlands. Second, a button box would be another instrument locked into fixed pitch like mandolin, and unlike mandolin you can't even really tune it to match other players in a session. A flute with a tuning slide can at least get you in the ballpark with other players, as well as allow access to bending notes, and playing all those wonky things like the slightly sharp "Piper's C" that shows up in a lot of tunes. 

And finally, box is another very fussy instrument like mandolin, needing lots of care and adjustment. Talk to a box player about humidity and reed maintenance (ugh). I've already got one fussy instrument with the mandolin. Keyless wooden flute is dead simple; it's a stick with holes in it. No excuses, no blaming the strings, the pick, or the setup like mandolin. It's all in the player... unfortunately.
 :Crying:

----------


## catmandu2

Well, I like old Hohners - and indeed are a standard in their numerous array of styles that have been lovingly deployed in the music  (112, 113, 114, p-work, p-wood, pres-, double ray, et al) with some pedigree for a characteristically good-sounding, low-cost, ruggedly durable and dependable box (albeit its mostly mechanical limitations compared with Italian boxes).  A fully decent 'quint' box can be had for a few hundred (semitone boxes more, and less readily had, but still a good buy) and readily available (old boxes are a weaknesses of mine).  Of course, many also enjoy posh boxes - but seems like the vast majority of players still own a few old Hohners, and probably we've all learned on them.  Vintage reeds hold up very well - it's the waxes and felts that are vulnerable, but that's not rocket science - just a steady hand.  Lots of folks fettle their own - a well-fettled Hohner is a very capable and rugged kit.  Boxes are very good and low-technology, so DIY is totally viable.

I've suffered from more MAD than most other instrument fixes.  :Smile:   :Frown: 

See, if a fellow had a flute, a concertina, and a fiddle (okay, with a mandolin too in a double case) - this person would be content right?

----------


## foldedpath

Well, that's the path not taken then (box). 

I should also mention that I live with a fiddler who has very good intonation and a good ear for hearing when we're out of tune. We play tunes together here at the house several times a week, and attend local sessions and workshops. A flute with a tuning slide just seemed a lot easier for tuning in a social environment. I didn't want to be "that" person with a fixed pitch instrument that everyone else has to tune to, or else grin and bear the dissonance. I've been traumatized by too many concertina players, I guess.
 :Wink:

----------


## catmandu2

> Well, that's the path not taken then (box).



I'd be happy to send you a little presswood in A/D to try your hand - it's notoriously intuitive and fun - it was designed to be.  It's got a few out-of-tune reeds, but the rest are beautiful .. it's enough to learn to play on.  You should have seen the knackered old 3-row box I learnt on! .. some of the notes wheezed and buckled like an old bray donkey ..  Just play for yourself - no one wants to hear you play airs anyway!   :Wink:   (especially your SO - she'd throw you out)

----------


## derbex

Back to tremolo  :Smile: 

On Monday I played with the practice band and used a lot of tremolo on the Star of The County Down, it sounded quite good , I think because it was playing behind a couple of violins and adding texture to their sound. I tried it on my own and it sounded horrible.

----------


## catmandu2

> Back to tremolo


Yes I think you do what you need (with a mandolin) to convey the music.  Here there seems no particular compunction, for example (skip to 3:40") -

----------

Jess L.

----------


## DavidKOS

> Yes I think you do what you need (with a mandolin) to convey the music.  Here there seems no particular compunction, for example (skip to 3:40") -


That was so nice a tremolo I was expecting an Italian tune!

----------


## catmandu2

:Smile: 

The mndln can be a delicate little affair.  It does what it does well -

----------


## foldedpath

> That was so nice a tremolo I was expecting an Italian tune!


Yes, surprising! And very smooth. However it's one small example among just a few others mentioned in this thread, and very hard to find many other supporting examples to demonstrate that it's considered a standard technique in the music. 

If rapid-fire Italian style tremolo was a great thing in this music, one might think we would hear more recorded examples of it from the prominent players. 

I reviewed my collection of music from the few mandolin players in Irish trad who have released mandolin-focused albums, including Marla Fribish, Luke Plumb, Simon Mayor, and Michael Kerry. Also a nice clip of John Doyle playing mandola on a slow tune ("Little Christmas") on a Liz Carroll album. None of them use constant tremolo on slow tunes. I know that's "argument from authority" and we should all do what we want... but I think it's interesting, and maybe an indication of the current status of the technique. 

Not to stir the pot, or anything.  :Wink:

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## DavidKOS

> I reviewed my collection of music from the few mandolin players in Irish trad who have released mandolin-focused albums, including Marla Fribish, Luke Plumb, Simon Mayor, and Michael Kerry. Also a nice clip of John Doyle playing mandola on a slow tune ("Little Christmas") on a Liz Carroll album. None of them use constant tremolo on slow tunes.


That's what I gather from my own experience hearing Irish traditional music - and why it was a surprise to hear.

----------


## des

(skip to 3:40") - Two mandolins - Barnie McKenna and John Sheehan

----------


## Dagger Gordon

> (skip to 3:40") - Two mandolins - Barnie McKenna and John Sheehan


Well, two does make a difference!

I think it is worth noting that neither of these two guys (who were both in the Dubliners) were primarily mandolinists - Barney mainly played tenor banjo and John the fiddle.

In Ireland the tenor banjo is very popular, and the technique involved in playing triplets in fast tunes on the banjo is not so different from playing tremolo on the mandolin, so I think it is probably fair to say that you might expect Irish tenor banjoists to use some tremolo when they play slower stuff on mandolin, which does seem to be true of Barney.

I also think that if you started on guitar, then you may well approach the mandolin from a more chord-based angle (I'm thinking of the mention of John Doyle in post #60) and your emphasis may be on an arpeggio chordal effect (for example) rather than a lot of tremolo. That is certainly true of myself at any rate.

Incidentally, in foldedpath's same post, I think it is interesting that of the four mandolin examples given, only Michael Kerry is actually Irish (I think Doyle's mandola playing is slightly different, as noted above), and in fact neither Simon or Luke's playing actually sounds very Irish to me. I haven't heard that much of Michael or Marla, to be honest, but my impression is that they don't play all that many slow airs (please correct me if I'm wrong).

As a matter of interest, I checked out Mick Moloney's 'Strings Attached' CD, to find it doesn't have any slow tunes at all. Even Loftus Jones is taken a fair lick, with a lot of triplets and some double stopping but not really any tremolo.  You can tell he also plays banjo and guitar, I think.

Edit: Just listened to a bit of Marla Fibish playing Eleanor Plunkett, and it is true that she doesn't seem to use tremolo on it. That's her style, I guess. I still think it would sound ok though.

----------

DavidKOS, 

Jill McAuley

----------


## foldedpath

> In Ireland the tenor banjo is very popular, and the technique involved in playing triplets in fast tunes on the banjo is not so different from playing tremolo on the mandolin, so I think it is probably fair to say that you might expect Irish tenor banjoists to use some tremolo when they play slower stuff on mandolin, which does seem to be true of Barney.


