James Kelly’s slip jig

Matt Molloy plays this tune in this way. Not “Dah-Di Dah-di Dah..”,
but “didi didi di…”
I’ve heard others slip jigs played in the same way. For example “the promenade”, and sometime “the butterfly”.
Does someone know where come from this way to play the slip jigs?

This would appear to be very close to two parts of “Barney Brallaghan”. Isn’t this the rhythm that’s known as a “hop-jig” ?

Hop jig and slip jig are generally considered the same thing, except by ethnomusicologists who have quite a bit more to say about it than that. Some people contend, however, that the hop and the single are what are actually similar to each other. But most dancers, if they use “hop” jig, mean a slip jig.

Zina

Played di-di di-di di-di rather than dah-di dah-di dah-di, could this be a mazurka version of the tune?

This tune always confuses me…

A lot of these slip jigs (like the Dusty Millar etc) are derived from old English 3/2 hornpipes, which have a straight di-di rhythm.

Good on you ‘Dow’ - ‘English’! I love those old 3/2 hornpipes, whatever way you take them, but I’m sure I’ve seen and heard them skipped as well, and how I tend to play them when I do… But maybe that’s one of the side effects of dyslexia - being a skip-aholic… “Hiccup!” Those damned Americans take an iron to hornpipes and play them as reels…

The Dusty Miller - one bar and one turn of it, from little acorns/skips grow - - - :

3/2
|: B3 c d2 B2 A2 G2| ~

Hey, after all, it is the skipping that drove them into 9/8ths… As with many tunes that fall into that category of ‘possible’ treatment, they were often notated ‘straight’, even now, with the treatment left to the interpretation or experience of a musician, or assumed…

Another way with this one -

|:F2 A A2 B A3|F2 A A2 A Bcd|F2 A A2 B A2 d|1 B2 e e2 d cBA:|
2 B2 e e2 d cde||
|:f2 a a2 f d3|e2 f e2 d cBA|f2 d e2 c d2 B|A2 B A2 G FED|
f2 a a2 f d3|e2 f e2 d cde|f2 a e2 c d2 B|A2 B A2 G FED||

http://www.mail-archive.com/abcusers@argyll.wisemagic.com/msg00203.html

http://www.leeds.ac.uk/music/Info/RRTuneBk/listings.html#greeny

I don’t understand how this is in 9/8. There are 6 eighth notes/3 quarter notes in the measures.

I take it you mean that one bar for ‘Dusty Miller’ given above as a 3/2 time old English hornpipe. Using an 1/8 note as the measure, you have the following count:
|1-2-3 4 5-6 7-8 9-10 11-12| - or, as given:
|B3 c d2 B2 A2 G2| - the first note being a dotted crotchet/1/4 note… But I still don’t see your math of 6 eight notes and three quarter notes anywhere?
I’m guessing that’s what confused you, and understandably. I still get confused about such things. Next I need to learn to dance to the damned things.

I think that because most of this tune is in duplets, it would have been best transcribed in something other than 9/8. I haven’t heard the recording, but I think the even triplets sound weird as written here if the rest of the tune is written as even duplets. Don’t they sound more like B/c/d than Bcd or (3Bcd? If it does sound like duplets versus *even* triplets, then I think it’d sound awful. Someone needs to decide whether this is a hop jig, mazurka or 3/2 and stick to it, not meander aimlessly between rhythms.

Errik, to answer your question, GM’s bars do add up mathematically to 9 eighth notes because he’s “forced” duplets by using (2 notation. Same as when you “force” triplets into (say) a reel, i.e. |D2 (3FED ADFD| adds up to 9 eighth notes if you ignore the triplet sign, no? It’s the same thing happening here but the opposite way round - triplets --> duplets.

You are right Dow, the triplets sound more like B/c/d than Bcd.

In that case I think that Matt Molloy’s point of playing it that way was probably to give it an antique flavour, i.e. it’s being interpreted as a 3/2 hornpipe, which is how a lot of these hop jigs used to be played before they crossed to Ireland. They still get played but very very rarely:

R:Three-two
M:3/2
L:1/8
K:D
|:F2A2 A2B2 A4|F2A2 A2D2 Bcd2|F2A2 A2B2 A4|e2f2 e2d2 B2A2:|
|:f2a2 a2f2 d4|e2f2 e2d2 B2A2|f2d2 e2c2 d4|B2=c2 B2A2 FED2:|

You could play this with a 3/2 version of “The Dusty Millar”, or something like “Little Fishie”, or indeed any other hop jig like “The Butterfly” or “Another Jig Will Do”. I also have another really nice hop jig type 3/2 which I’ll post at a later date.

BTW Pants, how fast does MM play this? Is it more “marchy” or more like the speed of a “slip polka”?

I think it was too late last night, that it was the ‘duplets’ in the original didn’t register ‘errik’, apologies, Mark having more experience in this area than I and being more conscious to your concerns.

