The Abbeyleix reel

i only have one thing to say, thi is a beast of a tune, good for the banjo, thats it

Where did it come from. Sounds nice.

-P

Isn’t this a Sean Ryan tune? I think the B-part’s supposed to be in D major.

One of my favorite tunes to play at home…this is in fact a Sean Ryan composition. You can find it in a collection of his compositions called “A Hidden Ireland”. The tune immediately after it is called the “County Leix reel”, and it’s just as twisty and they go nicely together, with the County first and then Abbey second. I’ll try to take some time out to post that one.

A nice variation for bars 2 & 5 of the B part (and actually what is written for this tune in the collection):

gAfA eABA

At least on the fiddle if you play that and use cross-bowing all the way down it sounds mad cool.

Cheers

Bar 6 rather

"The Hidden Ireland:
The First Selection of Irish Traditional Compositions of Seán Ryan"
Compiled by Brian Ryan

Page 27 ~ “The Abbeyleix Reel”

While they start the notation of with the key signature of D Major, the A-part of the tune has F & C as naturals throughout with any low G’s sharped ~ G,#. The B-part is D Major…

The G,# mentioned above is in bars 1 & 5 of the A-Part of the melody, the slight difference from the tune given here, all notes are natural except for this accidental:

| D2 ED CA, (3A,^G,A, |

“The tune immediately after it is called the ”County Leix reel"

Could anyone jot down a couple first bars of that? I’m trying to id the name of a tune after the Abbeyleix from a session. Might be that.

Thanks, Lesl

Can anyone direct me to any recording of this reel?
Thanks.

It’s in the “Road to Port Fairy” set, which you can hear on Trouble In The Kitchen’s MySpace page here: http://www.myspace.com/troubleinthekitchen

That tune starts at about 2:45 of the set… Good stuff

Also, Veronica McNamara has a CD at cdbaby called Petticoat Loose and it’s on it

Reverend…. thanks a lot…
concertina player…. thanks as well… do you know if her version is the same as the one in the database here?

Hi molaoch, I don’t know if the versions are the same as I don’t play the tune, but looking at the dots in Sean Ryan’s book and at the dots in the database, I can see some differences.However, as I say, I don’t really “know” the tune and so it might be that there are many versions out there with none of the dot versions being the generally played version, whatever generally played means? Perhaps someone here who knows the tune might be able to help further.

it’ll be hard to go past Trouble In The Kitchen’s version…….. you won’t be disappointed

Yeah, Ado cranks it. Mad tune, a standout on an album full of excellent tunes.

I played the Abbeyleix at the festival in Canberra a couple of years back and none of the Trouble lads joined in. Maybe it was the way I played it 🙁

yes, yes it was.

How did you know that, SirNose? You were in the beginners’ session at the other end of the bar while I played with the rest of your band.

David plays it as the first tune in the last set on his cd called Sway. Great powerful playing.
Brendan MCGlinchey’s,The Taproom,The Rambling Thatcher
Its the big finale on this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tn1lDE9W3dk

play video

Since the version in X:1 doesn’t show the all-important key change to this tune, here goes! This is a slightly simplified version of the setting in Sean Ryan’s own collection. The original can be viewed here: https://www.cranfordpub.com/tunes/Irish/Abbeyleix.htm

John Bowe plays this after the Land of Sunshine on his 70s LP, a set which John Nolan reproduces on his Rake of Reels CD.

For the correct key signatures just take the 1st setting and add K:Dmaj before the 2nd part, instead of cluttering the first part up with accidentals.

Fair enough, Kevin -- I was copying the structure from the linked Ryan scan. I’ve now changed it to use the transition key sig change as suggested.