Old Irish Harp Transcriptions Project – Page 4

Uair bheag roimh an lá

The final tune in this little group of three or four tunes we have looked at recently, is Uair bheag roimh an lá, a little hour before the day. We have Edward Bunting’s live transcription dots from the 1790s, and we have piano arrangements that he made based on this transcription. In this blog post I will line all these up and try to say something useful about the live transcription dots on Queen’s University Belfast, Special Collections, MS4.29 page 94/90/099/f44v.

Clár bog déil

The third tune in this group of four we are looking at is on the same page as the Little Munster Mantle. It is titled “Castle Moon” above the notation, and “Cleaur bug deal / soft boards of Deal” below.

This notation looks to me like it was made by Edward Bunting as live transcription “dots” written live as a traditional informant played or sang to him in the 1790s.

The notation is in Queen’s University Belfast, Special Collections, MS4.29 page 93/89/098/f44r.

Little Munster Mantle

The next tune in the group of four that I am looking at just now, is titled in the manuscript “Little Munster Mantle”. The notation consists of a line of dots, starting on B, and then two lines of notation a 3rd lower starting on G. I think this represents a live transcription notation, written here by Edward Bunting at speed from the performance of a tradition-bearer some time in the 1790s.

The notation is on Queen’s University Belfast, Special Collections, MS4.29 page 93/89/098/f44r. Lets look at the transcription in more detail.

A bhean dubh rún dileas

There’s a group of four tunes that Edward Bunting notated apparently live from traditional informants, on pages 92 to 94 of his little collecting pamphlets in the 1790s. I’ll do a series of four posts looking at each of these tunes in turn.

First up is A bhean dubh rún dileas. The live transcription notation is on Queen’s University Belfast, Special Collections, MS4.29 page 92/88/097/f43v. We have already discussed this page because it has the abandoned transcription dots of the Fairy Queen. But today I want to study the other tune on this page, which Bunting wrote over the Fairy Queen dots, obliterating them.

Ailí Gheal Chiúin Ní Chearbhaill

I first came across the song of Ailí Gheal Chiúin Ní Chearbhaill from the singing of Pádraigín Ní Uallacháin. You can read her commentary about this song in her book A Hidden Ulster (2003) p.220-223, or on her Oriel Arts website where you can also see a video of Pádraigín singing the song with harp accompaniment by Sylvia Crawford.

The Jointure, or the Golden Star

The Jointure or the Golden Star is an interesting old Irish harp tune. In this blog post we will look at Edward Bunting’s earliest notations of the melody and the jig that goes with it.

Caitlín Ní Uallacháin

Caitlín Ní Uallacháin was one of the personifications of Ireland in poetry and song. There is a whole nest of variant and different tunes titled Caitlín Ní Uallacháin (Anglicised as Cathleen or Kitty Nowlan), but we don’t have enough time or space to go into them all here. All we can do is look at four versions of the tune in Bunting’s manuscripts.

Hugh O’Donnell

Bunting wrote the tune of Hugh O’Donnell into his little collecting pamphlet, perhaps in 1792. You can see the tune written neatly and clearly on Queen’s University Belfast, Special Collections, MS4.29 page 12/12/021/f5v.

Miss Kelly

Some time in the 1790s, Edward Bunting made what looks like a live transcription notation of the tune of Miss Kelly.

An gearrán buidhe

The Yellow Horse is a curious little song air. We have three independent transcription notations of variants or versions of this tune, under two different titles, in Edward Bunting’s transcription notebooks from the 1790s. They are all three a bit tricky to understand.