Thanks also for the transcription in 3/2 Dow, I think that makes more sense to me. I was having problems with the ‘duplets’ despite understaning them. It just didn’t seem to come together quite right for me. I’d also like to know what speed Molloy plays this in. I hope someone out there can help. I’ve done a quick tour of his commercial recordings and couldn’t find this tune. Where did you get this recording from Gian? I’ve heard half a dozen variants related to it, near and far, as slip jigs. I have also heard hop jigs played flat like this, but as ‘listening pieces’, slowly.

Be careful ‘c’!! He might ignore you - https://thesession.org/tunes/3018.

Not sure about the “more experience” thing, but I reckon I’d give you a good run for your money in the passion-for-unusual-nay-geeky!-tune-genres stakes 🙂

So do we call him ‘Shane’? I’m starting to explore those 3/2 things, and I’m listening to GMs don’t call me I’ll call you. But the way, I don’t like GM either, it makes me want to know what’s under the hood, a Hemy, or is it just a little slant four…oops, I mean slant three. I prefer at least a slant six, even more than a V8…

I think Molloy plays it as the “Gan Ainm” on Track 5 of “Stony Steps”.

The sad truth of the matter is, those Italian numbers often looked nice from the outside, even sporty, but were rust buckets. I almost died in a Fiat. I think they were using old recycled tin cans for the bodies back then. In too many old cars of that nature you could see the asphalt passing under your feet. I suppose it did allow free air flow on a hat summer’s day. Hey, maybe that could be the next title for a tune - in 3/2 of course - “Death by Fiat”…

Thanks Kenny. I wondered about that one but haven’t the recording and couldn’t find a playing of it online. Do you have it so you can tell us the tempo?

Matt Molloy - Stony Steps (track 5)

Q:?

152 bpm

another slip/mazurka ?
https://thesession.org/tunes/2579/comments

I’ve written ‘Robinson’, who contributed the album to TheSesh. Maybe he can give us an idea of the tempo and eventually link the recording back to this.

So ‘g-m’, not knowing what to call you now, after being mesmerized by your tune statement as Dow provided above, do you still have the recording and can you help us with this question of tempo? - and, I haven’t seen an answer yet as to how you prefer being addressed?

You answer as I ask - magic…fast all around…

Not a mazurka. I know this as I do the one above, in several flavours, but basically a ‘hop jig’, and I’ve in the main known it skipped in those several forms, though I’m familiar with the way the Chieftains swung it, or didn’t…

Hmmm… 152bpm is a bit fast for a three-two which I’d play @ more like 120-ish, but that’s basically what these tunes are, GM, not hop jigs or mazurkas. Having said that, I can post you a “slip polka” if you want, which is basically a 3/2 played at a tempo closer to 150, and is better transcribed in 3/4 than 3/2. Slip polkas are great!

‘c’, is this playable as a mazurka? What’s the difference?

yes please, post me the slip poka

Let’s see if I can make any sense of this. And thanks for the challenge. To start with - no, neither has the geography of a mazurka, up and down, or the phrasing. They are basically too flat and too short and choppy, lacking that ‘lift’ and ‘flow’, a different kind of choppiness that says hop jig, slip jig, or 3/2 hornpipe. It would take some doctoring to change either into a mazurka, including changing the phrasing and making them at least 32 bar tunes, and making some pronounced changes even to the melody. These tunes are kind of trapped in strong one bar phrases. With the mazurkas one bar leads you to the next, where as with these tunes the phrase is chopped at the end of the bar, with intention, against any idea of flow. That choppiness is what makes these bars such strong rhythmic units, and recognizable for their family heritage.

- and yet, there are two divisions working within these two tunes, the strong single bar, and the pairing. It almost sounds contradictory. Yes, there is a strong single bar distinction, but they also exist in a clear two bar unit/phrase, paired, and again that creats something almost percussive, to me anyway. That probably takes us close to the difference, a basic, how you’d tap your foot to these two forms, where the heartbeat is for them. These two tunes are are almost marchy, demanding three toe taps to the bar, with an emphasis on that first beat, almost forced by the previous bar. I can see I’m going to be thinking about this for the rest of the week. I’ll have to play some more of these 3/2 tunes to get to grips with it, to better understand…

The dance the mazurka, like the music, is basically designed in chunks of 4 bar phrases, so the music speaks the movement and content of the dance. These tunes aren’t speaking the same language, their sentences are too short, suggesting their connection to solo stepping, steps, rather than figures of a dance. Two bar moves in couple oriented dance are rare and quirky. Modern square dancing and some nutty English ceilidh and American contra dances like to play with dancers that way, putting quick little two-bar moves here and there, to add complexity.

So are mazurkas supposed to skip more like a hop jig then, but with a different phrase unit system and strain length, parallel to the slide/hornpipe distinction in a way maybe?

