Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs

Subject: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From:
Date: 19 May 97 - 01:13 AM

Can anyone help with any songs in the Mouth Music style or indeed with any Irish or Scottish Songs (in either Gaeilge or Ga\ildhlig of course!)

Any help would be much appreciated as would the music for any of the less well known songs.

le bui/ochas,

Benjamin Hollister [e-mail]

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: cleod
Date: 19 May 97 - 10:21 AM

Sorry, the only mouth music I know about is performed by Sileas...I just got it on a CD titled "Celtic Odyssey" by Narada Productions (Narada Collection Series) and I've been looking for the lyrics ever since!!! If you ever find them, please!!! ^_^ [e-mail]

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Mountain Dog
Date: 19 May 97 - 10:32 AM

I remember seeing Silly Wizard some 16 years back when Andy Stewart did renditions of two or three beautiful examples of Scots mouth music, though alas I didn't catch names of any of them. It would be worth looking into the Silly Wizard/Andy Stewart corpus to see what mouth music the boys may have committed to vinyl, tape or CD. I'd check with the folks at Green Linnet Records as a place to begin.

Good luck.

Also, thanks to cleod for the lead on the "Celtic Odyssey" CD. Sounds like a great one to pick up.

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: cleod
Date: 19 May 97 - 10:45 AM

You're welcome, Mr. Mountain Dog, but in case you're planning to buy it, I must warn you, there is only one song by Sileas on that particular CD. The title is "Puirt a Beul" (for what it's worth). ^_^

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: cleod (again!!!)
Date: 19 May 97 - 10:53 AM

Whoops! I forgot to tell you, Mr. Benjamin Hollister, that I have the lyrics to two of the songs that appear on my CD, the titles of which are "Chuiagh Me 'Na Rosann" (I Went to Visit the Rosses) of which I have both the English and Gaelic and "Do/nal Agus Mo/rag" (Gaelic only) If you're interested, I can e-mail them to you.

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Dave Murphy
Date: 19 May 97 - 06:28 PM

I think we might be getting mixed up a bit here. Typically, mouth music doesn't have too many words that make sense. Puirt a Beul simply means mouth tunes and were popular in remote areas where there were few musicians or not enough of them when needed. What words there are would be used to accentuate a turn in a tune or a change in rythm.

Waulking songs, from the Outer Hebrides are very rythmical and do have verses and a lot of nonsense verse. You may have heard of waulking the cloth or "luadh" as the process is called in Scots Gaelic.

Anyway--my two cents worth.

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Susan of DT
Date: 19 May 97 - 08:07 PM

We have only two songs labeled "@mouthmusic" in the DT - it is a new category. Jean Redpath sings some mouth music in English, As has been pointed out, the words are not very signigicant. I thought I had entered one set, but I cannot find them (how to spell this stuff to search for it?)

It went something like:

Kitty Birdie had a cou; Black and white about the mou;Wasn't a that a dainty cou?;Dance Kitty Birsie.

The broon cou's gotten out and bullied all the kye...

...gotten out and eaten all the corn; what he eats today, he canna eat the morn..

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Dave Murphy
Date: 19 May 97 - 08:38 PM

Again, not to be awkward, but that song is a children's skipping song--from Glasgow

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From:
Date: 20 May 97 - 01:54 AM

I was told that Scottish mouth music came about because of the English ban on the the traditional instruments of the Scottish people. The Scots at the time simply transformed the sounds of pipes and other instruments into vocal sounds and phrases.

Interestingly enough, French Canadians also have a strong tradition of mouth music. I was informed by a Francophone from Quebec that French mouth music was created for the same reason as Scottish mouth music. The English wanted to control the Catholic french people of early Canada by banning their music & religious practices. The French simply turned to mouth music as an alternative.

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From:
Date: 20 May 97 - 09:51 AM

So that explains the "Reel a Bouche" on one of John McCutcheon's recordings. I never knew about the french connection. As I have Quebecois roots on my mother's side I am glad to find out such information.

Thanks muchly

Frank Phillips

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Benjamin Hollister
Date: 20 May 97 - 09:36 PM

cleod a chara,

Yes please for the Chuaigh me/ 'na Rossan. I already have the words to Do/nal agus Mo/rag. Just to let you all know why this sudden interest. I take part in sessions in Adelaide, South Australia and occaisionally the musos (especially me on bodhran) like a rest so we want to do some unaccompanied singing (my job yay yay) We have "The humours of Whiskey" in English, and "Fionnghuala" but want some more of the Fionnghuala style tunes, being morer interesting for the audience as a style. I have thought of Do/nal agus Mo/rag as an unaccompanied song, and will be working on it. The main problem is the lack of decent recordings here. We have to import from UK, E/ire and US and being a poor student (as most at the session are) we can't afford to get to many CDS etc. I speak Irish and a little Scots so pronunciation is no problem, its just having a recording to get phrasing correct.

le/ bui/ochas aris

Benjamin

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Dave Murphy
Date: 20 May 97 - 10:06 PM

There's a lot to what you say, about traditional instruments being banned, but in practice, it really wasn't too much of a problem. Settlements were sufficiently isolated that music, song, story could still flurish. And I can really only talk about Ireland, where the Gaelic was forbidden. In Scotland, I think the political climate was much harsher, particularly after the Highland Clearances--which indeed forced many Gaelic speakers overseas. In Ireland, the Blight did damage the oral tradition and music too. But lilting, mouth music or call it what you will is very popular in Celtic societies, whether they're Cornish, Irish Scottish.

Dave Murphy

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: cleod
Date: 21 May 97 - 12:02 PM

As for the possible French connection...my friend borrowed a book from the library and it said French people also live in Cornwall (?) I think...anyway, maybe they were influenced? In the book, there were Cornish songs that were French. Just a thought. ^_^

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From:
Date: 21 May 97 - 12:19 PM

If my history lessons serve me correctly there was a very active smuggling industry in the 16 and 1700's along the rugged coasts of Devon and Cornwall. Logistics would dictate that the likely ports at the other end of the pipeline would be in Brittany and Normandy. I have this vision of a Cornish guide learning french songs aboard a fishing boat as it sailed up and down the channel waiting for the fog and/or nightfall. Now THERE'S an idea for a folk song if one doesn't exist already.

Frank Phillips

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Bert Hansell
Date: 21 May 97 - 01:06 PM

Subject: RE: Mouth Music or any Gaelic songs
From: Bert Hansell
Date: 21 May 97 - 01:22 PM

Now Now, Bert you've got to stop hitting return on the "From:" field.

Frank,
I think there might be one
It has always seemed to me that there was a similarity between "Suzanna's a funicle man"(The Sow Song) and the music of Brittany. So much so that I have wondered if the song was either written to deliberately poke fun at the Breton Chanteurs or whether it was a half forgotten memory.

The line...
(snort) OW - (whistle) OW - (pfftht) Idle - E - Dow
...could be a replacement for the misunderstood words of a foreign language.
And the phrase "Sing lassy go rings below" has always reminded me of "avec mes sabots" from "En passant par la Lorraine".

What do you think?
Bert.