What’s a breakdown?
I have two of them in my repertoire. One of them is, to all appearances, a reel, and indeed we play it before one reel and after another. The other is a march in 2/4 time. I have a handful of recordings of breakdowns, too; they are, to my ear, indistinguishable from reels. I can’t identify a common melodic or rhythmic thread among these tunes. Can anyone enlighten me?