The Old Concertina Reel

  1. Simon DS
    Simon DS

    https://youtu.be/p4wmmCw88e8

    (Mars over Venus approaching Taurus)
  2. John Kelly
    John Kelly
    Great how the planets always seem to know just where to be at specific times! Fine tune and fine arrangement and playing, Simon.
  3. Simon DS
    Simon DS
    Those two are probably the most knowledgeable of all the planets in the Solar System, John.
    All that wisdom... well they are 4 billion years old.
  4. Gelsenbury
    Gelsenbury
    Runs like clockwork! Excellent, assured playing.
  5. Simon DS
    Simon DS
    This is quite a simple, repetitive tune. But perhaps it was written before Isaac Newton was born.
    I like this scale, I was trying to imagine playing it further up the neck in a different scale but I like it really simple.
    I've heard that the tune is unpopular in some sessions, but I think if it's played slowly then it would be quite good in terms of getting everyone into the groove.
  6. Richard Carver
    Richard Carver
    I can't imagine why it would be unpopular - the simple repetitiveness seems perfect for a session. Anyway, you have done a great job with it, as always, Simon.
  7. Frithjof
    Frithjof
    You played it with a good driving rhythm, Simon.
  8. harrywhohaa
    harrywhohaa
    Great playing and total package, what are you backing up with there OM/Bouzouki?
  9. Bertram Henze
    Bertram Henze
    Been away for some time and missed out - great stompy rhythm, the "downtown" scene seems familiar, just hope there's not too much meteorism in that tavern...
  10. Simon DS
    Simon DS
    Well, thank you gentlemen, I'm glad you enjoyed it.
    Yes I've been away on a little mandolin holiday too, playing an entirely different instrument.
    I saw a video on YouTube of a woman who said, basically, just cover everything with rosin, the strings, the bow, everything!

    So I picked up my dirt cheap Stagg fiddle and did just that. And picking it up, what a difference I can actually play fiddle! I mean I can get all the notes in pretty much the right place... with a barnstorming, stomping, thumping oak floor boards type of rhythm.

    (I have to admit that I did modify the fiddle. I strapped a long thin strip of bicycle innertube to the bridge which gives it a wonderful authentic 'fiddle playing in the rain' tone).

    So Bertram you are correct that bodily functions have been a factor -because of the violin.

    I haven't really had time recently to hear all of your videos, but I will catch up in the near future.
  11. Aidan Crossey
    Aidan Crossey
    Interesting that Simon gives this tune the name, The *Old* Concertina Reel. While it appears that this is a valid alias, according to thesession.org, I've only ever heard it referred to as The Concertina Reel. Well - I've heard it referred to as many an alias. For example, The ####### Badger. Others probably too offensive to share here. :-) But never The *Old* Concertina Reel. And that may well be simply a product of the circles in which we all move - a particular name sticks among a particular group of players.

    A tune in E Dorian which I *have* heard referred to as The Old Concertina Reel is also (better?) known as John Kelly's. Not the John Kelly who we all know from the song-a-week group, but John Kelly formerly of County Clare who later moved to Dublin and made his home in Capel Street a haven for trad musicians. (And in the process he and his wife sprogged 5 children, all of whom turned out to be musicians - Michael, John, Anthony, Marianne and James. All fiddlers apart from Anthony - pipes. James is undoubtedly the best-known of his children, both for his solo fiddle playing, his collaborations (e.g. with Paddy O'Brien and Daithi Sproule) and for his many compositions.)

    Incidentally, the same tune as Simon plays - but transposed into G - is known as The *New* Concertina Reel or as "Ríl Liam" (the latter name being associated with, I believe, Willie Clancy).

    Here - purely out of interest and for the purposes of comparison - is a version of the tune which I know as The Old Concertina Reel. It bears no family resemblance to the tune which Simon originally posted...

    I've got tab and so on at this link https://theirishmandolin.com/learn-s...m/#john-kellys

  12. Aidan Crossey
    Aidan Crossey
    Well ... clearly the adjective which applies to Badger in the quite well-known humorous(?) AKA for this tune which I quoted above is deemed too offensive to share on the cafe. (I typed it out in full and it's been "hashed" by the unseen hand.) So some of the other names by which I've heard it called - most of which use some "barrack-room" terminology - would never make it through the offence filter! :-)
  13. Richard Carver
    Richard Carver
    Ok, I think I follow (even though I shall have to substitute my own, possibly even more obscene, adjective for the badger). This is a really great one, Aidan, immaculately played (as goes without saying, really).
  14. Aidan Crossey
    Aidan Crossey
    In an attempt to be as delicate as possible and thus avoiding the automated blue pencil, let's just say that the adjective in question relates to the emission of intestinal gases...
  15. Richard Carver
    Richard Carver
    Which is to say that the word that I imagined was indeed ruder than what you wrote. That's where censorship leads you...
  16. Simon DS
    Simon DS
    Nice, clean playing Aidan, here are some of the concertina tunes:

    https://thesession.org/tunes/search?...=&q=concertina
  17. Aidan Crossey
    Aidan Crossey
    Thanks, Simon. That would confirm that - as of today - there are 23,593 tunes in thesession.org's database which *don't* reference the 'tina.

    Incidentally, one of the people who used to show up at sessions in my neck of the woods many years ago - since shuffled off the coil - used to restore and sell on concertinas as a major line in his used instrument business. Anyway, he used to bang on so much at the time about how the going rate for a concertina was £3,000 that it became a bit of a joke among us. So, if your man was in attendance on a given evening and if someone else in the company said for example that they'd splashed out a grand on something, one of us would roll our eyes and say "For real? That's a third of a concertina!". As a unit of currency, it didn't quite have the legs of, say, a monkey or a pony. But it tickled us to be able to get a rise out of him...

    (Perversely, though, I've never been able to shake it off and to this day if I see something for sale with a 3K price tag my mind immediately says "that's a concertina". And sometimes my mouth says what my mind has just thunk to the bemusement of whoever I'm with at the time.)
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