Strangest trad to non-trad (or vice versa) segue you’ve heard

So, I was a spectator at my local session last monday, and the session regulars were just on fire that evening.

About 11:30 p.m., a completely drunk young (20-ish) guy wanders in, and can’t believe his ears, the music is so good.

“WOW! YOU GUYS ARE FANTASTIC! HOW DID I MISS THIS PLACE? THIS IS GREAT!”

My fellow trad lovers sitting nearby and I nod our assent silently, not wanting to miss a note.

This guy is oblivious, though, to the intense listening going on, and continues to shout, um, encouragement.

So the box player, a young woman who plays professionally in a local “pub irish” band, launches into The Ramones’ “I Wanna Be Sedated” at breakneck speed at the conclusion of a reel, sending our new friend into a frenzy (bobbing his head up and down, giving the “devil horn” sign, etc.)

I have my whistle in my jacket, so I whip it out (the whistle, that is) and start doubling her vocal line. The drunk sees me and yells

“YEAH, MAN, YOU GUYS ROCK!”.

At this point, one of the fiddlers is laughing so hard he has to excuse himself to the toilet before he pees himself.

But, fortunately, he makes it back just in time for the segue right into “The Foxhunter’s Reel”, played as fast and as well as I’ve ever heard.

Of course, that was the final tune of the evening, there’s no way you can top that performance.

Man, now that sounds like a sesh I would have enjoyed.

AS a trash-ditional Irish band in London, we used to go from “The Wind that shakes the Barley” into Lou Reed’s “Vicious”….. and back.

And an abridged jig version of Stairway to Heaven fitted in between Tripping up the Stairs and the Trip to the Cottage.

Ah those were the days!

“Body and Soul” into “Soldier’s Joy” (band of three fiddlers, bass, keyboards and drums).

It worked … somehow.

Bach “Jesu, Joy of Mans Desiring” and take the arpeggio bit into Foxhunters

Alabama’s “Mountain Music” into James Brown’s “I Feel Good”… you should’ve seen the looks on those rednecks’ faces.

Even though it’s really not that off the wall, we did the Purple Haze intro [D, d, D, d, D] into “Trip to Nenagh”. Late nights.. Funny McFun Fun!

Cheers,
Armand

Armand - have you tried this version?
https://thesession.org/tunes/3976

(I’d love to know who the 7 people are who have it it their tunebooks…)

Theme from Gilligan’s Island (played as a slow air, with feeling) into just about any e-minor reel.

Elvis’s “Wooden Heart” goes nicely on the box to be followed by the Bluebell Polka (Could be argued that BOTH are non-trad!)
Apparently WH is an old German folk tune, maybe someone German here could give us its real name?

There’s a band from near where I live that plays what they call their “Morrison set” -- Morrison’s jig, followed by Jim Morrison’s “People are strange.”

There was no traditional link in it, but I still treasure the memory of the night Dave sang “Baker Street”, accompanying himself on the octave mandola, and Mark came in on his hurdy-gurdy to take the saxophone solo. Note-perfect too.

You know what James Brown’s last words were?

“OW!”

(Also, “I don’t feel so good.”)

If you played Purple Haze in D the notes would be D Aflat D A flat,the tritone or the Interval Diabolus which was banned by the medieval church on the grounds that such a dissonance could only have been created by the devil.I wonder if Hendrix knew that?

Danny, Wooden Heart is called “Muss i denn zum Städele hinaus” (Do I have to leave this town; southern dialect). And a polka being a polka I would call this a central European trad set.

Christy Moore’s “16 fishermen raving” go nicely with a klezmer/russian-style kasatchok which I think is called Katyusha.

On our CD you can hear on one set: Take Five, Dever the Dancer, Drowsy Maggie, Thousands are sailing. We call Five, Nine, Four, & Thousands. On another set we’ll go back and forth between Church Street Polka and I’ve Just seen a Face.

Thanks Kuec! Not that I’ll ever sing the German version, but thanks anyway. I played it tonight actually, once most of the “tunesmiths” had left and the session “degenerated” into a singing/playing free-for-all, as often happens, but is still good fun.

I once saw Spiers and Boden start Oops! I did it again (at least I remember it as that Britney song it may have been another) and segue into Boston Harbour. Worked quite well as I recall. Richard Thompson does a killer version of Oops! as well.

The Land of a Thousands Dances set byu one of the Battlefield Band incarnations was a crowd pleaser… Dashing White Sargeant to ‘I get by with a little help from my friends’ etc.

I heard somewhere that a lot of tunes are based on either Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (eg Wonderful World) or Pachelbels Canon. If I get bored in a session I try to see how many tunes/songs I can back up with Pachelbel. It’s interesting to see who twigs what is going on 🙂

First few bars of Stairway to Heaven into The Cow That Ate the Piper.

This version of Mrs. Crehan’s reel contains the Nestle’s Chocolate jingle at the end.

X:384
T:Mrs. Crehan’s
R:reel
D:Matt Molloy & Sean Keane: Contentment is Wealth
D:Mary Bergin: Feadoga Stain
Z:id:hn-reel-384
M:C|
K:G
G2dG eGdG|G2dG AdBA|G2dG eGdG|1 EGAB cedB:|2 EGAB cege||
d2 (3Bcd GdBd|GdBd eA~A2|d2 (3Bcd GdBd|ecAc BG~G2|
d2Bd G2BG|~G2BG AE~E2|GABc dedc|BdAc BGGF||

The finger of fudge jingle from the 1980’s played as a jig and slipped into almost any set is good.

Harem Scarem did a version of Ding Dong! The Witch is Dead on The Birnam Witch Project as the start of a set.

Then there was Gordon Duncan’s version of AC/DC’s Thunderstruck.