The Tailor’s Twist hornpipe

Source: Tommy Peoples_ “Master Irish Fiddle Player”. Transcription: Gian Marco Pietrasanta

I had a Tommy People’s instructional book once upon a time. I learned this hornpipe from there. Since then - I lost the tune. Thanks for the refresher!

This is a great hornpipe especially when those trio’s are single bowed.

This tune is also played by Liam O’Flynn on Planxty’s “The Woman I Loved so Well”.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeRzEdO2R4A

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Piper’s version

This is one of those hornpipes that you hear now and again in sessions, like it, and promise yourself you’ll learn it… Taken from ‘A Fine Selection of Over 200 Irish Traditional Tunes for Sessions’, compiled by David Speers with a Forward by Matt Cranitch. It was collected with the title The Tailor’s Thimble.

I learned the Tailor’s Twist a few years ago. It’s a lovely hornpipe. Yesterday in my ancient original Kerr’s Collection of the Popular Tunes of All Nations I discovered the hornpipe in the collection as The Jolly Butchers, perhaps the original name. The only tiny difference is the 2nd bar of the B part resolves in d instead of a.

A slightly different version as played by Eliot Grasso (at least his first time through the tune). He plays some nice variations on the tune repeats.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3QGlauE9U0

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I picked this up from Brian Hughes’s album “This Day 20 Years” following Fly By Night in a set. It is a really nice whistle tune which will test your fingering skills.