Top 10 fiddle tunes please

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: Scoville
Date: 27 Feb 07 - 03:21 PM

Okay, I've gotten so many different reports on "Off to California": GUEST Kathleen above says it's a schottische. Somebody else told me it was a polka. I was told that an alternate title is "Whiskey Hornpipe" and have always played it as a hornpipe on both fiddle and Appalachian dulcimer (on which it's pretty easy to tell the difference among the three since they use different strums).

What the Hell is it?

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: skarpi
Date: 27 Feb 07 - 03:29 PM

Hallo I dont play fiddle but

Calliope House

Ashokan Farewell

Road to Lisdoonvarna

Moudbawn chapel

King of the fairys

Bonde og byfolk ( Norway Hardanger fiddle tune )

all the best Skarpi Iceland.

P.s in my band we use both fiddle and Hardanger fiddle

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: John Hardly
Date: 27 Feb 07 - 03:39 PM

In Northern Indiana ten fiddle tunes that would stand you in good stead...

1. Arkansas Traveler
2. Red-Haired Boy
3. Blackberry Blossom
4. St Anne's Reel
5. Jaybird
6. Sandy Boys
7. Old Joe Clark
8. Temperance Reel
9. Rock The Cradle, Joe
10. Over The Waterfall

She left Ireland and now works for NASA at launch time. She's the star of counting down.

There it floated in the bay, covered with writing. I couldn't make out a single word. Then a little boat paddled by bearing this sign: "Read Here -- Bouy".

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST,Bill Cheatam
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 03:26 AM

The Real List..........Spokane, WA

Sally Johnson
Say Old Man
Dusty Miller
Sally Goodin
Tom and Jerry
Wednesday Night Waltz
Purple Velvet Waltz
I Don't Love Nobody
Cottonpatch Rag
Beaumont Rag

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: wilco
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 09:40 AM

Top ten in my east tennessee fiddle jams and music store:
Angeline the baker, arkansas traveler, soldiers' joy, lost indian, over the waterfall, st. anne's real, blackberry blossum, bonaparte's retreat, forked derr, billy in the lowground, leather britches, mississipii sawyer, red haired boy, ragtime annie, sail away ladies, whiskey before breakfast.

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: open mike
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 11:19 AM

Ashokan Farewell
St. Anne's Reel
Soldier's Joy
Whiskey Before Breakfast
Red Haired Boy (Little Beggar Man)
Liberty
Maggie Brown's Favorite Jig
Caledonian Laddie Hornpipe
Dance (King?) of the Fairies
Rosetree

o.k. i guess that is 10 so i have to stop now..


But I might add .....

Round the Horn
Smash the Windows
Swinging on a Gate
Ground Hog
Arkansas Traveller
Turkey in the Straw
Golden Slippers
Star of the County Down--with lyrics sung
Midnight on the Water (Waltz)
8th of January (in 1814 we took a little trip..Colonel Jackson...MS)
Tennessee Waltz
Beaumont Rag
ROAD to California...(diff. from Off to CA)

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: Jim Lad
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 11:24 AM

My wife still stops me dead on my tracks when she plays "The Burning of the Piper's Hut". Hector the Hero & Roisin Dubh are another couple of favourites.

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: greg stephens
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 12:22 PM

The original enquirer was from England, so it should be pointed out that the Fiddler's Fake Book, fabulous collection that it is, is pretty useless as regards English tunes. And its comments on the subject of English fiddle music are, to say the least, ill-informed. But, having said that, iot's a must-have collection.
The traditional English tunes that everybody, but everybody, knows (in England, that is) are Winster Gallop(very easy) and Soldier's Joy (not so easy).

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 08:24 PM

My favourite is St. Annes reel. Anyone know of it's origins? Scottish, Irish?

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: Jack Campin
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 08:41 PM

The two places it seems to be most played are Quebec and Shetland. Since Catholic saints don't get a great deal of notice in Shetland culture it seems a good bet it's French-Canadian.

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST,dax
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 08:43 PM

French-Canadian

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST,dax
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 08:45 PM

Cross post there Jack. It was made popular in the English speaking world by Don Messer.

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST,Scoville at Dad's
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 08:49 PM

I've always seen St. Anne's attributed to Canada. Not that that means I'm right, only that I've known it my entire life and never seen it ascribed to any other country.



