Re: [scots-l] Amazing Grace

[W. B. OLSON]

Carol Thompkins wrote:
> 
> I had
> > difficulty explaining to our host family the meaning of the title "Amazing
> > Grace". I think I was right in saying it was an American quaker hymn or
> was
> > that Lord of the Dance which was also played by our hosts in our honour!
> > >
> Hi Philip,
> 
> As a Quaker for many years, I can guarantee you that Amazing Grace is not a
> Quaker hymn.  Quakers don't sing at meeting except in rare instances, nor do
> we have hymns.  In fact, the meeting is mostly silent unless the spirit
> moves one of us to speak.
> 
> Just FYI.
> 
> Carol (going now to look at Rachel's music)
> 
> Posted to Scots-L - The Traditional Scottish Music & Culture List - To 
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You can find the original 1779 text of Newton's "Amazing Grace" on the
Cowper-Newton Museum website.

Bruce Olson
-- 
Roots of Folk: Old British Isles popular and folk songs, tunes, 
broadside ballads at my no-spam website - www.erols.com/olsonw 
or just http://www.erols.com/olsonw";> Click 

Motto: Keep it up; muddling through always works.
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[scots-l] Amazing Grace

[Carol Thompkins]

I had
> difficulty explaining to our host family the meaning of the title "Amazing
> Grace". I think I was right in saying it was an American quaker hymn or
was
> that Lord of the Dance which was also played by our hosts in our honour!
> >
Hi Philip,

As a Quaker for many years, I can guarantee you that Amazing Grace is not a
Quaker hymn.  Quakers don't sing at meeting except in rare instances, nor do
we have hymns.  In fact, the meeting is mostly silent unless the spirit
moves one of us to speak.

Just FYI.

Carol (going now to look at Rachel's music)

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Re: [scots-l] What makes a style "Scottish?"

[SUZANNE MACDONALD]

I'm correcting errors in my just sent e-mail
"unusuin" should read unison and condtitute constitute.
I also left out the Tertis last line quote.It is ".A note
infinitesimally flat or sharp
lacks the rich, round, penetrative, lucious sound that only a note
perfectly in tune will give you".

Alexander

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Re: [scots-l] What makes a style "Scottish?"

[SUZANNE MACDONALD]

 Wendy Galovich wrote:


Comment:
Actualy that is not what I was saying. We are able to detect differences
in pitch but can't measure them. The human ear measures musical
intervals by tuning in the unison  harmonics produced by the two notes.
Some are easy to do, such as the fifth, the third is more difficult, the
tempered semitone is impossible, either "exactly" as you say or
inexactly. The reason for this is that  there is no unusuin harmonic in
two notes separated by the ratio 1.059 or any of its aritmetic
multiples. That is why the piano tuner tunes the instrument in the
manner I described in a previous e-mail.


Comment:
I had not intended to misquote you. My appoligies if that was what was
conveyed.
Tempered scales and alternate scales must be dealt with sepapately. The
equal tempered 12-note chromatic scale with which we are familiar is the
one defined by the ratio of a semitone being 1.095. Deviations from
this, although discernable as being a different pitch ,do not constitute
a different scale. Also "common sense" is based on a person's education,
knowledge, life expereiences, etc. In other words it is frequently not
"common" at all



Comment:
There are two separate issues here. Firstly you  are saying that playing
the notes which conforms to the ratio which defines the equal tempered
scale is "overkill". It fundamently is not. Secondly, referring back to
the type of tune which began this discussion, a tune in A, altering the
pitch of the seventh note so that it is somewhere between G and G# does
not condtitute a different scale. Similiarly playing a tune which
conforms only approximately to the tempered scale is not playing in
another scale.
Please don't be offended but I have concluded that you haven't read or
do not understand the two quotes which I included in my last e-mail.
They are based on the work of  Herman von Helmholtz, who is considered
the father of the science of accoustics, who Encyclopedia Britanica
describes  as "one of the greatest scientists of the 19th century" and
on subsequent work by Alexander J. Ellis and  Llewelyn S. Lloyd, the
latter of whom was a Grove's consultant, writer of a text book on the
subject, and the author of approx 50 essays on the subject in learned
journals.The last line in the Turtis quote bears repeating here, "
I am concerned that we may be boring others on the list with this
discussion. If you wish to communicat further perhaps we snould do it
off list.

Alexander

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[scots-l] Higland Cathedral - Clarification

[Philip Whittaker]

On 11 Jul, Anselm Lingnau <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:


> Just wait for another century or so. By that time Highland Cathedral
> (which AFAIK was written recently by two chaps from Berlin) *will* be a
> traditional Scottish tune.

I think it will take rather less than that. Our French hosts, who had two
arrangements that included this tune announced it as traditional Scottish
Music! I was not suggesting the pipers thought that.

There seems to be a great love of this tune among people who otherwise do
not listen to much pipe music. I recall an event in Galashiels a couple of
years ago in which the compere's idea of a finale was to get everyone
playing this along with a piper. (Keep an Eb whistle handy just in case!) 
 I had not even heard the tune until the week before when we heard about
this event!

