Tune Req: Good references for melodies in general?

Subject: Tune Req: Good references for melodies in general?
From: Robin Tell-Drake
Date: 21 Oct 05 - 12:10 AM

I suspect this is kind of a newbie question, and I apologize for a vague subject, but here's the thing. Rise Up Singing, as I know many have noted, has no indication of a song's melody, even though it is a good broad compendium of songs. In my experience you can't actually learn a song unless you've heard it, or anyway you can't generally find more than a few melodies in one place. Are there any comparable collections of folksongs that do include the melodies of many songs?

I have an ulterior motive--my dad's birthday is approaching and my mom was asking about this. But I've always wondered anyhow.

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Good references for melodies in gene
From: Joe Offer
Date: 21 Oct 05 - 12:44 AM

Hi, Robin - you're right about Rise Up Singing - it's frustrating to try to find the melodies for many of those songs. We have many of the tunes in MIDI form in our Digital Tradition Folk song database (search box and alpha index on most Mudcat pages). You can find our tunes in a variety of formats at Yet Another Digital Tradition. If it's books you want, you might want to take a look through our Basic Folk Library bibliography.

I'd suggest the folk song collections by the Lomaxes, Carl Sandburg's American Songbag, the two Collected Reprints from Sing Out! books (from Singout.org). One other you might consider is Hal Leonard's Folksong Fake Book, which has about a thousand songs.

Good luck!

-Joe Offer, songbook collector-

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Good references for melodies in general?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 21 Oct 05 - 01:01 AM

I see Joe got in while I was compos(t)ing...

Sing Out! magazine has for the past year or so offered a CD of much of the stuff included in each issue of the magazine. You do have to pay a bit more for the subscription to get it along with the magazine. They were including notation for quite a few of the things in the mag; but we succumbed to the demands of poverty and let our subscription lapse a while back, so I don't really know what they're doing now.

Tunes, as opposed to songs, are available in lots of collections. Folk purists distinguish tunes as things ordinarily played without singing, and songs as things that ordinarily are sung (often without accompaniment). There's some overlap, so a tune book may give you tunes commonly used for songs, and words crop up to go with popular tunes. In my area, where there are lots of cowboy/bluegrass/wannbeirish players, the Fiddler's Fakebook is popular and has a fair selection. If you're more inclined toward old-time than bluegrass I like The Portland Collection.

A visit to "Mel Bay" or "Hal Leonard" on the web may find what you want, or may give you a better idea of how to describe the particular kind(s) of things you're looking for. They publish a lot of stuff, some with music notated and some with just words.

Note that Rise Up often gives "to the tune of" indications, and a list of the "tunes" in hand while you're looking might be helpful. You may also find .mid files of quite a few common tunes downloadable from the "Digital Tradition" right here at mudcat. A "paid subscription to mudcat" is quite inexpensive (i.e. free) if your mom is thinking of a gift. You can, I think, still download the DT database or, I think still get it on a CD(?). Check the FAQ here.

The summary answer is that there are lots of books available with tunes to songs; but the problem is finding the one(s) that suit your need.

John

Subject: RE: Tune Req: Good references for melodies in gene
From: Robin Tell-Drake
Date: 21 Oct 05 - 09:34 AM

That's a lot to work with right there, thanks! Digital better for me, books better for my dad, probably. Magazine an interesting notion.

Many thanks!