A few more:

1. Eight Days in Georgia [C]
2. Ballydesmond Polka [Am]
3. Where the White Lilies Grow [D, two-step]
4. Princess Royal [the version I know is in G major]
5. Seneca Square Dance [G, known by several other titles]
6. Tennessee Wagoner [C]
7. Pa Janvier [Dm, a morose Cajun waltz]
8. Red Hills Polka [D, an Illinois tune as far as I know]
9. Spotted Pony [D]
10. Kingdom Coming [aka Year of Jubilo, we also played this in C to go with Dixie]

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: open mike
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 01:18 AM

"St. Anne's Reel is a French-Canadian fiddle tune that has been very popular over the years."--this is a quote from a web page...so it
MUST be true..actually that is what i have always heard, too.

another great book source for tunes is O'Niel's 1,000 fiddle tunes
book.

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: Guy Wolff
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 06:38 PM

As a banjo player I have found these some of my faverites to play along with a good fiddler.They all have a lot of depth .Some I learned in North Carolina some in New England and some in the north of England .. all the best ,Guy

Bill Cheatum
Staton Island
Red Haired Boy
Sally Anne
Solger's Joy
Old French
Rickets Hornpipe
Jefferson and Liberty
Cluck Old Hen
Jamie Allen
Sony Brogan

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: Mike Miller
Date: 18 Apr 07 - 02:39 AM

Belfast Hornpipe

The Downfall of Paris

Georgia Camp Meeting

Chicken Reel

The Rakes of Kildare

Orange Blossom Special (Still smokin' after all these years)

Anything Johnnie Gimbel played, anything at all.

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST, donald
Date: 18 Apr 07 - 10:30 AM

Bonnie Kate
Jenny's Chickens
Bonnie Mulligan
Mason's Apron
Dionne
Mouth of the Tobique
Rakes Of Kildare
Calliope House
Canyon Moonrise
Neil Gow second wife
Cooley's
Drowsy Maggie

ok that's a dozen, but it's 10 in base twelve!

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: MissouriMud
Date: 18 Apr 07 - 12:59 PM

I would have to qualify my answer by saying that first it will be country specific(US in my case)- and possibly even region specific (midwest/ozarkian); and second it attempts to include a few tunes from each of the three primary fiddle tune keys - D, A and G. We dont do much fiddle work in the key of C at the basic level here. Finally I am making the assumption that you are looking for tunes to teach a beginning fiddler or at least someone new to the genre.   These are all tunes that any experienced fiddler in these parts would have to know (and would probably be sick and tired of).

With that in mind, our little school here teaches a number of tunes in its lower level fiddle classes - among which the most repeated seem to be, albeit in no particular order other than key:

Key of D
Fly Around My Pretty Little Miss (Hop High Ladies, Susannah Girl etc)
Angeline the Baker (or Angelina Baker)
Eighth of January (Battle of New Orleans)
Robinson County
Soldiers Joy

Key of G
Chase the Banshee (we have Banshees in Missouri)
Miss McLeod's Reel (Did you ever see the Devil Uncle Joe?)
Red Wing
Seneca Square Dance
Going Down To Cairo (Good Bye Liza Jane)

Key of A
Old Joe Clark
Cripple Creek
Horse and Buggy
Greasy Coat (got to have some of the modal tunes in there)
Cluck Old Hen (ditto)

That's 15 not 10. Those arent my necessarily personal favorites and I am not a fiddle player, but they seem to be the ones that are most used for basic teaching here so I assume they are good for that purpose.   If we were to have our young fiddlers put together a program for a 3 hour square/contra dance, most if not all of those tunes would be on the list. We probably teach simple versions of some of these tunes - so I am assuming these are tunes which either have a simple base melody to start with or seem to permit simplification of a more complicated base melody without losing too much. Obviously good players play all of these tunes in a manner that would be over the head of a learner.

I have not included any waltzes - while we play them and teach them here, I don't treat them as being "fiddle tunes" as we normally use that term here, but some good ones have been mentioned in the thread above. Of course if you're really dealing with total beginners, the Old Town School in Chicago teaches everyone Go Tell Auint Rhodie the first day, but I dont consider that a fiddle tune either.

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST,Lillian
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 01:16 AM

I'm just a beginner and I love these songs
and all you fiddlers out there!

Rakes of Mallow
Nonesuch
Colonel John Irwin
Lucy Farr's Barn Dance
La Valse Des Jonglements
Pride of Petravore
Si Beag Si Mohr
Whiskey Before Breakfast
St Anne's Reel
Ash Grove

Subject: RE: Top 10 fiddle tunes please
From: GUEST,fiddler
Date: 16 Aug 07 - 07:05 AM

they are TUNES not songs!