That may be true for Barney, but personally I can't see any relation or derivation between mandolin tremolo technique and the "treble" ornaments used by Irish tenor banjo players. 

Banjo treble ornaments are a flurry of three evenly spaced notes, played as fast and staccato as possible, to make up for the fact that traditional ornaments like cuts and rolls are so very hard to do on a non-sustaining instrument. Some banjo players play them so fast and staccato that you can barely hear a pitch of those three notes. Mandolin tremolo on the other hand, is used to extend the duration of a note, like playing with a smooth, long bow motion on a fiddle. It's not an ornamentation or articulation of the note. 

YMMV, but for me, treble ornaments and tremolo are totally different techniques meant to do different things. It would sound weird if you played tremolo as fast as the pick motion of a tenor banjo treble ornament.




> I also think that if you started on guitar, then you may well approach the mandolin from a more chord-based angle (I'm thinking of the mention of John Doyle in post #60) and your emphasis may be on an arpeggio chordal effect (for example) rather than a lot of tremolo. That is certainly true of myself at any rate.


FWIW, John Doyle plays mandola on that track I mentioned in a very idiomatically "Irish mandolin" style that doesn't sound like his guitar playing. He can switch modes like that; I've even seen him play fiddle at one workshop jam. That particular tune is a relaxed tempo, not an air, and a little too fast for something you might tremolo instead. But for reference here's a sample of it on the Amazon download page (click the preview arrow):

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001ROS118...m_ws_tlw_trk12




> Incidentally, in foldedpath's same post, I think it is interesting that of the four mandolin examples given, only Michael Kerry is actually Irish (I think Doyle's mandola playing is slightly different, as noted above), and in fact neither Simon or Luke's playing actually sounds very Irish to me. I haven't heard that much of Michael or Marla, to be honest, but my impression is that they don't play all that many slow airs (please correct me if I'm wrong).


That's essentially the point I'm making. It's hard to find many examples of mandolin players whether they're trueblood Irish or not (and I'm not sure that matters, but that's another discussion) who play a slow air, with or without tremolo to extend the note, because the instrument just isn't ideal for it.

----------


## Dagger Gordon

> That may be true for Barney, but personally I can't see any relation or derivation between mandolin tremolo technique and the "treble" ornaments used by Irish tenor banjo players.


No?  Well surely they both involve the ability of your picking hand to move up and down very quickly. If you can manage to get good triplets on the banjo I would say you were well on the way to being technically able to play good tremolo.

I can see that you don't like the idea of a mandolin playing slow airs, especially using tremolo. 
That has not been my experience. Ever since I started recording Scottish music over 30 years ago, I have always included a lot of slow airs, both live and on record, and to be honest they have always been well received.

I'm afraid I just don't get your objection to it.

----------


## ald

The first person who I actually saw in person playing Irish music was an Irishman I met in a bar 40 years ago (and we have been friends ever since) who took out his mandolin and started playing and singing.  His technique was not great (with hindsight) but it was very effective. He would sing Irish songs backed up with single notes and a few two note chords thrown in here and there. It was quite pleasant. He also played a lot of melodies, mainly jigs, and some slow airs, which he tremeloed. I thought they sounded quite beautiful, so I am surprised people here are saying the mandolin does not lend itself to slow airs. I have also met quite a few good Irish mandolin players over the years. I had the impression the mandolin was quite common in Irish music (Andy Irvine, for example).

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## foldedpath

> I'm afraid I just don't get your objection to it.


Personal taste?

And also a love for the sound of airs on sustaining instruments like the pipes, flutes, and fiddles. My ears just can't seem to make that connection when I hear tremolo. On slower tunes, I think modern mandolins have plenty of sustain to allow space between notes on the slower tunes. But again, that's just personal taste. 

I don't think we have enough examples from different mandolin players to establish tremolo as either a standard convention or something to be avoided as some kind of general rule. So it comes down to what we individually prefer to hear and play. As a relatively recent instrument in the tradition, we're all making this up as we go along.

----------


## Bertram Henze

> I had the impression the mandolin was quite common in Irish music (Andy Irvine, for example).


Andy Irvine is an exception rather than the rule - he stands for what many of us perceive as Irish music after the 70s revival, but the instrument is mainly a tool of song accompaniment for him (and masterly exceptional accompaniment at that, always), and his style is not exactly what you'd have heard at some crossroads session in the middle of nowhere before that era. His style has become a tradition of its own, in a way, and he always got away with playing a Romanian tune in an Irish music performance.

Much the same can be said about the Dubliners, by the way, with whom Andy Irvine spent some time.

So, "does it sound like Irish trad?" immediately evokes the counter-question "where in Ireland and when?" meaning "who played it, when and where were you to hear it and associate it with Ireland?" Association can be made in many ways:
- geographical - you were in Ireland when you heard it (since I heard the Pet Shop Boys' _It's a Sin_ on the radio all the time while driving through Ireland for the first time, it will always be Irish music in some remote corner of my head)
- instrument - some instruments are generally bound to  fit an Irish stereotype, even in non-Irish music (tin whistle, uileann pipes come to mind)

Maybe the original question should be rephrased "Tremolo for good sound with Irish music?" and would be far easier to answer that way.

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## Bertram Henze

> My ears just can't seem to make that connection when I hear tremolo.


I can understand that - a mandolin player playing tremolo has a hard time not starting _Doctor Zhivago_ in my head. But yes, that's a personal thing.

----------


## catmandu2

The mandolin in Irish/Isles music then constitutes some 'problems' - much as in other traditional forms when a 'new' instrument is introduced.  If played in such a style (such as the trem in the Ennis clip), it sounds 'Italian.'  It wouldn't be the 'pure drop' then, would it?, but rather more a 'modern'/continental inflection (as with modern trends generally in the music - faster and faster, supergrouops, 'fusions,' etc); not surprising, as the mandolin is a 'modern' implement in the idiom.  The issue has its correlate/equivalent among many other forms, as the dialectic - trad vs new - evinces everywhere .

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## DavidKOS

With crossover instruments it's all about playing style.

I've heard older recordings of Irish fiddlers and flute/whistle players and they had very pronounced regional styles, which are less so after that "Irish music after the 70s revival" period where certain players really influenced the genre and younger fiddlers players also played other related styles of "celtic" music.

So the mandolin has been an odder instrument to adapt a style, the closest older traditional instrument to it is the banjo, and that's certainly not as old as the flute, whistle, and of course the fiddle and pipes.

Has anyone done a study on the mandolin in Ireland? I need to search the net.

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> It's hard to find many examples of mandolin players whether they're trueblood Irish or not (and I'm not sure that matters, but that's another discussion) who play a slow air, with or without tremolo to extend the note, because the instrument just isn't ideal for it.


I've been playing slow airs for at least 40 years on the mandolin, often but not always with tremelo, but this is the first time I've heard "the instrument just isn't ideal for it"...

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## des

Great thread.

