To Thread - Forum Home

The Mudcat Café TM
https://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=144396
22 messages

Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley

14 Apr 12 - 08:30 PM (#3338432)
Subject: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: SeaCanary

On the recording Bonaparte's Retreat by The Chieftains there is a cut called "Bonaparte's Retreat" which, in turn, is a medley of tunes and Delores Keene's singing. What, please, are the names of each piece of music, in order, in that medley?


15 Apr 12 - 02:22 AM (#3338510)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: GUEST,leeneia

I have that album, and the liner notes are still in it.

The Wild Geese
a verse from 'The Green Linnet' sung by Dolores Keane
The Bonny Bunch of Roses - don't know if sung or instrumental
a distant echo of the 'Marseillaise'
Madam Bonaparte, 'a contemporary set dance'
finale from Bochsa's* Harp Concerto no. 1 in Dm, opus 15
'The March to Victory' by Paddy Maloney
'Bonaparte's Retreat,' an Irish set dance
another verse from 'the bonny bunch of roses'
'The Downfall of Paris,' a set dance
another verse from 'the green linnet'

*Bochsa was harper to Napoleon.

SeaCanary, are you doing a radio show?


15 Apr 12 - 02:42 AM (#3338514)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: SeaCanary

HA !! I wish. :)

Actually I'm collecting tunes and songs from around the time of the American War of 1812. Might I know what made you think I was doing a radio show?

I am much obliged for the help GUEST,leenia.


15 Apr 12 - 03:00 AM (#3338519)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: SeaCanary

BTW here's a link to the medley for your trouble and listening pleasure.


15 Apr 12 - 09:24 AM (#3338610)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Greg B

I've forgotten, is that the "long dance" tune entitled "Bonaparte's Retreat?"


15 Apr 12 - 06:26 PM (#3338811)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: SeaCanary

Greg B -- I don't understand your question. I would have thought the above link would have answered it. What am I missing unless you are trying to make a distinction between the medley on the recording called Bonaparte's Retreat and the tune within the medley called "Bonaparte's Retreat"?

Perhaps if you could supply a hyper-link to the tune you are thinking of? Could it be this:

http://grooveshark.com/s/Bonaparte+s+Retreat/3Qq28s?src=5


15 Apr 12 - 07:32 PM (#3338841)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Bonnie Shaljean

It's only a guess, but he may be referring to the tune in the "long dance" section of O'Neill's which goes by that name. In which case, yes, it's basically the same one, though O'Neill's version varies a bit, especially in the third part. But it's recognisably the same tune.

Grooveshark's nifty, SC - thanks for turning me on to it.

PS: Being Napoleon's harpist was the least of Bochsa's adventures: he later had to flee France, having been sentenced to imprisonment and branding for committing forgery. He went to England, became the first harp professor at the Royal Academy, got into more trouble for fraud, ran off with the wife of the guy who wrote Home Sweet Home and ended up dying in Australia. (His paramour's husband only outlived him by three months, leaving her free to marry a New York diamond merchant.)


15 Apr 12 - 07:49 PM (#3338852)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Bonnie Shaljean

Interesting... I just looked that tune up in the other O'Neill's, and see that in 1001 Gems (which is what I was using above) it's in a major key and sounds pretty much like the clip. But in the bigger, slightly earlier O'Neill's 1850 Tunes, it's in a minor key. Still the same basic melodic shape, but in a minor instead of a major key. Both versions work, though.


15 Apr 12 - 09:01 PM (#3338875)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: GUEST,leeneia

What SeeCanary asked about is a composition, almost an orchestral suite, of traditional Irish tunes and dances. The Chieftains combined them into a 15-minute piece which they called 'Bonaparte's Retreat.' It made an entire side of a vinyl LP of the same name.

SeaCanary, I asked about a possible radio show because it seemed tactless to ask "Why do you want to know?" But I was still interested, and I like to talk to people about their musical endeavors.


15 Apr 12 - 09:06 PM (#3338878)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: GUEST,leeneia

Here's a video of Aly Bain and others doing a very good job on the tune:

B's R


15 Apr 12 - 09:38 PM (#3338891)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Greg B

Joe Burke recorded a sparkling version of the long dance tune.


16 Apr 12 - 03:36 AM (#3338942)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Dave Hanson

Leeneia, that is the American tune of the same name it's not played in the Chieftains recording.[ great tune mind ]

Dave H


16 Apr 12 - 03:52 AM (#3338943)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: GUEST,Peter Laban

It made an entire side of a vinyl LP of the same name.


Let's make that 2/3.


16 Apr 12 - 04:09 AM (#3338945)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Bonnie Shaljean

Wow, Leeneia, thanks for posting that Aly Bain recording! He's one classy player.

It's not the same tune as the one I was referring to in O'Neill's, tho - which I based on listening to the Joe Burke clip. But I'm going to learn it. (Are there any alternative names for the Bain tune?)


16 Apr 12 - 04:21 AM (#3338948)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Bonnie Shaljean

PS: The minor-key version I spoke of above seems to be better known as "Bonaparte's Defeat", so I think O'Neill just mis-named it. It also appears elsewhere in his collection under its proper name, but in A minor instead of E minor. The two tunes make a great pair anyway.

One of the O'Neill books also gives the notes of the set dance "Madame Bonaparte" under the title of Bonaparte's-Something-Or-Other (can't remember & too lazy to dig it out) but Madame appears in another section under her rightful title as well. So there's a bit of confusion in the names, but B's Retreat does seem to be the major-key version.


16 Apr 12 - 08:49 AM (#3338998)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Greg B

The version that Joe Burke plays isn't in O'Neill's I don't think, at least not by that name. It is, however, in the Roche Collection.


16 Apr 12 - 09:01 AM (#3339003)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: GUEST

Bonnie, I remember reading somewhere (possibly in one of John Cullinane's publications) that another name for "Madame Bonaparte" is "Bonaparte's Advance".

Don


16 Apr 12 - 09:02 AM (#3339005)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Bonnie Shaljean

It's in O'Neill's 1001 Gems, Tune no. 980.


16 Apr 12 - 09:03 AM (#3339006)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Bonnie Shaljean

Sorry, cross-posted - mine was in answer to Greg.


16 Apr 12 - 10:31 AM (#3339040)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: GUEST,leeneia

Sorry about the confusion. I was pleased to help SeaCanary out, but I have no intention of actually listening to the thing.

Just to add to the wealth of data here: the Fiddler's Fakebook offers the following:

Bonaparte Crossing the Rhine
Bonaparte Crossing the Rocky Mountains
Bonaparte's Retreat - this has only two chords, D and A.


17 Apr 12 - 08:28 AM (#3339493)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: clueless don

Sorry - the message from GUEST on 16 Apr 12 - 09:01 AM was from me. I didn't realize that I had lost my cookie.

Don


01 Jan 22 - 02:55 PM (#4130693)
Subject: RE: Origins: Bonaparte's Retreat Medley
From: Lighter

Chaeles Fenno Hoffman,"A Winter in the West" (1834) [ref. to Kentucky in 1826]:

"[The condemned man] was...set up, on his coffin, in the cart. He asked for water, and requested that while a messenger was gone for it, the music would play Bonaparte's Retreat from Moscow."

W. H. Stepp, who recorded the now "standard" version of "Bonaparte's Retreat" for Alan Lomax in 1937, was also a Kentuckian.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Hamilton_Stepp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yeQucos9-M