This is a nice little instrumental in 5/4 time written by Maartin Allcock when he was a member of Fairport Convention and appearing on Fairport's all-instrumental 1986 album "Expletive Delighted" (Allcock is also an ex-member of Jethro Tull and of Simon Mayor's Mandolin All-Stars/Mandolinquents). From the title, one would expect that this tune was inspired by German or Austrian folk, but in fact the tune is much more reminiscent of Bulgarian or Gypsy dance music, with a complex driving rhythm and three interlocking harmony parts. Great fun to play once the rhythm is under the fingers. I'm playing the rhythm on Ozark tenor guitar, joined after the first eight bars by a Washburn M-3SW F-style mandolin. Lead melody throughout is on my 1925 Zimmermann waldzither, tuned GDAEB -- Allcock plays it on a capoed bouzouki which gives it a similarly nasal tonality as my waldzither. High and low harmony on waldzither and tenor guitar, joined for the second half of the take by double-tracked Embergher bowlback mandolin tremolo, building up in intensity and complexity after each repeat of the tune. Learned from Allcock's own three-part harmony transcription in the official Fairport Convention tune book Volume 1. There is a 1995 live video of Fairport playing this tune as the Coda to a song here, somewhat simplified from their studio version by omitting one of the harmony parts. My recording (with all harmony parts) is here: Martin
Sounds awesome and extremely tricky!!
I've just revisited this little piece with its tricky 5/4 time signature, which I had previously recorded in 2013. For this new recording I have used the same arrangement (edited by the composer of the tune, the late and much missed Maartin Allcock) but have somewhat re-jigged the parts to make it fit my current method of recording. Instruments in the order in which they join in: 1898 Giuseppe Vinaccia mandolin (alternating lead and first harmony) Vintage Viaten tenor guitar (rhythm) Garry Probert resonator tenor guitar (alternating lead and first harmony) 1925 Jul. Heinr. Zimmermann waldzither (second harmony) Listening to Fairport's original studio recording (link), it strikes me how much this is a mandolin ensemble piece -- Maart plays the melody on bouzouki, then adding mandolin and mandola harmonies as the piece builds. Towards the end, the sound becomes a bit more generic with the fiddle, percussion and bass, but it's a really fun piece. Martin