This year's Temple Bar Tradfest (the spell checker tried to turn that into "tardiest") features among many others Gilbert O'Sullivan, Duke Special, the Stunning and Luka Bloom. It also of course features many, many musicians whose place in the tradition is more obviously "traditional" such as Martin Hayes, Sean Potts, Kevin Glackin, Noel Hill and Julie Fowlis - herself not Irish but most certainly Gaelic. And it also features people who, just like Barney Mc Kenna and John Sheehan,  manage to be self-evidently part of the tradition while being hugely popular entertainers - this year includes the Fureys, The Dublin Legends and Foster & Allen.

More and more I'm coming around to view that this wide range of people - audience and artists - wanting to be part of "the tradition" is a remarkably fine thing. Is not the point of a "tradition" that it's alive and not frozen? That it connects to popular culture ? That it overlaps with other streams ? 

So ..... I don't like the idea that tremolo on mandolin doesn't belong with "good sound in Irish traditional music". Hey - that was Barney Mc Kenna and John Sheehan with Seamus Ennis on "An Poc ar Buille"
"
To connect this with mandolin tremolo - Dagger's point about the tenor banjo in ireland reminds me of the guy who plays tenor banjo at the end of Dun Laoghaire East Pier most Sundays - he plays "Lara's Theme" (Dr Zhivago) at a slow pace with a pretty good tremolo. Not exactly purist "trad" - but only in Ireland. 

And more to Dagger's point about triplets, banjos and mandolin, and to what Beanzy said earlier - listen to this kid,  Tiarnan O'Connail  (who should be getting more attention on this site). Particularly on the last of the three reels - written for mandolin - his playing seems almost approaching duo style - approaching an almost constant stream of ornamentation / triplet tremolo with the melody lurking underneath, occasionally popping up. I'm reminded her of tremolo used the way it is in choro - as ornamentation - and in gypsy jazz with triplets almost as syncopation>

----------

DavidKOS, 

Jill McAuley

----------


## foldedpath

> Has anyone done a study on the mandolin in Ireland? I need to search the net.


If you find anything useful, let us know. Info seems to be thin on the ground. We do know that people were playing the mandolin in Irish trad style back in the 1930's and probably 1920's, from this quote (which I've mentioned before here) from the Chieftains' fiddler Martin Fay in their authorized biography:




> "As a young boy Martin remembers hearing his uncle Andy Kelly, who was a famous mandolin player in traditional circles. But the music didn't impress the young boy any more than the other kinds of music he was hearing at the time."


Martin Fay was born in 1936 and raised in Dublin, so that places Andy Kelly somewhere in the late 1930's to early 1940's. Possibly the 1920's when he started. If people were calling him a "famous mandolin player in traditional circles" then it must have been a well-accepted instrument. If anyone scares up more info, please post it.

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## foldedpath

> I've been playing slow airs for at least 40 years on the mandolin, often but not always with tremelo, but this is the first time I've heard "the instrument just isn't ideal for it"...


Depends on how you feel about tremolo, I guess.  :Smile: 

And also whether we're talking about simply a "slow tune," or an actual slow air that includes extended phrasing, variable tempo, and pauses at the end of a phrase. Like the clips I posted above, with Joanie Madden playing Roisin Dubh on whistle, or Cillian Vallelly playing Port na bPúcaí on pipes. There is no way you're going to get through an air that slow-paced on mandolin _without_ using tremolo. That's what I meant about the instrument not being ideal for it, in reference specifically to slow airs. 

If you're choosing not to use tremolo, just the sustain of the note on a mandolin, then you're probably playing a "slow tune" and not an actual slow air where the notes are spaced too far apart.

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> If you're choosing not to use tremolo, just the sustain of the note on a mandolin, then you're probably playing a "slow tune" and not an actual slow air where the notes are spaced too far apart.


I see. I hadn't realised that...

----------


## Jill McAuley

> "
> To connect this with mandolin tremolo - Dagger's point about the tenor banjo in ireland reminds me of the guy who plays tenor banjo at the end of Dun Laoghaire East Pier most Sundays - he plays "Lara's Theme" (Dr Zhivago) at a slow pace with a pretty good tremolo. Not exactly purist "trad" - but only in Ireland.


Great post there Des, spot on. That Tiarnan O'Connail clip was the business - I remember seeing some from a few years back and he just keeps getting better and better! Also, I spent many childhood Sundays visiting family in Dun Laoghaire - we'd always get a bag of chips and walk down the pier, rain or shine!

----------

des

----------


## Beanzy

Did you not go for a Teddys ice cream?

----------


## Jill McAuley

Oh probably on occasion but I always associate the pier with eating chips!

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

Here's the tune that started me on mandolin - My Lagan Love played by the Wolfe Tones - Derek Warfield on mandolin.

----------


## foldedpath

> Here's the tune that started me on mandolin - My Lagan Love played by the Wolfe Tones - Derek Warfield on mandolin.


I can see where that might appeal to a mandolin-focused audience. The question for me is whether or not it does justice to the tune. What I hear in that Wolfe Tones version is a bare skeleton of the notes, flattened into steady meter with good rhythm, but not a heck of a lot of emotional interpretation of the tune. It's the same thing when comparing that Dubliners version of Roisin Dubh earlier in the thread to the Joanie Madden version on whistle. 

In other words, shouldn't an air sound like an air? Or is it okay to just borrow the bare melody line and call that the tune? 

Here's what Lagan Love sounds like from a singer in the clip below. This is what an air sounds like with full expression, which tremolo (IMO) simply can't capture:




Here's another version with Van Morrison, rougher around the edges but still obviously sounding like a slow air:

----------

catmandu2

----------


## catmandu2

> ... whether or not it does justice to the tune.


A big issue, obviously.  I tend to hear and relate to pathos in the music, while others may find this [aspect] maudlin or sentimental.  But I'm like Archie Shepp, who said [paraphr], 'I'm worse than a romantic - I'm a sentimentalist ..'

Van may not have been talking of 'airs,' exactly, in this context (speaking here of his writing process), but I find it relevant in this discussion.  Albeit the Wolfetones may not have been going for 'suffering'..







> Van Morrison, rougher around the edges...


- for posterity

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

A little slower so...

----------

Carl Robin, 

Dagger Gordon

----------


## foldedpath

> A little slower so...


That's a great case study for hearing it done both ways, and deciding which sounds better (personal taste).

One more thing that I don't think has been mentioned yet, is that when you go into full tremolo you give up the option of using ringing drones under the melody line, or partial chords tossed in here and there. That's the _one_ advantage we have over the sustaining instruments like pipes, flutes, and fiddles. You can play a full or partial chord with tremolo, but you can't hold a dyad or partial chord and let it ring, while playing a few melody notes on top of that.

----------


## Dagger Gordon

As with everything, it ain't what you do - it's the way that you do it.

Listen again to some of David Grisman's playing. No-one has done more for our instrument than him in my view. He is a very versatile player of course, and he tends to use quite a lot of tremolo, but he uses a lot of sensitivity and DYNAMICS. Generally he keeps it going while playing his tremolo quite quietly. Whether he's having a go at John Coltrane's Naima or an old timey waltz his playing seems to me to be exemplary.  I've been listening to his album The Living Room Sessions a lot.

