The Baker reel

This is from the andy mcgann/paddy reynolds album. I’ve been listening to it snippet by snippet, over and over again for the past hour or so, and I think I’ve got their bowing (seems to be unison) fairly exactly. Maybe this will be helpful to some of the less experienced fiddlers out there. And you advanced players can tell me if you agree that’s what they’re playing. It was hard to figure out, and some of it feels kind of weird at first. The bowings are not that unusual for me, or different from what I’m used to, except for the fact McGann bows his triplets up (seems to me.)Also, notice, I listened very hard, and I did not hear one single grace note in there! Not one! Well, it suits the tune i think. Still, it’s hard for me not to put any in.

It would be kind of fun if we all submitted more detailed transcriptions. One more thing to discuss. Whatcha think?

by the way, that last line is a variation on the second part that they play last time around, not another few bars continued from above.

This tune is also on Sharon Shannon’s “The Diamond Mountain Sessions.” Sharon plays fiddle, joined by another five fiddlers: Kane sisters, Mary Shanon(!), Jesse Smith, and Sean Smyth.

m, we have discussed that before and came to no real consensus. When I want to post a detailed transcription, I like to provide a “basic setting” followed by an “as played” setting. That way there’s a fairly clean, easy to read version, which also helps for people playing instruments other than the one I used to transcribe the tune. Your bowing marks for example, just clutter up the notation for whistle, flute, or banjo players.

So that’s my own compromise on the long running debate we’ve had here between basic and more detailed settings. Other people approach it differently. And Jeremy is the ultimate arbiter.

P.S. Good post, this tune.

That’s the name.

I’m not to well up on my musical terms.Do you mean by unison bowing that they use the same bowing pattern?

My fault, not yours. I used that term “unison” in a non standard way. Yes, i did mean that i think they are using pretty close to the same bowing patterns. i realize though, that it’s very unlikely that these Irish fiddlers were sitting there playing and their bows were going back and forth in sync like two orchestra players.

They were using a lot of sharp almost staccato bowing on the notes that are bowed separately, so it was reasonably doable to listen for the slurred together notes. But one problem i’m aware of, is that maybe i marked ‘slur’ every time i heard a slur, whereas sometimes it was mcgann slurring and other times it was reynolds. i tried my best to single out only one of the fiddles, and to listen for his slurs. Can’t be certain which one it was, but I think it was McGann. Also i played the pattern i discerned a few times, to make sure it didn’t feel too uncomfortable.

First tune on Seán Keane’s Jig it in Style album.