The Lass Of Ballintra reel

This is the name fiddler Gerry O’Connor gives to this single reel on his "Journeyman" cd. A slightly different tune (usually in G) goes by the name The Ballintra (aka Ballintrae, Ballintray) Lass(es). In his liner notes, Gerry also gives the names The Bonny Boys of Ballintra and Kiss Your Partner for this tune. O’Neill collected the same tune under the Kiss Your Partner name, in G, as follows:

X: 1
T: Kiss Your Partner
T: Lass of Ballintra, The
M: 4/4
L: 1/8
K:G
g/f/e|d2 Bd efge|dBGB AGEG|d2 Bd efgb|afdf g2 g/f/e|
|d2 Bd efge|dBGB AGEG|d2 Bd efgb|afdf g2 d/e/f||
|g2 gf gbag|fdad bdad|g2 gf gbag|fdef g2 d/e/f|
g2 gf gbag|fdad bdad|edeg fdfb|afdf g2 g/f/e||

On fiddle, I like it in F for the added brightness it gives (and just for the simple change of key, so our guitarist can’t complain about yet another reel in D or G 🙂.

Gerry cracks through this at a good clip, and it works great at that tempo, but the melody is strong enough to work as more lyrical or even slow reel as well.

Some modest variations I’ve been tinkering with:

For the turn from the B part back into the A part, I like to play:

….|defd cFAc|dfeg fdcA||
|F/F/F Ac defd|….

Wherever it occurs, the same cFAc phrase can also be played with a bowed triplet on the c: c/c/c Ac to save yourself the string crossing.

And I like to occasionally roll the first f of the B part. So instead of |fcfa gdga| you get |~f3a gdga| (and you could roll the g there too).

There is another version of this tune called the Flags of Dublin.

Skye Collection once again!!

Page 189, 2nd tune down.

Also played in D and known as the Flags of Dublin.

I LOVE THIS TUNE!!!!!!!!!!

Learned from an old Seamus Ennis recording.

X: 1
T:Flags of Dublin, The
M:4/4
L:1/8
K:D
B|:ADFA BcdB|ADFA BEEB|ADFA Bcde|1 fdce d2dB:|2 fece dABc||
|:dcdf edeg|fafe dcBA|1dcdf edeg|fABc d2dA:|2 GBBA Bcde|fece d2dB||

A great tune.
I came across this tune in ‘The Gunn Book’ (Fermanagh 1865) in key of G, titled ‘The Bony (sic) Boys of Ballintra’.
Also in O’Neill’s in key of G as ‘Kiss your Partner’

This tune is in the Gunn Book (Fermanagh 1865) as the Bony (sic) Boys of Ballintra

nb the spelling ‘bony’ and ‘boney’ appears in the Gunn Book several times. I take it to be an old spelling of ‘bonny’ and nothing to do with osteopathy!

Known in Scotland as "The Lass of Ballantrae" (Gow’s 4th Repository), and "The Lasses O’ Ballantrae" (Skye Collection), both in the key of F. There’s also a reel in G in Kerr’s Merry melodies called "The Braes of Dunblane" which is similar.

This version appears in P.W. Joyce’s Old Irish Music and Songs (1909), vol. 1, p. 164, No. 356.
Joyce copied this tune "from a MS evidently written by a skilled fiddler with much musical taste, from Limerick, but the name of the writer nowhere appears."

I hope this can be seen by non FB accounters too, from -52"
https://www.facebook.com/ciarank1/videos/10154445353189125/