I Ne’er Shall Wean Her jig

When played in A dorian, this tune is called "I Shall Ne’er Wean Her," and in B minor its title becomes "Mrs. O’Sullivan’s."

Reminds me of a tune the great Ulster singers Len Graham and the late Joe Holmes used to lilt in jig and reel versions. I think they called it "Wellington’s Medal".

I’m a bit confused about the key here - it seems to me that If I accompany this tune I play the chords for C major.

~ and just a minor variant:

|: G |
EGG GED | EGG c2 B | AcA AGA | cde e2 d |
cde g2 a | ged c2 d | e2 a edB | cAG A2 :|
|: d |
e2 g ged | egg g2 d | e2 a aga | bag a2 g |
cc/d/e g2 a | ged c2 B | Aaa e2 d | cAG A2 :|

& a version in F minor:

https://thesession.org/tunes/3971

Stoneboy wrote, "I’m a bit confused about the key here - it seems to me that If I accompany this tune I play the chords for C major." I agree. A dorian has an F sharp in it; C major, of course, has F natural. There are several places in this tune where you could drop an F natural in and it would sound fine, e.g., in measure 5 in the run up to G. I don’t think there’s any place an F# would fit.

Yeah, it ends on an A, but so what? It just begs to resolve to a C chord.

Great tune this! Here it is played by the group Sproai http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpR2jGWEVuU&feature=grec_browse

play video

The second tune of course.

It reminds me of a few vague tunes and, less vaguely, of an early Pogues song, which name I’ve forgotten.

The first part proceeds by steps, it creates an anxious suspense; is this imperious rise gointa stop?

I posted a setting which is very close to the Lúnasa version in their Maids In The Kitchen track. Of course they played it in Gm to be more cool :-), but Am is easier, at least on my banjo, or C whistle - lost my Bb whistle somewhere - should get another.

Maids In The Kitchen
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LBNaadGvdI

play video

Found in several old Scottish collections as The Irish Girl… https://thesession.org/tunes/13224

Some variations from Patrick Street.

A few small variations from the previous setting posted, transposed up to Bmin, and a variant ending from the Ross Ainslie & Jarlath Henderson album Air-Fix (track "Gordon"). Wouldn’t use that ending every time playing through the tune of course!

Taken from ‘A Fine Selection of Over 200 Irish Traditional Tunes for Sessions’, compiled by David Speers with a Forward by Matt Cranitch. I’ve added this setting as it appears in the book with the B part an octave below what’s usually played. Anybody come across this before?

@Eubonian, Have come across something similar to this. A similar jig of a different name, "Jig for Jules". See: https://thesession.org/tunes/16022

Harmony Glen play it on their album "Streaming Tunes" (https://thesession.org/recordings/2722), could have sworn I was listening to a variant of Mrs. O’Sullivan’s that goes lower than normal.

Heard this variant live on the whistle recently, 2nd or 3rd pass through the tune. The first two bars of the B Part, |dg2 g2e|dg2 g2e|, those repeated g’s were slid onto, air cut-off between each of them. Sounded great!