I realise that it is not Irish music, but I have no doubt that his approach can be easily adapted to just about anything.

----------


## Beanzy

Completely agree Dagger. I'm also not sure people will find online videos of examples of how it could be made to work. 
That's a large part of why I used the Quintillian quote, people are looking to others for what has been done in order to get some kind of permission to proceed. But Irish traditional music is only very traditional in its adherence to what works to express the music and all the instruments introduced to the genre in the 19th & 20th century prove it is open to what works as long as it actually works. Mandolin and similar instruments have been able to 'sit in' as long as they are kept to areas within the grasp of most players. 
We get to add a great lift to the start of a fiddle note in slower tunes and can give a really tidy pop to the faster tunes which I think can be a real improvement to just having fiddle on the fastest tunes.

However in terms of tremolo I don't think it has been properly explored by mandolinists with enough background in the specific genre of Irish traditional music, who also have brought their mandolin skills up to the point where the very high skill level required can be applied and explored. (We don't yet have a Chris Aquevella or Gertrude Weyhofen etc in ITM)

 As Foldedpath has been indicating getting the slow sean os feel, or the 'blás', would require the ability to be smooth with proper messa di voce (shaping and placement of the note), you would need tremolo which literally has no joins, which can rise and fall several times within one note. Ideally you would need to be able to establish a drone which is modulating and shaping, while performing a duo style tune with the required modulation and crans and fills of your tune. It would be a challenge which I think is achievable, but would be easily as difficult as learning the pipes to a very high level. You're going to have to lock yourself away in the bedroom for a lot of years to get the level of skill needed to master the skills needed to do tremolo to the point where it belongs and is a worthy equal to the instruments being used in that role so far. 

I'm totally convinced that the mandolin is capable of that role and just as convinced that I have not yet heard a player who has reached that level within the tradition. It's just not what people do, instead (like I did) we pick up the fiddle to get the sustain and subtlety of control and make ourselves into fiddlers, or get called by the lure of the pipes. But just because it hasn't been taken there doesn't mean it shouldn't, the mandolin can do this convincingly in the right hands. I really would urge people to shoot for the stars there, because even falling short of the ideal you're going to be a way better trad player from what you learn on the journey.

----------

Dagger Gordon

----------


## Bertram Henze

> I really would urge people to shoot for the stars there, because even falling short of the ideal you're going to be a way better trad player from what you learn on the journey.


Second that - the stuff to make yourself proud.

----------

Dagger Gordon

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> However in terms of tremolo I don't think it has been properly explored by mandolinists with enough background in the specific genre of Irish traditional music, who also have brought their mandolin skills up to the point where the very high skill level required can be applied and explored.


Some of us at least have been trying (for example I was brought up playing ITM and have been playing mandolin for close on 50 years).  :Smile:

----------

Dagger Gordon

----------


## Beanzy

I'm not saying there are no good players, nor is my point about not appreciating that people bust their chops getting good at this. I know, every fortnight I play with someone who has put a similar number of years to you into it and he has a real feel for what works, but just none seem to have taken the instrument beyond the level of accuracy & subtlety needed for its current roles so it can move to a core instrument position. For something like tremolo to really work in a genre like this, where it runs the risk of sounding like something totally alien, it needs a new level of playing beyond what is currently necessary to be good as a mandolinist in ITM . Now if you're saying you can seamlessly tremolo duo style with both lines modulating like a fiddler or piper with the drones going, to the point where people can't even identify its not either, then we've arrived and I'll be booking tickets. I think that's the level it needs to be convincing and I've never heard it to date. But again, I'm convinced if people aim for it, it is accessible and could work out really well.

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

And you could probably make tens of dollars playing like that considering the slow airs are such a small (but important) part of ITM.   Not that any of us are in it for the money...
The Wolfe Tones, like The Dubliners, used to try to put at least two Trad instrumentals onto each of their albums, but that's not what sold the albums.  I once recorded all the Dubliners instrumentals off the 3-box set onto cassette tape for my personal enjoyment.  It got lost in my continental moves...

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## Dave Hanson

If you can find it there is a compilation CD called, 'The Dubliners Instrumentals ' by Chyme Music, Belfast. 

Dave H

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> Now if you're saying you can seamlessly tremolo duo style with both lines modulating like a fiddler or piper with the drones going, to the point where people can't even identify its not either, then we've arrived and I'll be booking tickets.


But why would I want to try and emulate being a fiddler or piper with the drones going when I can try to achieve something different and appropriate with all the techniques available to me which suits the mandolin as an instrument in its own right?

----------


## Dagger Gordon

> But why would I want to try and emulate being a fiddler or piper with the drones going when I can try to achieve something different and appropriate with all the techniques available to me which suits the mandolin as an instrument in its own right?


Why indeed?  I mean, if you can, that's pretty cool but I honestly don't see what the problem is with just playing ITM on the mandolin, using whatever techniques you are able to do and which seem to you to be appropriate.  

This is Mandolin Cafe, after all!

----------


## Beanzy

My reasons for trying would be because I'm a mandolinist, so everything I do on the mandolin is to make me do it better, to explore all the possibilities. It's a bit like asking a climber why he doesn't just get the cable car to the top.

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> My reasons for trying would be because I'm a mandolinist, so everything I do on the mandolin is to make me do it better, to explore all the possibilities. It's a bit like asking a climber why he doesn't just get the cable car to the top.


Same with most of us I guess. With or without tremelo.

----------


## Beanzy

Yep, no harm in sticking to the well prepared routes, you still get a good climb. 
I'm just hoping someday there'll be an Irish Trad tremolo version of Charles Barrington to show us how it can be done.

----------


## catmandu2

> Yep, no harm in sticking to the well prepared routes, you still get a good climb. 
> I'm just hoping someday there'll be an Irish Trad tremolo version of Charles Barrington to show us how it can be done.


I'm thinking effective ('Irish') airs will be executed on charango and various 'exotic' instrumentation - like  Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh and hardingfele for example - before the mandolin proper, as folks bring radically new approaches and instrumentation to the (er) table.  There are folks playing tunes on ouds, for example.. I generally agree with most of what's been said - as Beanzy mentions, we haven't seen the art of the air realized (effectively, imo) on mandolin.  I believe there are many players extant, who would - if it could be done.  I understand mine is not a popular opinion; I don't feel that mandolin is effective for Bach, either, for example - I just don't like the sound.

Of course, I could be wrong and perhaps the player _will_ come with the technique to overcome its limitations.

----------


## foldedpath

> But why would I want to try and emulate being a fiddler or piper with the drones going when I can try to achieve something different and appropriate with all the techniques available to me which suits the mandolin as an instrument in its own right?


Maybe because (referring back to the James Kelley quote I mentioned earlier) the goal is to bring the music to your instrument, and not the other way around. 

I think it's worth noting that all the other players of plucked or hammered string instruments in this music -- the banjo, guitar, harp, and hammered dulcimer -- simply use the sustain of a struck note when playing slower tunes. None of those players use a constant tremolo technique, although it would be technically possible. Maybe it's worth asking why? It just might be because letting a note die with a little sustain is a better way to play the slower tunes in this particular style of music.

