The Ballinlea polka

The second of “Ptarmigan’s” polkas, follows on from “Jim McGill’s”. I like this one. Thanks, Dick for letting me post them. Hope the “abcs” are OK.

Just for the record Kenny, I wrote this & Jim McGill’s on Concertina, just as my wee musical tribute to the late Jim McGill, from Ballinlea, but also to give 3 local young Concertina players I was teaching at the time, a couple of little local tunes to play.

For me they both sit quite nicely on Concertina, & hopefully Box too, however although the first one isn’t so comfortable on Fiddle, I like playing the 2nd tune on Fiddle, so always felt that that one was probably the better, more rounded tune.

The first one was meant to be real simple for them & the 2nd just a little bit trickier, so it’s interesting for me to see that more folks here, so far, have “Tunebooked” the first tune.

Now I don’t want to say too much about them, for fear of sounding like I’m trying to make more of them than they really are, which is just two simple little throwaway tunes. However, I thought that perhaps any other folks out there who find themselves farting about with notes & writing wee tunes too, might just be interested in hearing how these two came about, since you (Kenny) went to all the bother of posting them.

Cheers
Dick

Here’s an MP3 of this tune & its partner Jim McGill’s.

Jim McGill’s / The Ballinlea Polka
http://northantrim.podbean.com/2011/06/08/jim-mcgills-the-ballinlea-polka/

Cheers
Dick

You can find a recording of this polka, and “Jim McGill’s” on “Youtube” - both played by the composer.
Type “Ballinlea polkas” in the “Search” slot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJ0qJ1D-Ef0

play video

Submitted on October 29th 2007 by Kenny.
https://thesession.org/tunes/7915

Musicians:

Dick Glasgow - concertina & fiddle

Padraig O’Mianain - melodeon

Sean Martin - guitar

Gerry McGouran - flute

John Moulden - spoons