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Thread: Skene Manuscript

  1. #1
    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Skene Manuscript

    I've been playing around for the past couple of days with Rob MacKillop's ebook "Twenty-Five 17th Century Scottish Tunes Arranged For Mandolin" (which unfortunately doesn't seem to be available from his web site anymore). That book has a number of arrangements of pieces from the Skene Manuscript, and that got me looking around for a decent source for the original pieces.

    What I quickly found was a site I'd not seen before, but which has a fabulous amount of source material: www.scotmus.com

    That site has many more tunes from the Skene Manuscript than either Rob's ebook or the renaissance music editions by Allen Alexander, and they are in the original keys and with double stops (but in standard notation, not in the original lute tablature). It also has a surprisingly musical MIDI player for all the tunes, so it's easier to browse through and pick the ones worth learning.

    The site description of the Skene pieces is:

    "The Skene MS (c.1620) is one of the most important early collections of Scottish music. A personal music-book in tablature for the mandour or mandore (a small type of Renaissance lute), it contains some 114 tunes, including the earliest recorded versions of several Scottish popular classics. This ScotMus.com album reproduces the first print edition of 85 of the manuscript's tunes, transcribed into modern staff notation by George Farquhar Graham for William Dauney's antiquarian study, The Ancient Melodies of Scotland (1838). Their edition rapidly became the definitive source of "ancient melodies" for several generations of editors and arrangers."

    So, I've picked and recorded three pieces that I hadn't seen before (they're not in Rob's or Allen's books). All are in the original key. Many of the original double stops are easy on the mandolin (the mandore was tuned in alternate strings of g and d, and the original tablature made extensive use of open bass strings), some had to be transposed up an octave to be playable with a plectrum, and a few would be too awkward (for me anyway) to finger and so I've left them out.

    1. Ostend



    2. Sir John Hopes Currant



    3. Chrichton's Gud Night



    It also struck me that the description of the mandore (on Wikipedia anyway) is a mandolin-sized lute with between four and six single gut strings, a flat soundboard and tuned in fifths and fourths. Well, I have such an instrument: my ukulele (retuned to mandolin tuning, GDAE). Ignoring the fact that the mandore was fingerpicked, and that it combined fourths and fifths, I thought that I'll probably be closer to the original tone with the uke, so I've recorded "Chrichton's Gud Night" again:



    These are only the tunes that I picked straight off Scotmus.com. I've also recorded four Skene tunes that I learned from Rob's book (who generally transposed them down from the original keys, by between a fourth and an octave):

    She Mowpitt Comming Owr The Lie

    Lady Cassilles Lilt

    The Lass O Glasgowe

    Shoe Looks As Shoe Wold Lett Me

    Martin

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  3. #2
    Mando-Accumulator Jim Garber's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Very cool site, Martin and thanks for posting the videos. BTW Google has the scanned the entire book The Ancient Melodies of Scotland. The tunes appear in the downloadable pdf at page 246 (page number of the pdf, not the book).
    Jim

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  5. #3
    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Thanks, Jim -- I did find that scan on Google as well, but the typeset music is a bit harder to digest than the clean type at Scotmus. Pity that they make you jump through hoops to get a printout on paper: I had to get a screenshot with the Screen Grab Firefox extension, then clip out the score and print it from the image file.

    I have now recorded two more tunes on mandolin:

    To Dance Around The Bailzeis Dubb

    I Mett Her In The Medowe

    As well as uke versions of the other two tunes in my previous post:

    Ostend

    Sir John Hopes Currant

    While I'm playing old Scottish tunes, here is one that is about 150 years younger: the first section (Amoroso) from the first Divertimento for Guittar by James Oswald, arranged for mandolin by our very own John Goodin (but played on uke):

    Divertimento I - Amoroso

    Martin

  6. #4
    Full Grown and Cussin' brunello97's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Nice stuff, amigos, thanks. And a belated Happy New Year to you both!

    Mick
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    Innocent Bystander JeffD's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    I just ordered it from Amazon. Martin thanks for point me in this direction.
    A talent for trivializin' the momentous and complicatin' the obvious.

    The entire staff
    funny....

  8. #6
    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Jeff: I'm glad to be of service, but also slightly confused -- I didn't mention any commercially available product in this thread so I'm not so clear what you've ordered from Amazon. The only thing I can think of is that Rob MacKillop has several CDs out with tunes from both the Skene manuscript and the Oswald Divertimenti (played on lute and/or English guittar), and as they're very good you'd no doubt enjoy them.