Or we could just ignore all that, and rip into a slow tune with tremolo because hey, it's what you do on a mandolin with Classical, Italian, and Bluegrass music.
 :Wink:

----------


## catmandu2

> I think it's worth noting that all the other players of plucked or hammered string instruments in this music -- the banjo, guitar, harp, and hammered dulcimer -- simply use the sustain of a struck note when playing slower tunes. None of those players use a constant tremolo technique...


I use it (trem) often on hammered dulcimer - consequently the instrument is quite effective for airs (and in fact was much earlier going to elucidate some of its similarities/differences with mandolin).  However, one can easily achieve a very fine, dynamic trem on HD - (I used to carry a youtube clip of one of my heroes Shivkumar Sharma in my sig line until it was no longer available - the subtlety executed is superlative); like with rolls on a snare drum, we can trem very softly - almost inaudibly.

Here's one showing some of the techniques while tuning up - not nearly as exemplary, but..




But yep, not on harp - the resonance itself does the trick (nor do we have sticks..)

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> It just might be because letting a note die with a little sustain is a better way to play the slower tunes in this particular style of music. 
> 
> Or we could just ignore all that, and rip into a slow tune with tremolo because hey, it's what you do on a mandolin with Classical, Italian, and Bluegrass music.


As with many things then... a matter of opinion and choice of the player.

----------


## foldedpath

> I use it (trem) often on hammered dulcimer - consequently the instrument is quite effective for airs (and in fact was much earlier going to elucidate some of its similarities/differences with mandolin).


Interesting. I did do a quick search through some YouTube clips to get a feel for what common practice might be on hammered dulcimer, specifically for Irish trad slower tunes and airs. Didn't find any with tremolo. All the ones I found were using single notes, along with partial or full chords at intervals. Maybe I didn't look hard enough. 

I do know what I'd be thinking of a hammered dulcimer player who sat behind me in a pub session, and hammer-tremolo'd their way through a slow tune though. I think I'd be heading to the bar for a refill. Personal taste, again...

----------


## catmandu2

> I do know what I'd be thinking of a hammered dulcimer player who sat behind me in a pub session, and hammer-tremolo'd their way through a slow tune though. I think I'd be heading to the bar for a refill. Personal taste, again...


I knew I should have been more explicit! - should have edited ..   :Smile: 




> I use it (trem) often on hammered dulcimer - consequently the instrument is quite effective for (*SOLO*) airs ..


Better?   :Smile:  

Same with harp - the overtones on these instruments are immense - going back now to several pages ago when Beanzy brought up - space and not playing .. the wire harp for example rings and sustains powerfully once a note is activated - it sometimes reminds me of an organ (which in turn reminds me of a pedal steel) - so stopping a string is just as subtle or distinct as activating a string  - this can be exploited to rhythmic effect, and was thinking of this in relation to 'how to play the mandolin in 'airs".. etc.  Of course this is true of all instruments to their degree - some instruments with powerful sustain are just more pronounced in these aspects and lending to these subtleties (_and why one doesn't play airs at sessions_).

Incidentally, The Asian long zithers don't have these problems, for example - they're pentatonic (there _are_ alterations, for the record) so players can whack *(or whip like mules) their instruments and stay consonant *which by the way is increasingly more common technique in modern zheng reperoitre, etc, as with guitars, etc .. a large resonant box is a mountainous resource to be exploited..)

----------


## catmandu2

> Interesting. I did do a quick search through some YouTube clips to get a feel for what common practice might be on hammered dulcimer, specifically for Irish trad slower tunes and airs. Didn't find any with tremolo. All the ones I found were using single notes, along with partial or full chords at intervals. Maybe I didn't look hard enough.


And btw, I don't know of any HD I like on the web except Rakes of Kildare on that little Oakwood .. I play O'carolan, jigs, reels, a hornpipe or two, but mostly harp pieces.  I got into HD for its harp-likeness - They were my surrogate for harp for decades until I finally started harping proper - mine are the large and resonant floating top variety (not the fixed tops - I can't stand the vast majority of everything on the net.  I abhor 80% of the HD I hear and can't abide 98% of it.  I've always abhorred HD in ensemble.  The thing was made to make people dance - it's a piano without a damper -

----------


## catmandu2

F-path, on my photo album page is a pic with my large Dorogi HD - it's built like a cimbalom - weighs about 30 pounds I guess, 4-strings per treble course (strung with 2-per in that pic)...sustains forever with its resonance.  I can flam, rub, roll and whatever I want with those sticks. I have leather, felt, whatever on some of my sticks - I can begin or end a tremolo almost inaudibly.  Fast ornaments come naturally and easily on HD (like a flute) - you have to _limit_ the travel of your stick (drop a drum stick loosely to the snare head - see how it bounces?), and tremolo as long and effortlessly as one does a roll on a snare.  It's a very expressive instrument.  Solo.  From pipe tunes to polkas ..

----------


## catmandu2

Here's an example of tremolo on HD (skip to 1.03:35") - not ITM of course, but an example of common tremolo technique (that I commonly use for airs, etc).











Don't mean to be rude to go on here like this, but these show a variety of relevant things..instrument to 'exotic' role there at the bottom; dynamic range of an instrument in the vid above that; etc.  To do on mandolin, one would have to be very quick to exploit the mandolin's particularly evocative capabilities ..

----------

DavidKOS

----------


## catmandu2

Here's a quite slow version of March of the King of Laois - enabling this player to use tremolo.  I play this at the tempo from the Chieftains recording I lifted it from, so I don't trem this one...but maybe I will now -   :Smile: 





So while there doesn't seem to be a lot of this approach in the 'celtic' stuff on the net, it's something that I do - and expect we'll see more of.  Albeit, I don't play _a lot_ of airs on HD - polkas, pipe tunes, jigs and reels.   But I do use tremolo quite a bit when improvising..

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

And there was I thinking the OP was talking about mandolin tremolo...

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

Here's tremolo on a Mandola (after the single note run-through) with "dragging" double-stops:

----------

catmandu2, 

derbex

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

and on a mandolin...:

----------

derbex

----------


## catmandu2

> And there was I thinking the OP was talking about mandolin tremolo...


In fact, all this is instructive and relevant to mandolin (at least it is for me).  Mileage varies..

Adaptation and applied techniques, aesthetics, refinement, derivations and progressions, cultural mobility...

The art of tremolo.

----------


## derbex

Nicely done Eddie, mandola sounded good both times through.

What's make is the mondola? Google didn't come up with anything.

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

That's my Dave Griffin Baritone Mandola - DDAAEEBB -18" scale.  Dave built it from a design by Ron Oates.  Dave also builds "regular" mandolins.

----------

derbex

----------


## catmandu2

Yes and thank you for posting.  It gives us a chance to hear how approaches differ instrument to instrument, styles of expression, etc.  The mandolin is a tricky little thing to wrought emotion from - especially through the 'air.'

