A new tune each Wednesday (more or less), chosen arbitrarily by your Webmaster, a mixture of traditional and new (but traditional in style) tunes. Site visitors are encouraged to nominate tunes for this page via the Suggestion Form.
This week’s tune:
Possum Up a Gum Stump This reel is traditional old-time as far as I know. Not to be confused with another, quite different tune by the same name, reportedly transcribed and played by John Hartford.
Last week’s tune:
La Luna Dins L’Aiga’, a schottische from Brittany in France. When we first learned this tune we didn’t know its name and called it “Breton Schottische #2”.
Recent Tunes of the Week:
- If I Had a Mouse I Would Feed Him Chocolate, aka “Polska efter Petter Dufva”. In the common practice with Swedish tunes, this one doesn’t have a title but is known as Polska efter Petter Dufva (#45?), there appear to be at least 192 polskas by Petter Dufva, so one of our local musicians gave it the name “If I Had a Mouse…” as a mnemonic way to remember how the tune starts. Try it out.
- Waiting for the Federals. This march or barn dance may also be known as the ‘Seneca Square Dance’ (if you’re north of the Mason-Dixon Line). By either title it’s fun to play.
- Swinging on a Gate. A charming traditional reel originally from Ireland? England? Scotland? USA? Do you know where?
- Gånglåt fra Äppelbo. A Gånglåt is a Swedish musical form meaning a walking tune, a sort of relaxed march. Like many Swedish tunes this one doesn’t have a title but is identified simply as a Gånglåt from Äppelbo, a small locality situated in Vansbro Municipality, Dalarna County, Sweden.
- Planxty Hewlett by Turlough O’Carolan. The name Hewlett is likely to have been the name of one of Carolan’s patrons, Carolan being a blind itinerant harper. The meaning of the word planxty is uncertain. See one theory in the Notes section for this tune.
- Joe Crapeau. Yeah, this sounds a little odd to us English speakers but “crapeau” is New Brunswick Acadian French for “toad”. This lively reel was named for Joe “Crapeau” Chiasson.
- Here’s a ‘two-fer’, Birds at the Feeder and Cat in the Window, two polkas composed last winter as companion tunes by Susan Reid.
- La Pêcheuse (The Fisherwoman) Well, I seem to be in Québécois mood these days, so here is a wonderful traditional reel.
- La Petite Marche, a relatively new tune from Québec by Yann Falquet.
- L’Ange aux Patins (Angel on Ice Skates), a lovely Québécois waltz by Claude Méthé
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