The Spoils Of Victory hornpipe

I wrote this hornpipe a few weeks back to celebrate Arnagh’s historic victory in the All-Ireland Gaelic Football championships. I’d have dearly loved to have been in Lurgan on the night in question rattling out a tune or two in honour of the boys in Orange and White!

Ard Mhacha Ab

Blimey … I wrote this tune back in 2002 and named it in commemoration of Armagh’s winning the Sam Maguire that year. I recently revisited it and started playing. The triplets which I’d written in X:1 really annoyed me. So I’ve tweaked bar 4 in the first part and bar 4 in the turn. The simplification now makes the tune "cohere" better - to my ears at least.

Me playing the tune (X:2 version) on mandolin. https://crosseyirishmandolin.files.wordpress.com/2020/01/spoils-of-victory.mp3

After several months of messing about with this tune, I’ve now got a setting of the second part which I’m finally happy with - three sets of triplets at the start of the second, third and fourth measures.