It's instructive to me.  But I also gain perspective from considering the 'problem' from multiple points.  I'm interested in how pipers phrase and create dynamics, and resultant expressions from instruments derived rather directly from the  'source' (ergo my harp and HD flight).  There's much subtlety and emotion that can be expressed - much contained in the playing of an air with the contrapuntalism of the olde instruments.. when i play these on HD, fiddle, free reeds, it's the pipes i'm emulating.  The distinctions made previously by f-path - are salient I think.

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

Well salt is bad for my blood pressure so I'll pass on f-path's comments.

----------


## Mike Anderson

> A big issue, obviously.  I tend to hear and relate to pathos in the music, while others may find this [aspect] maudlin or sentimental.  But I'm like Archie Shepp, who said [paraphr], 'I'm worse than a romantic - I'm a sentimentalist ..'
> 
> Van may not have been talking of 'airs,' exactly, in this context (speaking here of his writing process), but I find it relevant in this discussion.  Albeit the Wolfetones may not have been going for 'suffering'..


Thank you foldedpath for reminding me of the Van/Chieftains album, which I don't own any more but LOVED back in the day. 

As for the notion of anyone finding the pathos in airs (or any music) maudlin or sentimental, there's an easy solution: it's called the bum's rush. IMO anyone who doesn't relate to the emotion in music has no call to play it; you're just indulging in an exercise in wankery, showing off your chops, or "hey check me out - I'm cool because I play." Honestly, how can anyone not see these as shallow reasons to get involved in music?  :Disbelief:  

Feel it in your heart and guts or it or leave it alone. Join a garage band if you want to impress the neighbourhood chicks.

----------


## catmandu2

Anyway, I'm discovering more about my playing all the time - and threads like this are often inspiring - thanks to all for indulging.  I took a whole other aspect to playing March/King of Laois after listening to that beautiful slow march - I love how the Scottish drums are orchestrated into it - the varieties and textures we can draw from tremolo are a delight. 

Cheers!

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

Here's a tremolo with double stops on a Slow Air - My Singing Bird...

----------


## foldedpath

Eddie, I know we don't agree on this and that's fine. Just a difference of opinion. Since you posted that clip, here's my opinion. I'm not hearing a strong statement of the melody underneath that barrage of tremolo. There is a melody underneath all that picking somewhere, fighting to get out. 

I continue to think (and it's just my own opinion!) that tremolo is not the way to handle this material on mandolin. Some tunes are just better left to other sustaining instruments, the human voice, or a slower and more considered single-note approach on mandolin, milking whatever sustain you can manage with chord embellishment. 

Here's what the melody sounds like when sung, for reference:




There is a Clancy Brothers version on YouTube as well, but that's kinda painful to listen to, after this one.
 :Wink:

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

You look really young in that video...

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> I continue to think (and it's just my own opinion!) that tremolo is not the way to handle this material on mandolin.


Well that is your opinion as you say. My and some others' opinions happen to be different. Let us therefore celebrate the possibility to approach things in different ways and not be ruled by "convention"!

----------


## Beanzy

I'm glad to see it's being tried. I think it will only fit once it has been tried enough to develop a vernacular that suits the form.
If you listen to the use of vocal tremolo & vibrato in Irish music it gives a good lead as to how & where it could work well.
There are so many ways to use tremolo, in terms of where, how and when to swell and fade the effect, when & how much of a note to leave just ring or gap at the end etc. and it takes a lot of time to get the feel, even in singing. You'll often hear people taking issue with singers who use too much in any genre, but I always remember as a youngster hearing people take issue with particular singers and their choices or overuse of 'warbling' as it was often referred to, but those same people switched on straight away and were keenly appreciative of those singers who 'got it' and made it work.


It's a subtle game and will need time to develop.

It'll be people like Eddie who continue to explore who will find how it will work best. Thanks Eddie.

----------

brunello97

----------


## foldedpath

> Well that is your opinion as you say. My and some others' opinions happen to be different. Let us therefore celebrate the possibility to approach things in different ways and not be ruled by "convention"!


Well, if we're playing something called "traditional Irish music," then it's kinda hard to get away from being ruled by convention, isn't it? 
 :Smile: 

- - - Updated - - -




> You look really young in that video...


What is that supposed to mean?

----------


## Eddie Sheehy

You are a member of what I refer to as ITM Nazis.  Non-existent in Ireland but overly-prevalent in the US.  Since you continue to be critical yet hide behind a pseudonym you are now on IGNORE.

----------


## foldedpath

Eddie, I've bent over backwards to say that this is just my opinion. I'm sorry you feel that way.

As for anonymity, it's not that hard to figure out who I am. I've posted a link to my duo before where it's explicit. Here it is again, in case anyone wants to hear some tune samples (old ones, from four or five years ago, egad!). The applet might take a while to load the tunes:

http://www.ptjams.com/string14/

----------


## Beanzy

It's interesting to use someone like Sinéad O'Connor as an example of how artists, who are not from the Irish traditional music stable, can take their techniques and blend them with folk songs like this to make a complementary approach to the traditional one. 
She works from the basis of her training in Bel Canto and applies it to the work she produces. 
But because she is thoughtful and insightful about how she does it, reading the affect to be drawn from the listener she tempers the her technique to suit the folk genre. 
She still does not approach her work as a traditional Irish performer would, but her influence on the Irish folk scene is almost as strong as her influence in popular music in Ireland.

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> Well, if we're playing something called "traditional Irish music," then it's kinda hard to get away from being ruled by convention, isn't it?


Absolutely not in my experience. Having grown up in the tradition and played ITM most of my life I've witnessed numerous people pushing against the boundaries. In Ireland and the rest of the British Isles (and elsewhere), traditional music (not just ITM) is constantly evolving and you only have to look at some of the innovative musicians and groups who have emerged over recent decades to see how the music has been taken forward in new directions.

----------

brunello97, 

Jess L.

----------


## James Rankine

> Eddie, I've bent over backwards to say that this is just my opinion. I'm sorry you feel that way.
> 
> As for anonymity, it's not that hard to figure out who I am. I've posted a link to my duo before where it's explicit. Here it is again, in case anyone wants to hear some tune samples (old ones, from four or five years ago, egad!). The applet might take a while to load the tunes:
> 
> http://www.ptjams.com/string14/


Thanks Mike for the link to your music. Really beautiful playing and a fantastic tone from your mandolin. I almost always agree with everything you post and having now heard your musical voice I know why.

----------


## Dagger Gordon

It's a while since this thread was active.
I have a recent video of me playing a waltz, which I thought I would offer up.
I guess you might say that I use a sort of slow tremolo. I think it works for me, anyway.

----------

Beanzy, 

billkilpatrick, 

Dave Hanson, 

derbex, 

Randi Gormley

----------


## Shelagh Moore

Hi Dagger... at least for me it works in a very expressive and tasteful way as well.

----------

Dagger Gordon

----------


## Jen88

I say try it.
If it sounds good to you and the others in your band then do it, if not then maybe have a chat about what might work better and do that.
Re what is trad:
I really like Irish trad, but am not Irish in any sense.

