Bodhran history???

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Mr Red
Date: 11 Jan 03 - 08:45 AM

Clinton - not so quick - mine are stained with the blood of people who tell bodhran jokes. Shield? You bet. Metaphorical maybe but I have to admit to not banging it with a sword (or pen-knife).

Now the real reason I am posting, I have just got the Pete McCarthy book "the Road to McCarthy". His chapter on Monserrat refers to "a percussion instrument related to the bodhran" so no more info than the program. However I have written to him, snail mail preferred despite the website http://www.petemccarthy.co.uk

I will post any info he offers. watch this space.....

let's see where it leads us.

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Little Robyn
Date: 11 Jan 03 - 04:22 PM

I understand that the 'sticky thing' was originally a thigh bone of an Irish virgin, but they were becoming too small these days so people used the thigh bone of an Englishman instead.
I was told it was called a knocker. I had one that came with my bodhran and later a woodturner gave me another, slightly different shaped one. They're both good and that's great - I always wanted a good pair of knockers.....

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Mr Red
Date: 13 Jan 03 - 05:21 AM

Well I might make a start if someone would join in chorus and insult you...................**BG**

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Mr Red
Date: 17 Jul 03 - 02:43 PM

Clinton

Biddy Boys - would play on St Brigid day - the bodhrán sometimes appeared. From Mason T.H. "St Brigid's Crosses", Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 75, 164 1945.
If that is not that much before 1950 I should point out that it is supported by the (not on public display) bodhrán from 1820 for dancing and the Brideóg (St Brigids festival) National Museum of Ireland Cat No 1942/1790.

If that is not mature enough to chew on then I call on Giraldus Cambrensis who on his visit to Ireland was told that they have only two instruments the cythara (harp) and tympanum (single skinned tambour-like drum) in his "the Topography of Ireland" - if you can find a first edition from between 1145 and 1223 buy buy buy - there is profit in it at any price. Though JJ O'Meara Dundalk 1951 is listed as the more modern reference - perhaps it is a re-print or appraisal.

from
Janet E McCrickard "The Bodhran the background to the traditional Irish drum" ISBN 1-870500-15-6 ..... Fieldfare Arts & Designs, 2 Thornbury House, Wells Road, Glastonbury, Somerstet England. (Which is, in effect, the author) though it may be different than in 1987.
I could copy more of her 7 1/2 pages of studious references (out 62 total pages) of which at least one pageworth is bang on topic. But I will limit it to two from Curt Sachs "The History of musical Instruments" New York 1940 and "the Rise of Music in the Ancient World" New York 1943 - you may have better access to those.

Now if the book has any flaws I would point out it barely mentions red, skin and bodhran in the same sentence more than once - an ommision that is very hard to reconcile IMOHO.

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 17 Jul 03 - 03:55 PM

Although Giraldus' tympanum has often been interpreted as referring to a form of drum, that is not usually now thought to be correct. The word is generally now taken to mean, in this context, a form of lyre (or possibly psaltery) probably struck or plucked.

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Mr Red
Date: 17 Jul 03 - 08:03 PM

Ah now, the book has this covered in two ways - one is that it acknowledges uncertainty over the words tynpanum and tiompán &/or even tympanon, and how they where used (pretty flexibly) and discusses it. Witness the words whiskey and whisky. The second is it is not a categorical aspect - the author accepts the uncertainty and refers readers on to the Morcuse's Dictionary but as it is an op cit I have to wade through 7 pages to find the first ref. maybe tomorrow. There are plenty of first-hand accounts of people referring back to the thirties and the Bodhran at a fleadh. The wealth of referrences and the author's botany degree ensures her interest from the winnowing of wheat start-point but she did emminent research and deserves more than a cursory glance in this thread.
To say that Ireland does not have a long history of drumming is clearly false: witness the apprentice boys parades, different but for political as much as practical reasons.

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 17 Jul 03 - 10:36 PM

I don't think that anyone at all has suggested that Ireland doesn't have a long history of drumming; like almost every other country in the world, it presumably has. The issue has really been whether or not there is any basis for thinking that the bodhran has been a significant part of it. So much romantic twaddle has been spread about on the subject in recent years that a cautious approach is by far the wisest. The spelling of tympanum, tiompan and so on is irrelevant (as is whisk[e]y!); what matters in the context of what you wrote is what Giraldus meant by it.

Of course, there may be genuine information out there, and it would be interesting to hear more about what Janet E. McCrickard has to say. She appears to be a "New Age" writer, though, which doesn't immediately inspire confidence. Perhaps we will be pleasantly surprised.

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Mr Red
Date: 18 Jul 03 - 01:26 PM

She has done the rounds of people who where there in the 30's, paper and museums. Or did prior to 1987. She covers a lot more than just the word bodhran but remains on topic with skin/frame drums from a starting point of bodhran. It is the her sources that are paramount.

The problem I have with 1000 year old words is "context". We have the words but the context is mostly lost. It invovles more than just the accuracy of the speaker it involves the way they spoke then, their lexicon, and a million minutia we only glean from literally snapshots on vellum, in print or posed pictures. In the last 50 years we have moved through several takes on the "hot" "cool" usage in the context of popular verbiage. In a thousand years time they will have much more of the context because of forums like this.

FWIW she does discount the item as evidence adding that tympanum and tiompan can be struck with sticks and that alone guarrantees a common root for the word. And a millenium of discussion. Nice to know we are carrying on that tradition. Or should I say banging on about it?

