The Steampacket reel

Zina sent me an email asking for my "setting" of this tune, too grand a word for how I play it, which is not far off the standard session settings I’ve heard from other fiddlers.

I originally learned that opening bar of the first half as: |A~G3 AGFD| and I still use that on occasion, but to me it lacks punch. Sometimes I play that first measure as: |DGBG AGFG| and sometimes I like to repeat the AGFG in the following measure for a little swing:

|(3GGG BG AGFG|AGFG Addc|

My B part is even closer to the "standard" version…I roll almost all those high g’s, tho I suppose with a little noodling I could come up with something more creative. At session speed, though, I like the way the rolls ring out, so there they are. 🙂

Incidentally, the Steampack makes a nice follow-up to Bantry Lasses, which I posted not too long ago.

In the second to last measure, that should be an f after the triplet: |af (3gfe fde^c| d2 etc.

I fixed it in the abc notation. Gawd, if the clients I edit for saw what havoc I wreak in here….

T:Steam Packet, The
M:C|
L:1/8
S:Late… In The Night by Christy Barry, Conor McCarthy, Cyril O’Donoghue
R:reel
Z:gmp
K:G
| B~G3 AGFA | D~G3 A2dc | A~G3 AGFG | =F3G ABcA |
BGGB AGFA | D~G3 A2dc | A~G3 AGFG | =F3G ABcA |
d~g3 aggf | dgge fdcA | d~g3 agfg | dcde fdcA |
d~g3 agfg | a2ag ~f3g | a2(3gfe fdec | d2eg fdcA |

T:Steam Packet, The
M:C|
L:1/8
S:Kevin Crawford - D Flute album
R:reel
Z:gmp
K:G
| ~G3B AGFD | A~G3 Addc | A~G3 AGFD | =FEFG ABcz |
A~G3 AGFD | A~G3 Addc | A~G3 AGFD | =FEFG ABc^c |
d~g3 a~g3 | d2eg fdcA | d~g3 a~g3 | dcde fdcA |
d~g3 a~g3 | abag ~f3g | abge fd(3edc | d2eg fdcA |

T:Steam Packet, The
M:C|
L:1/8
S:The South West Wind by Ronan Browne And Peter O’Loughlin
R:reel
Z:gmp
K:G
| A~G3 AGFD | A~G3 Addc | A2GB AGFD | ~F3G ABcB |
A~G3 AGFD | A~G3 Addc | A2GB AGFD | ~F3G ABcA |
d~g3 a~g3 | dgge fdcA | d~g3 aggf | dcde fdcA |
d~g3 agfg | abag ~f3g | afge fdef | dfag fdcA ||
"2nd time start" ~G3B AGFD |

OK guys - whose the fastest gun in the West? Who can put the common name on this well known reel - first?

It is on Tommy McMahon & Bernard O’Sullivan’s LP.

Limestone Rock? But the B part is different

Did ‘Darach De Bruin’ not compose the Limestone Rock, Donough?

Sorry, wrong c at the end of the 4th bar, of 2nd part, should have written it like this:

dgg/g/g agfe|dgg/g/g fdcA|dgg/g/g agfe|d^cde fd=cA|
dgg/g/g agfg|abag fefg|afge fde^c|d/d/deg fdcA||

Funny, you two don’t know this is a very popular tune called The Steampacket: https://thesession.org/tunes/690

Slainte - yes, but as Donough points out, the A-part has something of The Limestone Rock about it. It took me until the B-part to recognise it as The Steampacket. It’s amazing how much difference a few notes can make.

Anyway, the notes may be the same, but they’ve got different names, so they’re different tunes. Identical twins look the same, but they’re not the same person.

I think this is just a setting of the Steampacket, and that the name has nothing to do with whether it’s a different tune or not.

Yes. I still believe this is just one of many versions of the Steampacket. Liam Kelly recorded a version similar to this on one of Dervish’s albums.

Kiss the Maid behid the Bar: https://thesession.org/tunes/676
Kitty’s Gone a Milking: https://thesession.org/tunes/1647
Trim the Velvet: https://thesession.org/tunes/1142

Oops, that should read Kiss the Maid behind the *Barrel*.

Does anyone have the abc’s for Denis Murphy’s version of the steampacket, on the From Galway to Dublin CD, track 6. I sounds a bit different from the sheet music printed here. Thanks.

X:1
T:Steam Packet, The
M:C|
L:1/8
S:The South West Wind by Ronan Browne And Peter O’Loughlin
R:reel
Z:gmp
K:G
| A~G3 AGFG | A~G3 Addc | A~G3 AGFD | ~F3G ABcB |
A~G3 AGFD | A~G3 Addc | A~G3 AGFD | ~F3G ABcA |
d~g3 a~g3 | d~g3 fdcA | d~g3 a~g3 | d2eg fdcA |
d~g3 a~g3 | abag fefg | afge fgfe | d2eg fdcA ||
"2nd time start" ~G3B AGFD |

X:1
T:Steam Packet, The
M:C|
L:1/8
S: Davy Spillane and Kevin Glackin
R:reel
Z:
K:G
| A~G3 AGFG | A~G3 Addc | A~G3 AGFD | =F3G ABcB |
A~G3 AGFD | A~G3 Addc | A~G3 AGFD | =F3G ABcA |
d~g3 a~g3 | d~g3 fdcA | d~g3 a~g3 | d2eg fdcA |
d~g3 a~g3 | abag fefg | afge fgfe | d2eg fdcA ||

Would also say that the Crooked Road is a related tune. Setting I learned from Brian McGrath has almost identical B part.

This tune packs a mean, powerful piston rod action!

It takes its name from the famous shipping company that was founded in London in 1839 by Scotland’s own James MacQueen http://www.merchantnavyofficers.com/rm1.html The state sponsored company would become the largest shipping group in the world a hundred years on.
See also: http://www.steam-packet.com/ for the Hiberno-Manx connections (so to say!)

Tune #1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgM1mwGxLf8

play video

Charlie Lennon plays this on his album The Emigrant Suite and calls it "The Tobacco Leaf".

Here’s quite a triplet-y version.