Paddy Fahey’s reel

For any or all of you that own the Skip Healy album "Purgatory Chasm," this tune is first in the last set. He calls it the "Camel’s Hump." It sounds really cool and Arabic-like if you play it with B and E flats. Just thought I’d add that.

And we thank you for adding that.

I hope Brad didn’t hit you too hard 🙂

Not half as hard as Skip will hit him when he finds out that this is not the Camel’s Hump. ;)

hey Brad, you wanna fight? Huh? Step up! haha, just kidding. Actually, I heard this tune on the album "Wind Among the Reeds" by Tommy Keane and Jaqueline McCarthy. As soon as the last tune came on, I recognized it immediately, although I couldn’t remember where I heard it from. I looked at the CD jacket and It said "Paddy Fahey’s." Then, it dawned on me…Skip Healy. I played Skip’s CD and this CD and they matched. So there! HA! Proof!!!! :P

Listen to track 16 again - I don’t think your breathing enough when your playing that low-whistle & the Oxygen deprevation is starting to kick in. Please don’t beat me up. ;o)

I listened to it again, dude…same tune except for a couple ornaments. :D

Josh -they aren’t even in the same key, listen to my transcription of the Camel’s Hump, than listen to your transcription of Paddy Fahey’s. They aren’t even similar. They are two different reels, maybe you ment to post a different tune?

These two tunes do make a decent set though.

Hmmm…maybe youre right. Do you think that one may be a variation of the other? That may be the case (I know about 3 versions of the Blackthorn Stick, so why not?).

and Skip’s version and Keane’s version both sound somewhat alike.

I’d like to find out, I still think they are two different tunes - Ask Skip at your next lesson. I’d like to hear what he says.

Will do!

This doesn’t sound like the same tune. The sheet music for the version Martin plays would be very helpful for one of my friends
Mike

Just do a search for "Paddy Fahey’s". It should turn up three or four different tunes. One of them is the Paddy Fahey’s that Martin Hayes recorded.

Mike, it’s in the tune archive here, as posted June 21, 2001—that will help you identify it from the other Fahy reels also posted. Be aware that Paddy Fahy (some spell it Fahey) has been a prolific composer but doesn’t often title his tunes. So they all go by his name. *Dozens* of them.

A musician from Belfast told me a few years ago that this tune was originally written in the key of "F", and that in his opinion, the flute players had ruined it by transposing it into "G"!
I have heard a tape of Belfast flute player Gary Hastings playing this tune, in "G", on an RTE radio programme. The title given to it by the presenter was "The Ould House".

Well, I’m fairly sure this is a different E major Paddy Fahy’s from the one that Will has already submitted. Dreadfully sorry if it’s the same one just a really different setting, Jeremy!

Anyway, this Paddy Fahy’s is one I got from John Whelan’s Celtic Fire cd. ‘Tis a good ‘un. And yes, I’m on a Paddy Fahy’s kick at the moment. 🙂

Zina

Zina, Josh Kane posted this one as "Paddy Fahey’s" in D major. But let’s lobby Jeremy to keep your E maj setting too—it’s great to have the odd key, works terrific on fiddle, it’d be nice to have the dots for it without having to transpose in my head or on the fiddle directly.

Josh’s version is at:
https://thesession.org/tunes/492

Damn! I hate it when that happens. Sorry Jeremy. I checked, I really did, just not apparently carefully enough. Thanks, Will!

Zina

In E major….

T: Paddy Fahy’s
M: 4/4
L: 1/8
R: reel
K: Emaj
BA|:GE ~E2 GBAF|GEGB AF=DF|GE ~E2 GABe|defd ed BA|
GE (3EEE GBAF|GEGB AFBA|GE (3EEE GABe|defd e2 ef:|
|:gefd Beee|=dBAF =DFAa|gefd edBA|Beed e2 ef|
gefd Beee|=dBAF =DFAA|GE ~E2 GABe|defd e2 ef:|

According to Cathal McConnell in his Pennywhistle Tutor, if someone teaches you a tune, and that person doesn’t know the name of it, and you don’t have a name for it and nobody around you has a name for it, you name it after the person that taught it to you.