I once went to a session where it was quite clear that they didn't want anyone who wasn't Irish playing their music.

I also heard some real horror stories from other people, so it put me off even listening to Irish Music for quite a while. That is very sad!

I personally think that it's great to celebrate and enjoy the music from various places, without getting bogged down in "You must use this instrument" or "You must be this particular race" in order to enjoy or appreciate it properly.

I've never been back to a Irish trad only session, but I've been to sessions where quite a bit of that is played and I usually play some tunes or do some songs that most people I know consider trad in the little session I run.

And what is "trad" will mean different things to different people. There isn't just one source who can answer such questions and have the final say on it!

I say just try and enjoy!

Cheers,
Jen.

----------

Jess L.

----------


## catmandu2

Very nice to my ear, Dagger

----------

Dagger Gordon

----------


## Bren

Interesting thread. I got sidetracked watching Van Morrison and Bob Dylan, which i hadn't seen before.

I'm a big fan of Daggers very clean and even long note style of picking on waltzes and slow tunes. 

Never really mastered it myself.  I also like the classical style where they keep a tremolo going  while picking out counterpoint or lower notes on other strings. 

I tend to do Italian style tremolo on long notes. After all, mandolin was designed for that. In a band or noisy environment that is. I seldom play tremolo as often when playing such tunes at home.

 When out and about, it depends what the other instruments are in a session. Maybe not play at all if i don't think mandolin will help much. That's hard if you don't get out much and are dying to play some tunes! 

Once a woman came up to me and said, in front of the banjo player, that she loved the sound of the mandolin. I said, it's a very romantic sound compared to banjo. Which was just mischief making but , really, you're looking for a voice that fits and in your own way, trying to make it sing and articulate a feeling just as much as a fiddler or Piper is.

Anyway, i never knew tremolo was frowned on until i read it on The Session. I certainly never got that impression from my early listening where Barney McKenna used it on Dubliners recordings, or in Scottish sessions.

----------


## Dagger Gordon

[QUOTE=Bren;1564064]
I'm a big fan of Daggers very clean and even long note style of picking on waltzes and slow tunes."

Thanks Brendan

----------


## Dagger Gordon

> Anyway, i never knew tremolo was frowned on until i read it on The Session. I certainly never got that impression from my early listening where Barney McKenna used it on Dubliners recordings, or in Scottish sessions.


Neither did I. Nor, for that matter, did I know you had to use DUD DUD for jigs. I'd been playing mandolin for at least 20 years before that.

----------


## Dagger Gordon

Sorry double post

----------


## foldedpath

> Anyway, i never knew tremolo was frowned on until i read it on The Session. I certainly never got that impression from my early listening where Barney McKenna used it on Dubliners recordings, or in Scottish sessions.


On that latter point, I don't think it matters what people think about it in the context of Irish or Scottish pub sessions, because the majority of tunes will be at dance tempos where tremolo would be redundant (or impossible) anyway. 

You might get the occasional retreat march, or something slow like "Hector the Hero," or "Da Slockit Light" where a mandolin player might try tremolo to stretch out the notes. But those are usually few and far between among all the jigs and reels. So you'll get different individual opinions, but I doubt that much of a consensus has ever built up about it in the context of session playing. There just aren't that many opportunities for it.

Other than that, for either stage performance or playing alone at home, it's just personal taste as to whether it works on the slow tunes, including the true slow airs with rubato tempo. Personally I don't think it works in the latter case because it's impossible (in my head anyway) to avoid hearing it like Italian or Classical music instead of distinctively Irish or Scottish. But that's just me. It's one reason I picked up the flute as an additional instrument. The other reason being a wider range of ornamentation and dynamics, but the sustain sure is nice. 

By the way, I like Dagger's playing of the waltz in that clip above. However, steady meter following the tempo isn't quite the same as Italian/Classical tremolo. The music I was mainly referring to was the un-metered type like slow airs with irregular timing like Pórt Na BPúcaí. Or Scottish piobaireachd (formal bagpipe music) if you _really_ want a challenge! In a tune like that, you'd be playing tremolo "off the beat" because there is no beat. It's why they're traditionally done on sustaining instruments. Or at least plucked instruments with tons of sustain, like the wire harp.

----------


## Dagger Gordon

> On that latter point, I don't think it matters what people think about it in the context of Irish or Scottish pub sessions, because the majority of tunes will be at dance tempos where tremolo would be redundant (or impossible) anyway.


Yes, perhaps the majority of tunes will be. But we do slow tunes in the pub sometimes, and sometimes the place will indeed quieten down for them. And then how you play is important.

----------


## catmandu2

> ...got sidetracked watching Van Morrison and Bob Dylan, which i hadn't seen before..


Be sure and check out the rest of the doc - great John Lee Hooker segment.

But I'm always moved by that rendition of "One Irish Rover."




> ...Anyway, i never knew tremolo was frowned on until i read it on The Session...


For my part, I haven't noticed (nor promulgated) such ecumenism - I'm just playing my airs and pibrochs at home - not expecting anyone to pipe down for it!   :Smile:

----------


## Bren

> But we do slow tunes in the pub sometimes, and sometimes the place will indeed quieten down for them.


Sometimes. Often they won't, so a good strong tremolo helps establish a melody line that everyone else can hear. I like to play waltzes in sessions ...forgive me.





> I'm always moved by that rendition of "One Irish Rover."


You kind of forget that singular artists like those two, that don't talk to the media (or their audiences) much, do actually meet up and play together at times. Nice to see that Dylan was familiar with Morrison's song. The work they create stands so apart that one doesn't always think of them mixing like that.

----------


## foldedpath

> Sometimes. Often they won't, so a good strong tremolo helps establish a melody line that everyone else can hear. I like to play waltzes in sessions ...forgive me.


Waltzes in sessions are great. I like playing the "Far Away" tune, which is often referred to as an Irish Waltz, whatever that is, and often comes up in local sessions. Here's a sample of me playing it:

http://ptjams.com/string14/audio/str...e_far_away.mp3

"Hector the Hero" is usually played in 3/4 waltz time, at least in the local sessions. What Dagger is playing on that waltz video isn't tremolo. Or maybe we understand the term differently. I think some of us are talking past each other here.

Do you know what a slow air is? What the term "rubato" means? Here's a sample below (and I think I linked this tune earlier). 




Do you think this is a good candidate for Italian-style mandolin tremolo? 

I hear this kind of thing in local sessions, usually started by a fiddler or piper. Everyone else sits out, and then joins in when the next tune in the set is a march or dance tune. And there is a lot of crossover (IMO) between this and the slower tunes that are played in sessions. 

Past a certain point in slow tunes and non-metered playing, I give up trying to follow on a plucked instrument with short sustain like mandolin and just listen, enjoying someone else playing the tune. Your mileage may vary, and I know that every session is different.

----------

catmandu2

----------


## catmandu2

Beautiful.  I love the pipes.

Ya there are some instruments that you just want to hear 'em and that's it.

