Tag Archives: Gaelic

A port-a-beul in reel time: Dhomhnuill a Dhomhnuill

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This week’s tune is a piece of port-a-beul (Gaelic mouth music) in reel time entitled Dhomhnuill a Dhomhnuill (or as I learned it: Donald Donald). I learned this from Gaelic singer, scholar and musician Michel Byrne when we played in The Big Squeeze Ceilidh Band together for many years.

Realising I know very little about the song, I did a bit of online digging. The trustworthy TuneArchive project has a reel with the same title and some of the same phrases that comes from the Athole Collection (1884) and would appear to be a relative of our tune.

However, clarsach player Karen Marshalsay has recorded our version, which she says came from the Isle of Skye collector “Frances Tolmie’s 100 Songs of Occupation from the Western Isles”, which was published in 1911. There is more on the background of Frances Tolmie and her work on this web page on the Gaelic Literature of the Isle of Skye. This would suggest the song and tune come from the Isle of Skye, which is as I remember it, but I’ll check with Michel.

This recording is from the Edinburgh International Harp Festival in 2004.

Michel sings this in Bm/D, which brings about a top D in the B part, so the resources are for a setting transposed to Em/G. There are few places to decorate, although cuts and rolls can be used along with the casadh.

Fingal’s Cave, but not by Mendelssohn

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A quick update ahead of FluteFling’s Scottish Flute Day, which is on this weekend. We looked at a tune that is probably a march or possibly a strathspey and I have certainly heard it as a reel.

Fingal’s Cave (Cuilfhionn) was published in Kerr’s Merrie Melodies, possibly in 1875 according to the usually reliable Tune Archive, but there is little information beyond that other a description of it being a Highland tune. It seems to have been relatively little recorded too, although is described as being popular.

I first heard it by Andrew Cronshaw on The Great Dark Water and he got it from Kerr’s if I recall correctly. Other recordings have since been made and my version is derived from one of Christine Martin and Ann Hughes’ Ceol na Fhidle collections — or so I thought but I can’t find it online.

There is another, lesser-known tune with the same title composed by John Gow, one of Niel Gow’s sons, which appears to be unrelated. There’s some background information on the cave and Gow’s version on The Fiddler’s Companion (the precursor to Tune Archive).

I have yet to record this and will do so after the FluteFling weekend. However, the dots are now up on the resources page for this year.

Photo of Staffa by Scott MacLeod Liddle, some rights reserved.

The Iona Boat Song

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The summer term began this week with another gentle Scottish rowing tune.

Caol Muile (The Sound of Mull) or The Iona Boat Song is a Scottish Boat Song intended to assist with the steady rowing rhythm required to cross the stretches of water that link the islands, these are possibly very old tunes. The words for them have been lost but, as with The Skye Boat Song, words have sometimes been added in more recent times.

The excellent archive web site Tobar an Duchais/ Kist o’ Riches has a field recording of Hugh Duncan of Islay singing a version in Gaelic that was collected in 1953. The words were composed by Rev. John MacLeod of Morvern. There are links to other versions of the song on the site from about 30,000 different field recordings in total.

Another author was Sir Hugh S. Roberton, founder of The Glasgow Orpheus Choir. His words evoke the spiritual heritage of the island which has been a final resting place for many saints, leaders and royalty of Scotland.

I taught this tune with the Scots Music Group a couple of years ago. See the Resources page for this class for the music. Our setting owes something to the excellent Ceòl nam Fèis tunebook published by Fèisean nan Gàidheal.

Photo of Iona by Jim Barter, some rights reserved.

A Hebridean rowing tune

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The new term began last night with one of a handful of rowing tunes that I am aware of. Iomramh eadar Il’as Uist (Rowing from Islay to Uist) was originally published in 1815 in Captain Simon Fraser’s collection — perhaps my favourite of the older collections. If you don’t have it, a PDF of a later edition can be found on the International Music Score Library Project.

The Skye Boat Song is the best known of these tune types (see the interesting history of it on Wikipedia) and the Arran Boat Song is widely played but Rowing from Islay to Uist perhaps less so. I first heard it on Ossian’s St Kilda Wedding (highly recommended) and it has been recorded by others since.

Ossian played it in Am but it fits the whistle and flute well in Bm. It is usually written out in a slow, rocking, 6/8 time and it is often described as a jig due to this. 3/4 makes sense to me but I have adhered to the original time signature. It’s a long way from Islay to Uist, so take your time with this one. The weaker c# notes on our instruments can be bent to good effect.

Resources for the tune can be found on the Resources page for the classes.

Photo: North Uist near Solas by Scot Tares, some rights reserved.

A slow tune: The Braes of Locheil

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I first heard the tune on a recording by Sprangeen in the early 1980s. An all-female band that included the harp duo that would become Sileas, the diverse lineup included flute and concertina player Ann Ward. If you haven’t heard it, it’s worth checking out.

At that time very few people had recorded Scottish traditional music on the flute and it became became an inspiration for me as a beginner on the instrument. Later on I had the good fortune to play alongside Ann and for a couple of years the Thursday flute and whistle classes that became FluteFling were held in her house in Edinburgh. On that recording she plays Boehm system flute, but she also plays wooden flute as well as cello.

A popular tune, there are many more recordings, but I next heard it by fiddler John Martin recorded it with singer guitarist Billy Ross on The Braes of Locheil. The two had been half of the Ossian lineup for two recordings and Billy Ross sings the song in Gaelic (Braigh Loch Iall), which is where the melody originally derives.

This BBC Alba link is to a setting of it sung by Art MacCarmaig and the Tobar and Dulchais/ Kist o’ Riches web site has 17 entries, including this one, sung by Captain Donald Joseph MacKinnon of Barra.

Another flute player to have recorded the tune is Belfast’s Desi Wilkinson, who plays a highland pipe setting on Shady Woods. He plays it in a staccato manner using tonguing for emphasis that suits the pipe march rhythm.

The tune itself first appeared in the Simon Fraser Collection that was published in 1816, but much of which was collected in the late 18th Century. There are reprints of it but a scanned PDF of it is available from the Petrucci digital archive of public domain music. One of my favourite earlier collections, many of the tunes are accessible to whistle and flute.

There is more on the background of the tune at the Tune Archive.

Resources for this tune are available on the Resources page for the classes.

Photo: Sunset on Loch Eil by Duncan McNeil, some rights reserved.