There are several thousand different Irish
dance tunes either on recordings or in tune books. Out of these
there is a smaller collection of what traditional musicans call
"session tunes." There are probably about 400 to 500
tunes in the general pool of commonly played pieces. I travel
around the country and attend Irish sessions from California to
West Virginia.
This is a list I've compiled from memory of what tunes seem to
be played the most often in my experience. I don't yet play all
of them myself, because I'm learning as I go. I've never been
to a session in Ireland, but I understand that the US repertoire
is similar. Therefore, this is merely my personal list, not intended
to be the be-all and end-all authoritative source for session
music.
This isn't a complete list since I haven't yet learned the names
of many other regularly played tunes. I've purposely left out
dance tunes that I like personally but that I don't consider "common"
session tunes. For example, I like playing "Flowers of Edinburgh"
and "Banish Misfortune," but I rarely hear those tunes
at Irish sessions, so they're not on this list.
I will keep updating this list as I go along however. Many people
categorize O'Carolan's harp tunes in a different class than "traditional
Irish music," so I haven't put them on the list either even
though I play a number of them personally.
To be able to attend a serious session and play a lot of the time,
one's repertoire needs to be a bit over 200 tunes. However, if
you are just getting started, I'm confident that you could learn
any 10 of these tunes and go to any regular weekly session in
the US and someone else there would know at least half of them
to play along with you. The more of these you learn, the less
you'Il have to sit out at a session and wait for the regular musicians
to play a tune that you know.
Violinists often ask me for sheet music that they can read along
with at sessions. Unfortunately this is not very practical for
several reasons: A medley of tunes is often spontaneously selected
by the person who starts a set. If that person has to preselect
the tunes and playing order to announce to the group, it takes
away a bit from the fun and continuity of the session.
Also, there is no one particular source for written session tunes,
rather, about 5-10 different tunebooks which cover about 90% of
the common tunes. I have witnessed frustrated players trying to
shuffle through written music at sessions, in dimly lit pubs,
desperately trying to locate a tune before the session leader
finishes playing it.
Session playing is a "style" of music. To participate
fully, one need to memorize the music, since this meets one definition
of a "session." There's an old saying, "when in
Rome, do as the Romans do." This advice is true for other
styles of music as well. To play classical chamber music, for
example, one must brush up on sight reading and technical violin
playing skills. You can't just show up at a chamber group expecting
to play by ear!
Its important to keep in mind that most of these tunes have alternate
names, though I've tried to pick the name that is used most often
in my experience. Also remember that the traditional repertoire
doesn't remain constant, but gradually changes as new tunes are
composed and older obscure tunes are rediscovered and released
on recordings by popular groups. Sometimes tunes also seem to
get "worn out," from being played too much, and lose
favor at sessions. I've started adding the "key" of
the piece after the name, but I'm not finished yet.
| Another Jig will do Bank of Ireland Battering Ram Behind the Haystack ...D Blackthorn Stick Bobby Casey's Boyne Hunt Boys of Blue Hill....D Boys of Wexford Brenda Stubbert's Butterfly Chicago Reel Chief O'Neils Favorite.....D Clifs of Moher.....Am Collier's Concertina Reel Congress Reel Cannaughtman's Rambles.....D Convenience Reel Cooley's Reel......Em Crabs in the Skillet Cup of Tea Dennis Murphy's Slide Dick Gossip.......D Dingle Regatta Dinky's.......Am Docherty's Doctor Gilbert's Drowsy Maggie......Em Drunken Landlady.....Em Dust on the Windowsill......Am Earl's Chair Egan's Polka......D Far from Home......G Faral O' Gara Farewell to Ireland |
Father Kelly'sFoggy Dew......Em Foxhunter's reel Frieze Britches Garret Barry's Gravel Walk....Am Hardiman the Fiddler Harvest Home......D Haste to the Wedding......D High Reel Home Rule/Hangman's Noose.......D Humours of Tulla Hunter's House Hunter's Purse Hunting the Hare Jackie Coleman's......D Jenny's Chickens Jig of Slurs Julia Delaney......Dm Kid on the Mountain.......Em Kilarney Boys of Pleasure King of the Fairies Lark in the Morning.....D Longford Collector Love at the Endings......D Maid Behind the Bar......D Martin Wynnes 1 &2 McMahon's(The Banshee).......G Monaghan's jig......Em Mooncoin Morning Dew........Em Morning Star Morrison's jig.......Em Mountain Road........D Mug of Brown Ale Musical Priest |
My Darling Asleep........D Nine Points of Roguery O'Keef's Slide Off to California.......D Old Copperplate Out on the Ocean Paddy on the Turnpike Plains of Boyle Providence reel Rights of Man.......Em Road to Lisdoonvarna.......Em Rocky Road to Dublin.......D Rolling in the Ryegrass........D Rose in the Heather Sailor's Bonnet Saint Annes's reel........D Salamanca reel Sally Gardens reel.......G Scholar, the Sculley's Reel.......D Sean Ryan's jig(the Banshee) Shaskeen Ships are sailing........Em Silver Spear Silver Spire Sligo Maid Star of Munster......Am Swinging on a Gate.........G Tarbolton.......Em Temperence(Tee-Totaler's)Reel....G Ten Penny Bit Tobin's Favorite.......D Top of Cork Road(Father Kelly's) Toss the Feathers Tripping up the Stairs......D The Virginia Walker Street reel.......G Wind that Shakes the Barley.......D Wise Maid......D |