The Return Of Spring barndance

I’ve got trees budding, flowers blooming, an we only cound one frost so far this year ~ NOT NORMAL!!! Hell, as it is going we’ll have daffodils for Saint David’s (Dewi Sant) Day…and that ain’t usual…

This lovely old tune is sometimes notated in 2/4, buy I don’t think it lies there well. It was recorded by Morrison, and I’m surprised I couldn’t find it here already, but you know, as big as this site is, I may have missed it. I’ll give another transcription of it later. It has been ages since we played it so I can’t say exactly where we first picked it up and I haven’t found notes on it. It can be played as a barndance/schottische, or taken up tempo and played as a ‘ballroom polka’…

James Morrison ~ tempo: 120 bpm
~ or less, the recording, a 78 rpm, was sharp & reading 120 - 125 approximately…

M: 2/4
N: | d2- dB | = | d3 B | ~ & is true for similarly notated measures…
For example, in the A-part, measures 1, 2, 5, 6 ~ etc…
G |
|: d2- dB | G2- GD | G>B ed | dc cB | c2- cA | F2- FE | F>A ed | dc Bc |
d2- dB | G2- GD | G>B ed | dc c>B | Af f>B | Ae e>c | dB c/B/A/F/ | GF G2 ||
g2- ge | ff f>d | ee eB | d2- dB | G>B ed | F3 D | F>A ed | G3 (3B/c/d/ |
gg g>e | ff f>d | ee eB | d2- dB | G>B ed | F2- Fe/f/ | gf ef | g2 g>e ||
|: dB g>f | ee a>g | fd ef | ed BG/B/ | dB g>f | ee a>g | fd ef |1 g2 g>e :|
2 g2 ge ||

Here are a few other options for measures along this line:
| d2- dB | = | d3 B |
The following examples are from the A-part, measures 1, 2, 5 & 6:

|: d>d dB | G>G GD | G>B ed | dc cB | c>c cA | F>F FE | F>A ed | dc Bc | ~

~ or ~

|: (3ddd dB | (3GGG GD | G>B ed | dc cB | (3ccc cA | (3FFF FE | F>A ed | dc Bc | ~

I have a few other transcriptions knocking about and may add those later. I’m sure I’ve also got it in an issue of Treoir ~

Yup! ~ Iml 36 Uimhir 2 2004 ISS No 790 004X
between pages 24 and 25 ~
the regular “Ag Déanamh Ceoil”, page 2:

“The Return of Spring”
~ I’ve added the second ending at the end…

K: G Major
B |
d>d dB | G>G GD | G>B ed | dc cB | (c2 c) A | (F2 F) D | FA ed | dc Bc |
d>d dB | G>G GD | G>B ed | dc c>B | Af f>f | Ae e^c | dB c/B/A | GF G2 ||
g>g ge | ff f>d | ee eB | d2 dB | GB/d/ ed | F3 D | F>A ed | G3 B/d/ |
g>g ge | ff f>d | ee eB | d3 B | GB/d/ ed | F3 e/f/ | gf ef | g2 g>e ||
|: dB g>f | ee ag | fd ef | ed BG/B/ | dB g>f | ee a>g | fd ef |1 g2 g2 :|
2 g3 ||

You’ve got an apple orchard eh? I thought you said you were renting? What can I say, I’ve got three black mulberry trees, but they are in pots, actually only two now, I sent one off with Mark. If I’d known you were into fruit I would have sent you one too. Mostly, it is native species I like to promote, but I’ve a weakness for anything that makes a good pie or jam or that the birds enjoy… So, now we know you have an apple orchard out back of your mansion… 😉

I’ve got a loquat tree that I grew from a pip when I was about 12 (which makes it *at least* 6 years old). It currently resides in London in a large pot, but not large enough to stop it being blown over several times a week. Perhaps Mark would drop by and pick it up and take it to Japan on his way home. I am not suggesting this on xenophobic grounds, but merely because I feel it would be happier in its native environment. It has a better chance of fruiting there (it has never yet fruited - although I have seen a loquat tree in fruit in a front garden just down the road), and would thus make a more valuable contribution to the ecosystem. If I were to bring it to Mid-Wales, I don’t think it would ever forgive me.

It has leaves to die for.

That last comment had not even the most tenuous link to the tune being discussed - or even to the title (except ‘return’, since it was about the *return* of a tree to the land of its forebears). This begs the question, why hasn’t Jeremy put a ‘Gardening’ section on this website? The scope for musical gardening discussion is endless: Which tunes, played to an apple tree in blossom, produce the heaviest crop? What are the best keys or modes to serenade your marguerites in? What instrument do slugs hate the most? What is the best time of year to hear your gnomes playing tunes?

Bodhran playing with the skin down and 4 inches from wet ground is great for bringing worms to the surface… That is if you are the sort that likes that kind of thing ~ hookin’ the poor bastards and waving them in a stream or lake in the hopes they’ll give it up for you to have a fry up…

Hey, why not a fishing section? How many of us are into slingin’ a hook and line or fly tying? 🙂

“ ~ serenading marguerites ~ ” ??? Nah, I have been known to down Margaritas while serenading with others in the Irish style, on a veranda in Spring till the sun came back up the next day… Your on spoon and what?!!? ~ just say when and where… I’ll start practicing obscure tunes… 😏

It’s played as a polka by Seamus Begley on Meitheal, more or less like this:
T:Return of Spring, The
R:polka
M:2/4
L:1/8
K:G
d>e dB|G2 GD|GB/d/ ed|c2 cB|cd cA|F2 F2|d (3B/^c/d/ ed|B2 Bc|
d>e dB|G2 GD|GB/d/ ed|c2 cB|Af f/e/f|Ae e/d/e|dB cA|G2 Gd||
|:g>g ge|f>f fd|ed Bc|d2 dB|G (3B/^c/d/ ed|1 A2 A2|d (3B/^c/d/ ed|
B2 Bd:|2 A>A Ag|fd ef|g2 ge||
|:dd g>f|ee a>g|fd ef|ed Bc|dd g>f|ee a>g|fd ef|g2 ge:|

Not sure he plays it in this key, though…

# Posted by patrick cavanagh - July 16th, 2013

Thanks Patrick… It’s ‘one of those kinds’ of polkas, a type which I still think fits 4/4 better than 2/4…

A query.
Is this tune derived from the “classical” repertoire? 19C opera? Salon music? Just wondered.
SK

That makes sense, as too for several other tunes that have made it into the mix, including the polka “Jenny Lind”.

This is a polka, always has been a polka, always will be. The source recordings for the settings here called it a polka, it sounds like a polka, but C submitted it as a barndance, for the usual inscrutable reasons. So I’ve changed that, and added a setting closer to what was played originally, from Treoir via Bill Black.

Treoir Iml 36 Uimhir 2 2004, pages 24 & 25, “Ag Déanamh Ceoil”

Bill’s transcription was already given = X: 6, as are repeatedly both 4/4 and 2/4 transcriptions, with full explanations in the notes above regarding associated tune, dance, & step forms & styles…