    Martin

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    Innocent Bystander JeffD's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Well now I am confused. What I got is a reprint edition of William Dauney's antiquarian study, The Ancient Melodies of Scotland (1838), which contains the tunes in modern manuscript form, not the tab of the original MS.
    A talent for trivializin' the momentous and complicatin' the obvious.

    The entire staff
    funny....

  10. #8
    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Oh, I see -- I hadn't realised that the book has been recently republished as a reprint. As Jim has pointed out, the book is now in the public domain and can be downloaded as a free PDF from Google Books. Of course, having a proper printed book is an entirely different tactile experience and I heartily approve of the concept of buying actual books.

    Martin

  11. #9
    Innocent Bystander JeffD's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Quote Originally Posted by Martin Jonas View Post
    Of course, having a proper printed book is an entirely different tactile experience and I heartily approve of the concept of buying actual books.
    We are in violent agreement on that. I love getting the paper or book and putting it on my music stand. Even if its a PDF, I print it out and put it on the stand.

    I am not one of those exclusively authentic experience musicians, but there really is something about the paper, especially with ancient music, and especially especially with a bowlback.

    But I won't wear a puffy cuffed shirt. As Mason said to Dixon, we have to draw a line somewhere.
    A talent for trivializin' the momentous and complicatin' the obvious.

    The entire staff
    funny....

  12. #10

    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Many thanks to all for the music sources. I guess, Martin, that you already know of Nigel Gatherer's collection on http://www.nigelgatherer.com/tunes.html (see also the links mentioned therein) and http://www.orpheusweb.co.uk/gatherer/music.html ?

  13. #11

    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Love it!

  14. #12

    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Reviving a somewhat old thread, I joined the forum just to say thanks for this link. I play a Martin Tiple tuned to open C; the Bremner's Guitar Collection included on the ScotMus site is made to order, so to speak. And much more suits the instrument as well. Cheers.

  15. #13
    Registered User Jacqke's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    For those wanting a free PDF of William Dauneys book Ancient Scottish Melodies and the included facsimile of the Skene manuscript, it is available on the Open Library at https://openlibrary.org/works/OL6925...otish_melodies.

    This is a printable pdf

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  17. #14
    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    I have dug out the Skene transcriptions discussed in this thread from ten years ago -- the Scotmus site is no longer online, but I have a printout and the original 1838 Dauney book on which the site was based is widely available online as PDF in good quality.

    Here are two new recordings I made this week, with my rough approximations of period-appropriate renaissance instruments -- the mandore and the cittern. I attach the relevant pages from the copy at the National Library Of Scotland.

    No. 72 What High Offences Hes My Fair Love Taken

    This is tune No. 72 of Dauney's edition, "What High Offences Hes My Fair Love Taken". The mandore was a small bowlback soprano lute with four to six gut string, played with either a quill or fingers. The instrument I'm playing matches that generic description. However, the specific type of mandore played by the author of the Skene MS had five strings tuned in fourths and fifths ADADA played with fingers, whereas mine is tuned in fifths GDAE (mandolin tuning) played with a pick. I had to omit some of the bass notes to fit my tuning.

    On the repeat, I double the tune one octave lower on a five course cittern, covering the omitted bass notes where appropriate.

    "Baroq-ulele" four-string bowlback mandolin with Aquila nylgut strings (GDAE tuning)
    1925 Zimmermann waldzither tuned (G)DAEB


    https://youtu.be/GMJdODMT3qg

    No. 73 Sincopas

    This is tune No. 73 of Dauney's edition, "Sincopas". His annotation to the tune is "Sincopas, or Cinque pas, as its name implies, was a dance regulated by the number five, which will be perceived at once by running over the notes of the air".

    I'm playing the tune solo on an early 1900s Thuringian waldzither, a direct descendent of the metal-strung renaissance cittern, although my tuning is not authentic for the period. The high B string is very handy here, as the tune has a fairly wide range.

    1925 Zimmermann waldzither tuned (G)DAEB


    https://youtu.be/NSLZ3N_wRIw

    Martin
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  19. #15
    Registered User Richard Carver's Avatar
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    Default Re: Skene Manuscript

    Some more tunes from Daunay's transcription of the Skene manuscript. No duplicates, I believe.






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