This tune is pretty popular here in Los Angeles. Hammy Hamilton taught the tune to Frank Simpson, who then taught it to a small handful of others and so forth. Nobody knows the name, so we just call it "The Reel of Hammy." It’s a tasty little tune that’s best served at a medium tempo with a creamy dollop of lilt to sweeten it up. It’s a little tricky on the flute (at least it is for me, with the B rolls and those cross fingered c-naturals), but it’s just such a happy little tune, that it’s well worth the practice.

This looks to me like a version of one of Paddy Fahy’s reels. I have an RTE recording of Gary Hastings playing it - he called it "The Ould House". Nigel de Boullier, from Belfast, told me it was written in F. It’s been recorded several times recently, by Kevin Crawford, for one. I’ve just looked through the database for "Fahy’s". This tune is already in it twice - submitted by Zina, in E, and by Josh Kane, in D. Seems to be popular in any key. Flute players - including Gary Hastings , prefer it in G.

I found it on Kevin Crawford’s CD "In Good Company," just like you said. Thanks for the info, Kenny!

This was also recorded as the first track on the Kane Sister’s eponymous CD

if you visit this link you can see the sheet music for the tune and hear (confusingly) another Paddy Fahey tune.

http://www.thekanesisters.com/hear.htm#paddy1

Another version in G is @ https://thesession.org/tunes/2294

Other versions in D and E are @ https://thesession.org/tunes/492 & https://thesession.org/tunes/968

Another version in G is @ https://thesession.org/tunes/2294.

"Paddy Fahy’s"
Key signature: E Major
Submitted on September 15th 2002 by Zina Lee.
https://thesession.org/tunes/968

see interesting comment by slainte on this and The Fairy reel in G at: https://thesession.org/tunes/2944

Though it makes it lack its relief or lift, this tune can be played through in Eminor too, interestingly,

X: 2
Tara Bingham

Hi , i am looking for the Jig that appear in the first set of the Brian finnegan first solo CD, ”When the party’s over” but this is a reel, why appear this tune in the CD’s??!?! some one can help me?

1. Click on "Tunes"
2. Find the "search" box
3. Make sure to set the tune type box to "jigs"
4. Type "Hammy Hamilton’s" into the search box and click on "search"
5. You will get 6 hits - you will have to take the time to look at them to see which is the right one

Finbarr played it in E.
https://thesession.org/recordings/2548

JACKB, your setting is note-for-note identical to the one whistlemanhimself posted 11 years ago.

Apparently this Paddy Fahey reel (n°15 in Hollohan’s thesis) was originally composed in G and not in F like some people said in the comments above. Paddy Fahey plays it in G and you can find the recording here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gr8h3X_o2Dc&t=1966s

play video

Not at all satisfied with any of the existing settings of this excellent tune by the master himself, I have provided something extremely close to the version I recently recorded with the band Cavort in Seattle. You’ll find this as reel #15 in the Holohan collection of Paddy Fahey transcriptions (message me if you want a copy of it). If you listen to different recordings of this tune you’ll notice that people often put the F-naturals in wildly different spots; the version I’ve posted is just how I play it, as I think it’s both faithful (enough) to the original but also easy for accompanying players to follow.

This transcription is what can be found on page 258 of Maria Holohan’s 1995 thesis.
I tried to simplify her notation by introducing the "mordent" notation. Anyway, you can allways refer to what has been published on youtube and allready cited in one of the above comments.
You can note that each part is supposed to be played single.

A flute version, with modifications in the second part. A good example of the natural evolution of traditionnal (though not so old) tunes ?…
https://youtu.be/9Gqb3GSDHDQ?t=148

play video

https://youtu.be/GhpW17zz3pw

play video