Leitrim Clog Dance hornpipe

Source: Seamus McGuire & John Lee - the missing reel
Transcription: gmp

WHAT IS CLOG DANCING?

This type of percussive dance began over 200 years ago, long before tap dancing, using the usual everyday footwear, clogs, wooden soled shoes with leather uppers.

During the industrial revolution people moved away from their villages into the new towns. They left behind them the old traditions linked to agriculture and the turning of the seasons. But people still wanted to dance.

In the mills you had to wear wooden soled shoes (leather soles rotted on the floors which were kept wet to keep the air humid). So people took their inspiration from the clatter of weaving machines and used their working shoes on the newly paved streets. Clog dancing became very popular with ‘Champion Cloggers’ and Music Hall performances.

The Musicians accompany the stepping with a variety of instruments including accordion, concertina, melodeon, violin and whistle. They play traditional British tunes which would have been popular when the steps were being originally danced.

In Britain, Clog dancing is most often associated with Lancashire in the Northwest of England - although it was presumably once more widespread than that. This tune sounds to me like a close cousin of a southern English tune, The Dorset Four Hand Reel.

clog dancing is popular in some parts of the U.S., also, mostly rural & southern, I think - not really sure coz I don’t know much about it.

Co Leitrim has (had) one of Ireland’s few coal mines at Arigna. The traditional footwear of miners were clogs. The local set, The Leitrim Set has steps in it which are much easier to perform in a shoe with a solid wooden sole. The father of an old friend from Drumshanbo was a cobbler and used to buy the worn out leather shoes from the wealthier farmers and cut away the uppers to be soled and sold as clogs

Stan Laurel (Laurel & Hardy) from Ullverston in Lancashire first went to the US as a boy clog dancer as did Charlie Chaplin — in a troup called “The Lancashire Lads”

Cecil - Southern US? I would have guessed it was more of a New England thing. But what do I know? I’ve never been west of Cardigan.

I tell a lie - I’ve been to Dingle.

We play the related English tune mentioned by quirl as a Polka:
T:Dorset Four Hand Reel
M:2/4
L:1/8
K:G
|:G G/2B/2 d c/2B/2 |ce ce|G G/2B/2 d/2c/2|BA A2 |
G G/2B/2 d c/2B/2 |ce ce |G G/2B/2 d/2c/2 | BA G2 :|
|: gg g/2f/2 e|dd d/2c/2 B|A A/2B/2 c/2B/2c/2d/2|ed d2 |
gg g/2f/2 e|dd d/2c/2 B|A A/2B/2 c/2B/2c/2A/2 |BG G2 :|

It is remarkably similar.

I was planning to submit The Low Level Hornpipe,attributed to James hill,A great tune which Sean McGuire recorded after the High Level.Will this cause furthur confusion as Sean`s recording now incorrectly leads to this link?Should I think of another name for Hill`s Low level Hornpipe or could I ask Gian Marco to withdraw the “also known as the Low level”which is in with this clog? or forget about the submission?Any ideas anyone?

I don’t think James Hill wrote the Low Level.

Submission by ‘Falbeer’ of a tune he calls “The Dorset”
https://thesession.org/tunes/7072/comments

Re. Alancorsini’s post above.

Arigna’s in County Roscommon.

Some variation here, most learned from
https://www.facebook.com/brett.lipshutz/videos/3230431560548758
I also added two variations of part ending without the low C not possible for everybody.