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Torctgyd
Date: 12 May 05 - 06:23 AM

Now I know why there are so many jokes about bodhrans and banjos. The banjo is just a bodhran with a neck and strings attached! It's the same instrument!!!!!

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: GUEST,Allen
Date: 12 May 05 - 07:40 AM

"Has anyone else come across the Persian (central Asia anyway)version of the dear ould Irish drum. This is about 450 - 600mm across and say 50mm deep. It has a number of brass rings attached to the inside of the rim about two thirds of the way around, secured by staples so that they overlap and hang loose. Players hold the drum upright across the body in palms of both hands with fingers against skin, and tap and shake the drum. Rhythms can be very complex. Sounds fantastic in trained hands. Kind of like a grown-up tambourine with orchestral pretensions. Guess I'll just keep rattling away on the ordinary bodhrans."

There are some fantastic Azeri players of frame-drums, with or without brass rings.

BTW, I think there were sorts of lyres made with jingly bits, so that would fit with tympanum.

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: GUEST
Date: 12 May 05 - 06:52 PM

Saw someone playing one of these in a concert in the Pleasance, Edinburgh recently: very impressed.
I also love the Spanish and Italian way of playing the larger tambourines, which involves a lot of different hand movements and produces a variety of sounds, not just the jingles!
TB

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: GUEST
Date: 12 May 05 - 06:54 PM

Oi oi my cookie's gone again!
TB

Subject: RE: Help: Bodhran history???
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 12 May 05 - 08:18 PM

G'day,

Just to throw in a bit of dating info from the far side of the world ... I have, in the Bush Music Club Archives, a videoptape of a c. 1980 program on a woman (now deceased) who had gone from being something of a country singer back towards her Irish ancestry and was teaching (vaguely Irish-derived) dancing in schools.

At one point she tells how she had been taught to play the bodhran by her grand mother (presumably in the 1920s) ... using a wooden spoon as a tipper on a wooden bread board. I can't remember whether she mentions the story that I have heard from other quarters ... that the drum was proscribed under British rule as a "war instrument" - presumed to lead soldiers into battle - and possession of a drum could be a capital offence, so the playing skills were passed on via other expedients like the bread board.

I personally find the logic a little strained, but I have also heard that the bodhran was encountered in Ireland before the 1950s folk revival - but only played in various festivals ... using one made for the event and ceremonially burned on a bonfire at the end of the evening (... now there's a tradition to ponder ... !).

Sorry, no citations - just a ragbag of recollections. (I should, at least, dig out the videotape and see if it still has a signal on it - or, at least, get the references to the subject.) She sent it to me when she was looking for someone who might publish her autobiography / reminiscences of Irish songs, music and dance / collection of her modern dances based on her heritage.

It was much too big for us and I suggested it might be better as three separate books. She wanted to see it come out as one book ... and I gather that she died, not long after taking back the typescript.)

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: Bodhran history???
From: Splott Man
Date: 13 May 05 - 03:08 AM

I remember seeing one for the first time in the mid 60s, played by the Corries on TV. They said it was introduced to Ireland by Phoenician traders.

That fits the Persian connection.

Of course, it could be hearsay.

Subject: RE: Bodhran history???
From: Boab
Date: 13 May 05 - 03:17 AM

For handling of the cipin, any hard reasonably flat surface lends itself to learning "triples" etc.. When it comes to the nuances of jigs or brush work, however, the bodhran skin is essential. I'd say to anyone who is thinking about learning the bodhran, by all means pick up a piece of melamine board or similar, and go to it; it's a good way to start.

Subject: RE: Bodhran history???
From: GUEST,guset
Date: 24 Aug 06 - 10:07 AM

"by all means pick up a piece of melamine board or similar,"

but for christ sake, don't bring your board to a session.

Subject: RE: Bodhran history???
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 25 Aug 06 - 07:50 AM

What's Rolf doing these days?

Subject: RE: Bodhran history???
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 25 Aug 06 - 05:42 PM

Well, last I heard, he was doing all these big pictures: but that was last year! Got my photie took with him at Heathrow airport when he was waiting for a plane to Edinburgh to do one there.
Oh and talking about boards........just got myself a washboard, £5 in an antique shop in Innerleithen, metal one side, glass the other. Cost me £7.50 to buy enough thimbles to cover my index, middle and ring fingers. Could this be worse than bodhran or wobble board, I ask?

Subject: RE: Bodhran history???
From: GUEST,Jack Campin
Date: 25 Aug 06 - 06:50 PM

Tattie Bogle - I just bought a washboard from a junk shop in Innerleithen today too! How many has that town got?

Glass washboards are musically useless (unless maybe you mike them up).

I adapt washboards. Cut the metal in half not-quite-diagonally to make two trapezoids and set in a plywood surround to make a board with a triangular wooden area. Hold fore-and-aft, hit with five thimbles in each hand, from both sides. The result is something that can convincingly replicate the rhythms of a Scottish dance band drummer.

I have one of the frame drums with rings. I bought mine in Urfa, it's the Kurdish variant. The rings seem to be a Central Asian idea originally, like chain mail.

BTW Monserrat was populated by a lot more Africans and Caribs than Irish. If it has any indigenous frame drum it's surely more likely to have come from North America or Africa.