Day 1 - Barrowburn Reel

ABOUT THE PIECE

Reel
by Addie Harper (I thought Addie was a woman)
He led the Wick Scottish Dance Band for years and I think he is still alive now
This is what he said about it:
This must be one of my most popular compositions. It came to me while on holiday in Northumberland just south of the Cheviot Hills near the little district of Barrowburn. It was the ideal setting for creating music. Later that night I sat down by the roadside at a little village called Henshaw near Bardon Mill and composed "The Barrowburn Reel". 

COMMENTS

I have played it in the band and heard it a lot but couldn't remember its name. It's a nice cheery tune in an easy key, and it sits nicely under the fingers so I thought it would be an accessible one to start with. It was surprisingly quick and easy to learn by heart and only took 10-15 mins to get up to speed. The only dodgy bits were remembering to go back down on bar 2 and remembering how it starts.

When I looked up Addie Harper there was a link to Gordon Gunn, a fiddler who is also from Wick...maybe worth listening to?

Learning Tunes - aims

I love playing Scottish dance music. I'm not Scottish, and have no background in folk music at all but got a taste for it about 10 years ago from going to a couple of musicians' day schools in London, run by the RSCDS (Royal Scottish Country Dance Society), and carried on doing that once or twice a year with a friend until one of the tutors invited me to come and play with his band (Craigellachie). I have been playing with them about once a month since May 2015, which I love, and can't quite believe I'm doing, and I sometimes wonder when they are going to realise that I have no idea and tactfully drop me. I've carried on taking part in RSCDS events including the London days, a weekend at Dillington house in 2017 and I've just spent a week at the RSCDS summer school in St. Andrews, which was amazing. At the end of it I had a looong train journey home to think about what I had gained from the week and decided that actually, although stylistically I could be better, and could play more confidently and rhythmically, and could ornament better, actually those things aren't too bad. The main thing that made me realise I was far from being the equal of the other musicians there was that I rely on sheet music all the time and don't know any tunes by heart, and am terrified of taking part in sessions because I know I can't. So the plan this year is to learn some things by heart. To take it all more seriously and try to do a better job. To be more focused and do practice and find out the titles of things and try to remember what tune goes with what title. Lots of tunes are already familiar, and they are all a predictable length and follow a predictable pattern unlike classical music which I have never been able to memorise successfully. I'll try to do a new tune each day, which I won't manage but at least 4 a week. So here goes.