So, can someone say?  I'd read it was the wire strung first before the pipes - considering all of the Isles - and the music then went the pipes in a fashion that began with the harp?  I may have that reversed but i dont think so.  I'm familiar with the history since about 1600, but prior?

----------


## Dagger Gordon

[QUOTE=foldedpath; What Dagger is playing on that waltz video isn't tremolo. Or maybe we understand the term differently. I think some of us are talking past each other here.[/QUOTE]

It's certainly not tremolo in the Italian sense, but at the same time it's not just single notes either.
As I say, it seems to me to be a sort of 'slow tremolo'. But it may not be tremolo at all, depending how you understand the term.

For what it's worth, I've always played a bit like that. Actually some of my early playing was influenced by the clarsach, and on my Highland Mandolin album (1988) I had a version of Archibald MacDonald of Keppoch with Katie Harrigan on harp, which I thought sounded nice.

----------

Shelagh Moore

----------


## Shelagh Moore

> Anyway, i never knew tremolo was frowned on until i read it on The Session.


Some of us pre-date that self-appointed arbiter of all that is correct in ITM/traditional music.

----------

Jess L., 

John Kelly

----------


## Bad Monkey

> Some of us pre-date that self-appointed arbiter of all that is correct in ITM/traditional music.


As does the music itself :Cool:  It may just be me,but some of those guys that hang out on the session forum seem to take themselves a wee bit serious sometimes.
 FWiW I remember my great-grandfather using a bit of tremolo now and then while playing tenor banjo. It was the 60's and I was a "wee biter" sitting on the kitchen floor trying to play along on a Monkey Ward mandolin that was strung up with only four strings. Hey, I was 4 and they wanted to play was well as tune my instrument. I remember that I couldn't get any kind of tremolo going at all so my great-grandfather showed me how a couple of triplets (like you're playing a jig) could fit rhythmically into a melody with my grandfathers' fiddle line and "keep the note going". The rhythm was the thing for him, it was important to make sense with the rest of the tune, you didn't just bang away as fast as you could. 
Now this was tunes played with family by Scots with brogues so thick you could walk on it, so may not be strict I-trad. If anyone ever said "OOO I love Irish music" he would lay it on thick with "we're Scots, we play Scottish tunes by definition" and all that kind of stuff. LOL once I did hear him say that the difference between Scottish and Irish tunes were the Scots could sing when they weren't drinking. 

anyway, I guess my point is that a guy that learned to play trad music in Scotland pre WW1 used a bit of tremolo so we can add that to the mix. I can't say when or why he started using it other than "you can keep the note going".


ed for spelling

----------

Bob Clark, 

catmandu2, 

Jess L., 

Randi Gormley, 

Shelagh Moore

----------


## catmandu2

As you say - a bit of tremolo - different likely than the drenching "Italian-style' approach.  For me, an effective tremolo (in a trad air, e.g.) is - rather than the unremitting barrage to emulate a sustaining instrument - yet another opportunistic device to impart texture, shade, volume/tonal dynamics -


Here's one of those approaches of lending different (trad Chinese) instruments to 'Western trad.'  As with mandolin, tremolo on guzheng is a prolific technique.  Notice the dynamics achieved - rising/falling, pulsing, etc:

----------

Simon DS

----------


## jdsobol

Listen to what Enda Scahill does with tremolo--both on mandolin and tenor banjo. He occasionally takes the standard triplet and extends it into tremolo passages on jigs, reels, hornpipes, and even on old-time tunes. It's flashy, maybe over-the-top for some tastes--but it's certainly a legit choice.

----------


## jdsobol

Here is a tune played on cittern with tremolo technique adapted from the Spanish guitar. I spent years practicing "Recuerdos de la Alhambra." Then I heard the Irish classical guitarist John Feeley do something like this with the Carolan tune "Blind Mary," and nicked it for a cittern arrangement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6Eedhoctqg

----------

catmandu2, 

Paul Kotapish

----------


## catmandu2

Of all the various tremolo techniques of all the instruments in all the musics of the world, I would think that some variation in deployment - in our case here ITM - would inevitability result, particularly in 'fingerstyle' approaches.  I mentioned that more haphazardly earlier on the thread - thinking then of charango and santoor approaches specifically.  With our ever increasing 'polyphonic' melding of music, players, style, instruments et al, I suppose it's reasonable that crossfertilization of technical elements like tremolo will ensue.

*Fwiw, as a cl/fl guitarist long before i ever got into ITM, i've done my share of dabbling with the fingerstyle trem (which I also do on chrngo) approach on cittern.  But I'm generally unimpressed with my particular results (I went to other instruments for sustain!   :Smile:   ).

----------


## Dagger Gordon

It really is a case of different strokes for different folks, and unlike Italian (or indeed Croatian and many other traditions) there is not (yet?) a hard and fast expectation about tremolo in Irish mandolin.

On the other hand there is certainly an expectation of triplets in Irish tenor banjo playing, and many Irish mandolin players will in fact be mainly banjo players. It seems to me that if you are able to play good banjo triplets, then that technique of very quick right hand movement (unless you're left-handed) would be bound to serve you well if you wanted to do tremolo, so I am surprised that you don't hear it more. 

Unless of course you just don't like it, which I guess is what this thread is all about.

----------


## John Kelly

Tired to access your video, but getting a message saying it is not available!  Has it been taken down?  Othere videos opening as expected.

----------


## Jen88

Getting so many good tune ideas from this thread  :Smile:

----------


## billkilpatrick

Nicely played, Dagger.  There's a video of Monica Huggett talking about vibrato in Baroque music where she says "It's ridiculous to think of people in the 17th century saying 'I mustn't do vibrato!'"  Same for tremolo - in any music, really.  If it works and serves the piece, have at it.

----------

Dagger Gordon

----------


## Dagger Gordon

I feel we should take note of this extremely beautiful Irish air as played by Simon Mayor.
He uses a variety of techniques,including a wee burst of tremolo at around 1.15. Exemplary playing, in my view.

----------

Bob Clark, 

catmandu2, 

Jill McAuley, 

Mike Floorstand

----------


## JCook

One of my favorite Irish airs is "My Lagan Love." I love the melody (played in C) and when I play it I play it straight the first time through with no tremolo. On the second time I tremolo the long notes, and it's a really nice effect. Tremolo isn't only for playing long notes, but it can also be an expressive texture when used judiciously. I play this tune slowly and the tremolo on the second time through adds some emotion to it. I usually play it solo, so the long sustained un-tremoloed notes in the first run ring, even though the mandolin doesn't sustain that well, but adding tremolo later makes a difference.

Jack

----------

Simon DS

----------


## Dave Hanson

Simon is playing ' The Lark in the Clear Air ' absolutely beautiful.

Dave H

----------


## catmandu2

Interesting - voice-leading and varied arpeggios..  Great example of creativity in overcoming the instrument's limitations - wringing out sustain and dynamics from a highly percussive instrument (without resorting to trem).

----------


## catmandu2

Oops, meant - varied (and beautiful) _textures_ and arpeggios..

----------

