Apologies if this has been discussed before, but I found this clip on youtube and it seems very strange indeed. Bodhran practice advice for when you, um, don’t have a bodhran. The answer is…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uyx95cm8NbY&feature=related
Is this weird, or what?
m.d.
Invaluable advice. I once hosted a guitar workshop where my students innovatively made their guitars out of cornflake packets (empty naturally..Weetabix works fine too). Just as good if not better than the real thing (made for wonderfully understated accompaniment). They went on to form a ceili band called The Cereal Killers.True story.
Good advice.
“BodhranMasterclass” - a contradiction in terms, innit?
She didn’t even mention pizza boxes.
I like the way she deomonstrates how to put the elastic band around the bundle of sticks. I always wondered how the hell you do that.
Well heck, no need to skin anymore goats, just play ye clip board at the office and youre good to go.
Just like in the spy movies, where the hero can make a weapon out of anything…
Wooden spoons. I recommend them, along with the aforementioned pizza boxes, for bodhranless bodhran learning.
Is there a correct pronunciation for the word? Always herd it as bow rawn but every now and then it’s pronounced as boar on. Which is correct? And why does it always seem like it’s an American teaching the damn thing?
Neither is correct. Intentionally.
The True Name of the instrument is not to be spoken lest it be invoked.
That had nothing to do with Jason Bourne.
I guess she couldn’t use walls, lockers or sides of buildings. Probably an infringement on band drummers.
“The True Name of the instrument is not to be spoken lest it be invoked.”
@ Jack…now thats funny. In the Movie “The boys and girl from county Clare” the hippie girl called it the Bad Ron
I heard a little Scottish twerp at a session call it a “Bu-rAAnn”
Was he a twerp because he said “bu-rAAnn” or was he a twerp because he brought one?
Or was he a twerp just because he was Scottish? Tread very carefully…
No - he was a stupid little twerp first of all. but saying burAAhn with a scotch accent just somehow emphasised his twerpitude.
“Or was he a twerp just because he was Scottish?”
Slanderous and highly irresponsible.
I refuse to believe there are any more twerps to be found in Scotland than anywhere else, including Wales.
I think all nations, cultures and other human categories have an equal percentage of twerpishness.
But what is the global percentage of twerps? of the 6 billion people on planet Earth how many are in the twerpdom? And is there a cross over of with clotdom, berkishness or the pillockry?
It’s her that’s the twerp, I’ve laughed many a time at her inane ramblings. There’s hours of her on you tube, spouting mixtures of hippie nonsense and stuff that’s so obvious you’d have to be mentally retarded not to be able to work it out for your self. She reminds me of that quack Gillian Mckeith. Just as Mckeith is a self obsessed charleton ettempting to nibble at the edges of proper medicine, this wifey is just a self obsessed charleton ettempting to nibble at the edges of proper music. They both deserve all the scorn one can muster.
Scotch accent??? Whisky is Scotch. An accent is Scottish and you are offensive!!
…and not for the first time. Taking a look at your history on here I struggle to think of threads that are more mindless!
Everyone is a twerp of someone else..
I thought scotch was a tape ????
( starts running away very fast can hear pipes coming )
ha, yeah, and you can buy it here:
http://www.macfrugalsfurniture.com/
She would be a lot more convincing if she knew how to pronounce the word ‘ bodhran ’ properly.
Dave H
she can play.
so does it matter about how she pronounces the word,Bodhran players, PARTICULARLYspoons players, djembe drums and bad guitarists, need assistance, other than a kick up the ass.
All our lives would be improved if they went off to workshops learned the tunes , learned to listen and learned to play quietly, and also in time, and with restraint.
its the fecking spoons players that get to me.
“she can play”. ha ha ha ha
Have you heard her play 4 33 by John Cage, its sublime and erotic.
bodhran..sublime…erotic
in the same thread?
Nicholas…you forgot to mention spoons
…and the Stumfp fiddle! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4p_6_-f450&feature=related
Did anyone notice that her theme music has no bodhran?!
cmon its not that strange,i mean its a percussion instrument and the lady is correct,obviously one cant get the tones etc but you can certainly learn a little just like pipe band drummers practice on tables and pads etc,also shes right if your skint and are saving to buy a decent bodhran you can learn away that way for a while !
Anything that helps Bodhran players improve is good, and that is a very good point drummers do use practise pads and this is what she is advising ,good advice.
Yes, she’s advising something you’d have to be mentally retarded not to be able to work out for your self.
I thought scotch was for hopping.
Or making butter.
Or an excuse to drink soda.
That sort of thing is alright for people who live in the city or town, but what happens when you live in a remote area where there is no access to Sheshkabab Skewers or Clip Boards…..what then?
Well, I suppose you could always catch a live goat, hang it your kitchen, and whack away with a serving spoon or suchlike.
Or, alternatively, your fecked.
as for the muppett who said she cant play….she actually can..ok she’s not the best but aint bad,and as for her pronouncation…she;s a yank and a lot of them just have problems getting it as its an irish word…….just like the english folk cant say it properlt initally…people are very quick to cut others on here…id like to see them try it in a pub or other setting…some of those comments are just nasty snobby begrudging rubbish !
“as for the muppett who said she cant play….she actually can”
Can what? Go on, elaborate …
“Scotch accent??? Whisky is Scotch.”
Scotch whisky.
That seems redundant.
“Whisky” simply IS that lovely stuff they distill in Scotland.
