Here is a favorite tune of mine, The Road to Lisdoonvarna. It is the first tune of two that I play with a guitarist, Mike Fischman (FYI the second one is O'Keefe's). I Love the ebb and flow of this piece!
By the way Mike, I thought a very cool thing about Enda Scahill was that I played this tune for him and asked what the style was and he said, "I don't know. A reel?" He looked at me as if to say, "Why do you care? Just play the tune!"
Another cool thing; he told us, "For my first book I got lucky and accidentally named the parts of the banjo correctly".
Indeed lovely ebb and flow Wayne. Great ideas for variations there Steve - thanks. Here's mine from a few years ago when I couldn't stop myself from speeding up!
I like to play sets that change from one type of tune to another. I usually play Road to Lisdoovarna followed by Cooley's Reel. I chanced upon it one day while playing Lisdonvarna and noticed that the opening two note interval is the same,making the changeover natural. Playing Lisdoonvarna nice and leisurely and then ripping into a fast version of Cooley's makes the transition even more dramatic.
Here's one version of that pair, with Morrison's Jig attached up front:
I like to play sets that change from one type of tune to another. I usually play Road to Lisdoovarna followed by Cooley's Reel. I chanced upon it one day while playing Lisdonvarna and noticed that the opening two note interval is the same,making the changeover natural. Playing Lisdoonvarna nice and leisurely and then ripping into a fast version of Cooley's makes the transition even more dramatic.
Here's one version of that pair, with Morrison's Jig attached up front:
Nice! At some of our local sessions, we play this one with an E minor jig as well, Swallowtail. I think I'll post a set of this with another slide, rather than Swallowtail, just for fun. It'll probably be in a day or two.
For some reason, people just love playing E minor tunes next to each other. One of my friends plays a whole sequence of 4 or 5 reels in the Drowsy Maggie family (Reel with the Birl, Tap Room, Rolling in the Barrel, Morning Dew, etc) as one big E minor set -- and now that I think of it, another friend plays Golden Stud followed by Dunmore Lasses and Cup of Tea. That doesn't seem to be nearly as common with other keys, just E minor. Funny?
I decided to record two versions, one a bit slower and ornamented (the way I usually like to play it):
And one closer to breakneck slide speed, with another of my favorite slides that I recently learned. I got a little carried away with the second tune and played it thrice.
Here's my version, along with guitar, bass guitar, and mandolin (in the final repeat). I'd been meaning to learn this one for a while, as it crops up so often, and I do love a minor key jig (slide? is there a concrete distinction?).
I'm fairly new to the instrument, so all comments/suggestions are welcome.
Bob, I do have a suggestion: keep doing what you're doing! You're right on the money and the only thing you will need to think about down the road is speed and variation; things that come in time for all of us if we stay the course.
