The Murroe polka

The Kerry polka is often incorrectly called Peg Ryans, this one is the real Peg Ryans, but is also called The Murroe Polka.
Murroe is a picturesque country wooded area east of Limerick City better known prabably as being the location of Glenstal Abbey.

There is no ‘correct’ or ‘incorrect’ in these realms. A number of tunes have been ascribed to Peg Ryan and in the absence of a name, she not always having one, sometimes folks just took the easy route. Now, hopefully that won’t turn into a chicken or the egg discussion… They tend to arrive us as ‘gan ainms’ first, or in most cases… There are those nut cases who start with a title first - in search of a tune… Each to his own point of inspiration…

I added “Phil’s Polka” as an alternate name. We learned this tune from Phil Duffy, an excellent box player from Cavan, who didn’t know what it was called. It was released as part of a set on our CD “Live at the PAC”.

This is the first proper tune I learned on the Accordian.

“The Murroe”
Submitted on March 13th 2003 by Northcregg.
https://thesession.org/tunes/1508

This is the first polka of the set called “Ballyfin Polkas”, track 14 of:

“The Chieftains: Water from the Well”
https://thesession.org/recordings/192

2. ) “The Ballyfin Polka No. 2” / “The Balldesmond Polka”
Submitted on January 20th 2012 by ceolachan.
https://thesession.org/tunes/11708

3. ) “Gurteen Cross” / “St. Mary’s Polka” / “The Ballyfin Polka No. 3”
Submitted on April 2nd 2003 by Bannerman.
https://thesession.org/tunes/1564

Good old polka I learned - in Morroe from Peg Ryan (yes, that one) and it’s great for a 8th or 10th tune as it’s easy but too easy and the change in 2nd part is a boost for confidence to the learner.
Great tune to have at any rate.

Thanks, I only just realized my second ‘L’ wasn’t given with enough kick on this new (old!) keyboard… Maybe I need to exercise that particular finger more?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xajuvd2JXuc

play video

My late partner came from Murroe and she knew Peg Ryan, who was a local fiddle player. This might help explain the two names for the tune.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvaFAb3Ikf8

play video

From the playing of Bobbi Nikles & company.

This is also known as Mrs O’Dwyer’s, and as Slugs and Snails, according to https://musescore.com/heartekst/traditional-music-mrs-odwyers.

Additional note: played as Mrs O’Dwyer’s by the Old Swan Band, along with Packie Russell’s. A version rendered in the English style on nyckelharpa at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bs-o0VU3PgM.

play video

Based on the playing of Billy Clifford (https://thesession.org/recordings/3755) . He called it Padraig (O’Keeffe’s) Polka. This setting is clearly related to The Murroe but, on the grounds that they’d clash if played together, it probably merits a separate entry. However for want of a distinctive name….
Breandán Breathnach collected a similar version (gan ainm) from a manuscript of David Collins from Abbeyfeale in 1958. See CRE4.80. I first heard the excellent Joe Sullivan play this in Buckley’s in Killarney - a grand tune!

See the wonderful ITMA collection for a setting of this polka notated by Pádraig O’Keeffe for one of his pupils https://www.itma.ie/digital-library/score/padraig_okeeffe_oconnell_ms_001 . The setting is very close to X4.
As with most of O’Keeffe polkas, no name is attached.