Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament (??)

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: DaveRo
Date: 31 Jul 24 - 03:25 AM

Having said that Benedetti's arrangement of Ashokan Farewell with the SSO (which crops up if you google the combination) sounds like a bad idea I thought I'd better listen to it. It's on a 2014 album based on Max Bruch's Scottish Fantasy, Op. 46, which presumably accounts for the presence of the SSO.

Homecoming - A Scottish Fantasy
Nicola Benedetti (violin, fiddle), Phil Cunningham (accordion, piano), Ewen Vernal (double bass), Tony Byrne (guitar), Éamon Doorley (bouzouki), Duncan Chisholm (fiddle), James MacIntosh (percussion), Julie Fowlis (vocals), Aly Bain (fiddle)

BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Rory Macdonald (2014)
   
There are samples - including of Ashokan Farewell - here:
https://www.nicolabenedetti.co.uk/recordings-details/homecoming-a-scottish-fantasy

Curiously the last two tracks are not on the 2024 re-release, Ashokan Farewell and this:
trad.: Chan e caoidh Mhic Shiridh (It Is Not MacShiridh I Lament)
Ewen Vernal (double bass), Nicola Benedetti (fiddle), Duncan Chisholm (fiddle), Phil Cunningham (piano)

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: Helen
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 05:23 PM

No, I'm a frayed knot! :-)

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 05:15 PM

Helen,
If you're Hase Waits I might just do that.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: Helen
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 05:09 PM

And Guest, perhaps you should re-read what DaveRo said on Date: 30 Jul 24 - 07:10 AM.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 04:41 PM

Guest,
When the play lists are submitted to the collection agencies they are the people who decide how the money collected in licensing fees is distributed to writers / publishers / performers.

I don't know to which discredited organisation you are referring.
"traditional arranged by" is used by a performer so that they can be paid as arrangers when using non cop material.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 03:56 PM

how can that be if they don't even know who wrote it- or is describing it as 'traditional' another moneysaving wheeze from this discredited organisation?

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 03:16 PM

Guest, THE BBC does not pay royallties direct to artistes but to collection agencies such as MCPS and PPL in the UK and they will, have or should have the correct composer details.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: Helen
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 02:08 PM

Steve Gardham, come to our regular music session and we'll play it for you on whistle, harp - plus fiddle, mandolin & Irish flute. :-)

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 02:02 PM

It doesn't matter whether it 'could pass for Scottish'. It was written by a man who deserves credit for it.

I would hope he chases the BBC for royalties on this broadcast performance on the BBC, who know Rockall about traditional music anyway.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 01:42 PM

To be fair, one does associate slow airs much more with Scotland than with the USA, and this one could pass for Scottish.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 01:40 PM

Played almost daily on Classic FM. I'd love to hear it played on whistle and harp.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: Sol
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 01:20 PM

Great tune however, that 7th has always been 'the seller' for me.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - [NOT] A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 12:21 PM

The first version of it I heard was a duet by the Northumbrian piper Pauline Cato and the fiddler Tom McConville, both on record and at a gig at Bodmin folk club when it was at the Garland Ox with Vic Legg running the show, so that dates it! Vic - now there was a man...

A version I can live with...

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,Ray
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 10:08 AM

I only heard he play the first few bars as I was on my way out but, when she started, I assumed she was still tuning up. I much prefer the Jay Ungar version.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: gillymor
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 09:17 AM

Yep, at our session we play it just once a year, usually at the Xmas party, so we don't wear it out. Playing it inspires a lot of warm feelings.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: Lighter
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 08:33 AM

"Pays homage to Scottish mythology"?!

It pays homage to Camp Ashokan at the Ashokan Reservoir, near Woodstock in New York State.

I quit listening to it. Not because I got sick of it, but because I don't want it to pall! It's that good!

BTW, Burns released a new and expanded version of The Civil War a few years ago. Even better than before.

(But not as good as his Vietnam War series!)

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 08:09 AM

We must have played the damn thing hundreds of times in our pub sessions. In my view it doesn't bear the multiple repetitions it's often played with in various versions, many of which border on the dreary. Classic FM is not innocent! Nicola Benedetti played it well if not a little idiosyncratically. Mr Ungar is known to be solicitous as to getting the appropriate reward for the performances of his composition and I'm sure he'll get to hear of this!

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: gillymor
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 07:58 AM

Before they played it together on The Transatlantic Sessions Ungar told the great Shetland fiddler Aly Bain that he had Bain in mind when he composed it.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: DaveRo
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 07:10 AM

If that was Nicola Benedetti, who is director of the Edinburgh festival, she was interviewed by Laura Kuenssberg recently. She (Benedetti) said:
"I’ll play Ashokan Farewell by Jay Ungar, which is an American tune actually but really pays homage to the Scottish mythology and the Scottish sound. So, it’s a personalised arrangement of that tune."

Does it? Anyway, she knows who wrote it. There are several recordings of her playing her arrangements online, including with the Scottish Symphony Orchestra - which sounds like bad idea to me.

I too always associate it with Ken Burns' Civil War films.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: Lighter
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 07:01 AM

How could anything named "Ashokan" be Scottish?

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,G-Force, not logged in
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 06:33 AM

Makes a change from it being described as Irish.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: Helen
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 05:16 AM

I recently found out that I have been mispronouncing "Ashokan" for many years. Actually since the Ken Burns Civil War movie was released and I also bought the CD.

I thought it was pronounced 'Ash-o-kan, with the emphasis on the first syllable, but a fiddle player I met recently said it is pronounced Ash-'o-kan, with the emphasis on the "oh" sound. I checked a few online videos and I stand corrected. (In my defence, I am an Aussie and most of the place names here with traditional, First Nations history have an emphasis on the first syllable.)

Lovely tune.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 05:02 AM

The way it was played definitely did not have a traditional feel to it.

I was reminded of the occasion when an old time fiddler was being interviewed and he was asked if he could read music. His answer was "not enough to do me any harm". Quite.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: Neil D
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 04:58 AM

Beautiful melody composed by American Jay Ungar. Used to great effect in the Ken Birns Civil War documentary, which by the way is the best thing ever to appear on television.

Subject: RE: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: Helen
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 04:47 AM

Yes, Jay Ungar was the composer. It does have a traditional feel to it, so maybe Mr Ungar can take it as a compliment but he deserves to be recognised for composing it.

Subject: Ashokan Farewell - A Scottish Lament
From: GUEST,Hootennanny
Date: 30 Jul 24 - 04:26 AM

Interesting to hear this morning's BBC Radio's essential news programme signing off an item about the up coming Edinburgh festival. They had just finished an interview with an apparently well known violinist and she signed of the programme and I quote with 'the traditional Scottish lament Ashokan Farewell'. It was described thus twice.
I hope that someone at the BBC or elsewhere will put them right and ensure that the royalties go to the composer and not to the 'traditional arranged by arranged by' violinist.
In addition to that, the way she performed it it was almost unrecognisable. But I guess that is down to personal taste. I prefer fiddle music.