It’s (mostly) poor relations are Irish whisky, Canadian whisky, bourbon whisky, rye whisky, corn whisky, etc.
Not to mention Penderyn.
(although I did)
have you tried Irish Whiskey?
“she;s a yank ”
She’s from Cape Breton.
have you tried Irish Whiskey?
# Posted on July 25th 2011 by bazouki dave
Yes sir, I have.
Occasionally when I am in the mood for the lovely qualities Irish has to offer, it is what I reach for. And if it is offered by a friendly hand, I never balk at the drop.
Some of those I could get in Ireland and am partial to are seldom seen where I now live.
(unless you pay through the nose in some pretentious and very mercenary “pub”)
However, my favorites, the vast majority of them, come from Scotland. I lean toward single, usually the stronger ones, peaty and agressive. I tend not to be a subtle man about what i want in whisky, fiddle music, pipe tunes, and women.
All “whiskys” have their virtues and their fans.
So do reality TV shows, and board games for ages 6-adult.
I painted with a very broad and prejudiced stroke, and for that I ask indulgence.
No apology here, but no offense intended either.
Merely my personal slant, and I stand by it.
(This is an issue worth a few words - We are talking whisky, not bodhrans Sir!)
I’m reminded of that splendid scene in The Quiet Man when the wee fella, pictured, is offered a drop of water for his dram, he quickly covers the glass with his hand and says, “When I drinks water, I drinks water … and when I drinks whiskey, I drinks whiskey.”
"http://www.users.uswest.net/~aknot/quiet3x.jpg
Canadian whiskey, bourbon - horrible concoctions. Though I am a North American, I wouldn’t drink the stuff. That’s why most people who consume this horse-p*ss dilute it and hide the flavour with sodas, etc. Who can blame them?
Now give me a lovely Scotch or - better yet - a heavenly, smooth, triple-distilled single malt Irish . . . now THERE’S a great drink.
Bail ó Dhia oraibh! Greetings one and all!
Ah yes Michael! Re: The Quiet Man, thanks for that reminder, maith an fear!
That brought back many happy memories of visits to Glasgow.
I’d played with Brendan and Martin McHugh many times, and they were always saying “You must come up and play with Da!”
So it was in September 1984 that as I was heading southwards after a glorious fortnight walking, painting and playing up in The Kyle of Sutherland, I finally met that lovely gentleman of music, the late Jimmy McHugh. We ended up playing for a week. That was the first visit.
Every time I arrived the lads and girls without failure would get out two videos, The Quiet Man and Celtic winning The European Cup; obligatory viewing in The McHugh household!
I didn’t know until after he died, when Ann and Brendan told me that he’d written a tune called “Brian’s Visit”.
Anyway we shared many a bottle over the years, and similar to what you quoted I recall Jimmy offering some good advice one night at Sharkeys, with that beautiful twinkle in his eyes
“There’s only one thing should be added to whisky…more whisky!”
All the best
Brian x
Now we’re off onto something in better taste - is there any internet video of Jimmy McHugh? There seems to have been an American Tin Pan Alley musician of the 1930s by the same name who gets all the hits.
I only heard him play once, across a table in a near-empty room late at night at a festival. Unforgettable.
Hi Jack!
Your comment about better taste made me laugh! When I read the comments about whisk(e)y I nearly wrote that myself, but felt I had to allude to llig’s quote from The Quiet Man.
Fortunately that’s what led me to write about Jimmy.
You’re right about the American composer; it appears he was quite prolific and has some huge standards to his credit.
Our Jimmy though was just before the boom of mobile phones and HDD videos. I don’t think there is even much audio archive material of him playing.
I do know that a special CD from the first memorial concert has the last track of him playing “The Pigeon on the gate”. And that’s all I know about any recordings of him.
He did loan all his old 78s to RTE so that they could fill their archives, a very generous gift indeed. The whole of the living room walls were filled with shelves of these records, and he’d talk about how many of the old players never sounded right on record, they always seemed to be a bit tense he said.
Sometimes when I asked him about a tune or its source he would say “Oh that’s one off the block!” A very modest way of saying that he’d composed it.
Maybe if you contacted the maestro of recordings and sources here at The Session
https://thesession.org/members/726
you might have some success.
Here’s a link to very humble beginnings in Glasgow. Maybe a mark of respect for what he gave is that at Jimmy’s funeral the traffic lights were turned off and police saluted at every crossing as the cortege passed through.
http://www.irishinscotland.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/Comhaltas1978.pdf
Sorry I can’t help with footage of his playing, but hope some of this is a start for you Jack.
All the best
Brian x
Hurrah!
Finally, some really sound bodhran advice slips through -
Never water your whisky.
Do we have a breakthrough here?
(all you drummers now, march toward the light)
🙂
If you take your whisky neat, be aware - they ask negative questions in the Northeast (of England)
Landlady: Do you not want any water in your whisky?.
Pedant: Yes. (putting hand over glass)
Bodhran Expert
http://bodhranexpert.com/
“Hi, I’m Michelle Stewart from Bodhran Expert ~” Bless her for her generosity of spirit, however… 😏
YouTube: Bodhran Masterclass
http://www.youtube.com/user/BodhranMasterclass?feature=watch
A bit of doweling and a plastic bottle works just fine…
Bdhran Expert Dot Com ~ with the dreaded bent wrist in preparation for a little RSI, and what an exaggerated swing, UGH! A snare drummer!?!
The combination of tones, I think I’m developing a serious headache… I need a bit of music for the cure, and something to drink…