I’ll post a slip polka for GM tomorrow, plus a little surprise for him!

I have just transcribed a slip polka,
I’ll post it tomorrow.

…I like the surprise ( the good ones )

Oh no, I think it might be the same one 🙂

‘c’ said: “These two tunes are are almost marchy, demanding three toe taps to the bar, with an emphasis on that first beat, almost forced by the previous bar”.

Actually they’re often played so that bars of 3/2 (or 3/4) alternate (often at irregular intervals) with bars of 6/4 (or 6/8). This creates a different “heatbeat”/flow again. They can be played with your 3 regular toe taps, but for most tunes, you’d be missing internal sycopations that run across the barlines and alter the whole phrasing of the tune completely.

Try a 6/4 tune! Or try a 6/4 in a set with a 3/2. That’s *really* geeky stuff 🙂

I don’t understand how you can have a triplet with only two eighth notes. Clue me in.

Hi Fov, I refer you to the 2nd half of post #14 on this thread.

Hm. I did read that but it confused the snot out of me. I can’t reconcile the idea of the pairs of eighth notes with the dotted quarter at the end. I’d never be able to count this properly.

It’s not though. GM’s changed the abc so that it’s 3 pairs. If you’re still confused, try my 3/2 transcription which sounds exactly the same. I think it makes more sense on paper that way.

Oh I see what you mean with the 1st bar. Hmmm, try my transcription, Kerri.

Or maybe this’ll make more sense:

R:Slip Polka
M:3/4
L:1/8
K:D
|:FA AB A2|FA AD B/c/d|FA AB A2|ef ed BA:|
|:fa af d2|ef ed BA|fd ec d2|B=c BA F/E/D:|

In a workshop at the University of Limerick Harry Bradley taught the pupils a tune he called a hop jig. He said that they are unfortunately often labeled together with slip jigs despite the difference of rhythm. According to Harry, where slip jigs would have the basic pulse of three groups of three eighthts (diddly diddly dyedidly), hop jigs have a quarter and an eighth (dum-di dum-di dum-di). The difference would be somewhat analogical to that between the pulse of single and double jigs.

Now I keep running into hop jigs played evenly. Could this be result of a similar development that has happened to reels, dotted rhythm becoming even? Even in Matt Molloy’s version you can sort of hear the emphasis on the “on-the-beat” notes", although he does play the notes(almost) quite evenly.

Markus

I don’t understand all the confusion about this tune--it works fine in simple 6/8

M:6/8
L: 1/8
K: D
FAA BA2|FAA AB/c/d|FAA BA2|efe dc/B/A :||
faa fd2|efe dc/B/A|fde cd2|B=cB AF/E/D :||

And give a listen Tiarnan O’ Duinnchinn give it a go on pipes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBT6gMz3THs

play video

Note that it’s called Larry McDonagh’s.

So the devil made you do that did she? You and me… It must be the same union of devils… Folks can do as they please, eh? Who are we to say otherwise… 😉

Heh, my own setting is based more on Lunasa’s version on Redwood, which varies things in the B part. I play it something like:

X: 1
T: James Kelly’s
M: 6/8
L: 1/8
K: D
FAA BA2|FAA dB/c/d|FAA BAd|efe dc/B/A:||
faa fd2|efe dc/B/A|fde cdB|ABA GF/E/D|
faa fdf|efe dc/B/A|fde cdA|B=cB AF/E/D||

I still prefer it as I’ve known this, as a 3/2 hornpipe or 9/8, as given previously…

c, I suspect we’re playing it the same way--I’m just using a simplified (dumbed down?) way to notate it. Sure doesn’t sound like a “jig” when I play it.

I suspect that is often the case…

I should be in bed now and nuzzling under the covers nursing something strong and sedative… 😀

Key signature: D Major
Submitted on October 2nd 2008 by bogman.
~ /tunes/8964

X: 7
T: Larry McDonagh’s
M: 3/4
L: 1/8
R: slip/hop jig
K: Dmaj
|: FA AB A2 | FA AA B/c/d | FA AB A2 | ef ed BA :|
|: fa af d2 | ef ed BA | fd ec dA | B=c BA FE :|

This is a simple but catchy tune I picked up of this Tiarnan Ó Duinnchinn youtube…………

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBT6gMz3THs

play video

The info says it’s a slip jig ~ .
.
# Posted on October 2nd 2008 by bogman

this tune shares its peculiar ‘slip/mazurka’ rhythm with Michael Gorman’s also
https://thesession.org/tunes/1714/comments
with which it makes a nice set (Gorman’s 1st, Mc Donagh’s 2d).

more similar tunes at: https://thesession.org/tunes/2579/comments

Learned this tune from Ceri Rhys Matthews, earlier this year. Love the expanse of the B part. Matt Molloy said this tune ‘ …is older than dirt’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5ZZeK1UkP4

play video