I think it has almost supplanted that other "traditional Scottish" 
favourite "Amazing Grace" which the Kelso pipe band also played. I had
difficulty explaining to our host family the meaning of the title "Amazing
Grace". I think I was right in saying it was an American quaker hymn or was
that Lord of the Dance which was also played by our hosts in our honour!
Again surprise it was not Scottish! The French seemed to sing a song of
their own to Amazing Grace, by the way.

I think the answer, Anselm, is "If you can play it on the GHP then it's
Scottish". It makes life a lot simpler!


Philip

-- 
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

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Re: [scots-l] What makes a style "Scottish?"

[Jack Campin]

> This is also to do with the fact that the twelfth-root-of-two (or 1.059)
> ratio applies to `physically ideal' strings that have no diameter. If
> you look at a piano with the various lids and covers off you will find
> that this is obviously not true, especially for the bass notes. It turns
> out that a piano tuning must be `stretched' somewhat for the piano to
> sound in tune with itself on account of these deviations, and good piano
> tuners are supposed to cater for this.

> As a pianist, I don't know what to make of all this varied-interval
> business. On the one hand, I'm half glad that I don't have to worry
> about it; on the other hand it seems that I can't really play Scottish
> music, which I think is a pity :^(

There's nothing to stop you tuning a piano to just intonation, meantone
or whatever, and fortepianos used for early music are sometimes tuned
that way, with Werckmeister III being the most popular alternative and
the most likely tuning that Nathaniel Gow grew up with (presumably the
tuner still makes some compensation for string stiffness as described
above, but early piano strings were lighter so there is less to correct).
Much of Terry Riley's music in the last few decades has been for pianos
or other keyboards tuned in just intonation.  If you stuck to playing in
G, D and A, going back to Gow or forward to Riley might even improve the
sound of the piano for Scottish music.  

There was a spectacular example of tweaked piano tuning on Radio 3 last
week; a concerto for piano and gamelan orchestra by Lou Harrison, in
which the piano was tuned to match the gamelan.  Really nice piece.

A Scottish answer to that might be getting a gamelan made tuned to the
pipe scale so it could play along with a pipe band.  I hereby trademark
the band name "Shotts and Dyak Head" for the result.

===  ===


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Re: [scots-l] Troy's Wedding - pipe version?

[Jack Campin]

> I already have the dots for the jig "Troy's Wedding" in notation for the
> fiddle. However this is surely a fairly recent pipe tune. Does anyone have
> a pipe version of the tune with all the grace notes? Or can anyone direct
> me towards a collection which includes this tune in pipe notation?

Ian MacCrimmon's Collection of Bagpipe Music book 2.

===  ===


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Re: [scots-l] What makes a style "Scottish?"

[Clarsaich]

In a message dated 7/9/01 9:01:41 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:

<< Non-tempered scales are common in a lot of kinds of music, >>

I remember studying accompanying (piano) at college when I was working on my 
degree is *classical* music. I was working with a violinist, and she 
complained about the piano. "I hate playing with tempered instruments, I have 
to make my flats sound sharp and my sharps sound flat," she said. So it's not 
just folk music...

By the way, I was told by my piano tuner that it is common to sharpen the 
treble on a piano to make it sound brighter. He suggested this as a possible 
reason why I have trouble when I tune my harp by ear...I always pull the 
treble a bit sharp.

--Cynthia Cathcart
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Re: [scots-l] Troy's Wedding - pipe version?

[Anselm Lingnau]

Philip Whittaker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> The pipers and our hosts often played Highland Cathedral which they are
> convinced is a traditional Scottish tune. Oh well, Over the Sea to Skye
> and all that. There is a tradition of non-Scots writing tunes which are
> readily accepted by Scots as traditional!

Just wait for another century or so. By that time Highland Cathedral
(which AFAIK was written recently by two chaps from Berlin) *will* be a
traditional Scottish tune.

Anselm
-- 
Anselm Lingnau .. [EMAIL PROTECTED]
If you do not think about the future, you cannot have one.   -- John Galsworthy

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[scots-l] Troy's Wedding - pipe version?

[Philip Whittaker]

Last week I undertook to find on the Internet a tune for a young piper.

I already have the dots for the jig "Troy's Wedding" in notation for the
fiddle. However this is surely a fairly recent pipe tune. Does anyone have
a pipe version of the tune with all the grace notes? Or can anyone direct
me towards a collection which includes this tune in pipe notation?

The conversation took place on a pleasure boat on an artificial lake in
Isere - south East France where the Small Hall Ceilidh band and the Kelso
Pipe Band were honoured guests of the Association Musicale de Vif. 

Quite an experience! Of which more later if anyone wants it.
Certainly there is a distinct pulling power of men in kilts!

The pipers and our hosts often played Highland Cathedral which they are
convinced is a traditional Scottish tune. Oh well, Over the Sea to Skye
and all that. There is a tradition of non-Scots writing tunes which are
readily accepted by Scots as traditional!


Philip W

-- 
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

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