Irish Flute Tunes

Here's a good tune.  It's particularly good at being the one after the one before it.  Paddy Killoran made a good job of it on a record about 70 years ago.

A nice reel which is nice to play.  All very nice indeed.

Here's a very popular reel. I'm surprised I hadn't put it on the site before now. It suits most instruments which people use for playing Irish traditional music. The ones it doesn't suit are probably just too hard to please, or to be pleased with.

Here's a tune I was asked to put on.  I wasn't aware of knowing a "Wedding Reel" so I just made a stab at this version: http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/518 .  It's more a "Reading Reel" here and in order to expunge some of my most dodgy notes it may have to be a "Weeding Reel". I've played the second part as plainly as possible here.  I suspect some people (especially a few in the list on...

Here's a nice jig which I stole from the same place as the previous two tunes.

Another bit of Bothy Band booty.  A Tar dis to Sligo would be handy.  The roads are better now than they were but it's hard to find them under all the cars.

Here's the first of today's "sure he's just nicking tunes of Bothy Band records now" tunes.  I stole it from a Bothy Band record.  Ir's a sort of slide / jig but I'll keep it in the jig section as I'm too far north for sliding.

Not much to say about this tune ... common as muck but feels better in the ear than muck. As with most common tunes it's common because it's a good tune and so people like it.  It's also a good reel for learning on the flute, without too many "funny bits".

Here's a Micko (or is it Micho?) Russell reel.  It sounds a bit like something else - don't they all? I'm never sure about the Micko / Micho thing. A badly written "k" can have a fair bit of "h"iness about it so maybe they're the same thing.  I'm sure there are plenty of people who know the answer to this crucial question.

I think this jig is from a song : "The Roll-ick-ing Boys of Tan-der-a-gee". All I know of Tandragee is that the Northern version of Tayto crisps are made there.  Whatever about other questions of nationality, surely the two Tayto communities in Ireland could come together.

Here's a great reel for flute, fiddles or flugelhorns.  I'm working of the layout for an irish fluglehorn tunes site but it's not ready for air yet.

Here's a reel to get misty-eyed about while you travel out on the high Cs.  If you know any fiddle players who haven't quite got round to playing elevated notes it can be a fairly passable recreation to watch their various ways of playing the second part of this reel.

If someone could clone Clones then there would be no need to miss Monaghan ever again. Sorry for trotting out the same puny pun as before. I have no imagination. This reel is a good stalwart of sessions and recordings wherever Irish traditional music is played.  I hope this version is OK.

Someone else misses it too. Here's another pelt peeling for poor felix. I've not played this tune for years as there used to be someone living here who played it all the time.  The only thing more annoying than that was almost any other tune he played.  My immune system is just beginning to allow the tune back into my head now.

Like ways to skin a cat, there is more than one set of notes to make a Miss McDonald's Reel. This is a nice light sort of a one. I've been mostly dining on stout, gin, water and nervously nibbled nails over the last while - not a burger in site. I can't say that I miss McDonald's at all. In fact I'd be happy if the one in the centre of Belfast wasn't there. It makes the surrounding area smell of s...

Here's a nice reel I was asked to play (is this it, M?). I used to hear this tune more than I do now.  Maybe that's just because I need my ears syringed.

This sounds like the stage between mass arrests and sentencing. I think this tune is on a record of Kevin Burke and Jackie Daly.  I know it is in CRÉ 3, number 119 as that's where I stole this version from.

I never knew the name of this tune and seems to have about 6.3 half versions of it floating around in my head. While I was in the process of stealing tunes out of Ceol Rince na hÉireann Vol 3, I found this version with this name.  It is number 116 and comes from Roger Sherlock's flute playing.

Here's a tune I was asked to play.  It's on Matt Molloy's first record.  I don't know where he got the tune or the name from.  It sounds a bit odd played slowly but here goes ... (The quicker version seems to recover its composure a bit) Brendán Breathnach put it in Ceol Rince na hÉireann 3 (No. 12) in case you want to see the dots, or blood spatters.

Here's a flute friendly sort of reel.  Brendán Breathnach got it from Denis Murphy but it appears on a few other people's records, including one of Mary Bergin and one of Matt Molloy. My playing here is more Lame Knack Cross than Lománach Cross but hopefully it is still a cross that is possible to bear.

I must have pressed the wrong buttons on the recorder.  Poor Lucy sounds like she's calling for rescue from an oil drum, or maybe it's a big soup tin. This is a good sturdy reel of Scottish stock - more soup.  I hope Lucy isn't stuck in an echoey BROTHel.

Here's a common enough reel named after a far from common fiddle player.  The tune may well have other names but this is what Roger Sherlock called it on a record.

Here's a jig Mary Bergin recorded.  It's not a long way to Old Tipperary from this tune on the same record.

Here's a tune Brandán Breathnach collected from the South Sligo whistle player Jimmy McGettrick and included in Ceol Rince na hÉireann 2, number 215.

Here's the one after the one before it.  This tune is fairly hyperphenominally popular and can be found rattling around sessions everywhere.  I'd imagine Miltown Malbay is getting its fair share as we speak.