4/6: Ogden Traditional Irish Music Session

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Mark Stevenson

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Apr 3, 2019, 1:53:27 PM4/3/19
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Howdy fellow sessionistas, 

Spring has sprung, St. Paddy's Month is behind us, and traditional musicians everywhere have been abandoned by the roadside or sent back to their rooms until next March. 

It's also time for the Ogden Irish Traditional Music Session this coming SATURDAY, APRIL 6th, 7:00pm - 10:30pm-ish.

The session is held at my house in Ogden, 1465 Mitchell Drive - it's close to the Weber State campus.  If you haven't been here already, let me know if you need directions (801-540-4540).  Please come through the driveway-backyard to the downstairs back door, since I might not hear the front doorbell. 

If you're new to this, we try to make sure that everyone gets a chance to start a tune - play your party piece or start us on something new you want to learn.  That way everyone gets a shot at playing at least some tunes they know, and the rest can learn something new. If you're new to the music or so shy that you'd rather just lurk and listen to see what it's all about, you're welcome to drop in as well.

Hope to see youse there!

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Additional sessions:

The Republican - 2nd and 4th Tuesday of every month, 7:00 p.m., 917 State St, Salt Lake City. (must be 21 yrs. old to enter)
The fellow who used to send out email reminders about this session moved out of state last year, and a number of folks have asked me if this session is still going, and indeed it is, after many years of generous support by Jason, the owner of the Republican. The session is typically anchored by Ross and Mary, two of the nicest people you'll ever meet and who have a vast repertoire or tunes between them. It's a very welcoming session, so drop in anytime!

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Back by popular demand - some online tune resources (haven't checked all the links for updates, but hopefully most still work.

TUNE RESOURCES.
The Traditional Tune Archive - huge tune database searchable by style, region, etc., and with historical notes about the origins of many tunes:" http://www.tunearch.org/wiki/TTA 

I've found great some ceili band recordings of hundreds of standard session tunes (MP3s which can be streamed or downloaded) from the Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann website - they can also be purchased online as the Foinn Seisiún Books - Volumes 1, 2, 3:
 
Here's an excellent database of tunes in ABC format: http://www.norbeck.nu/abc/
You can copy and paste the ABC code into the window on this page, and it will spit out sheet music in .jpg or .pdf format - very slick:

- MONSTER online tune book!  The King Street Sessions Tunebook, which was put together by a fellow in California for download: http://www.pacholo.com/mike/download.html.  Its a compilation of 1006 traditional tunes, representing many different tune types (jigs, reels, strathspeys, a few ballads, even a section on the compositions of O'Carolan), along with chords for accompaniment, which is often hard to find.  Also a nifty index in the back, with other tunebook resources, recordings, etc.  Its a huge PDF file (over 7MB, 400+ pages), so you might keep that in mind before you hit 'print.'  Thanks to Ross for the great tip on this one.  Many of the tunes we play are in here, and if you pull it up with Adobe Reader (PDF format), you can just print the pages you need for the session.
 
- Henrik Norbeck's ABC Tunes - tons of Scottish and Irish material: 
 
- http://music.gordfisch.net/montrealsession/index.html  Another site with loads of great tunes, including lots of cool Quebecois and Breton tunes

- here' a huge database of online tune resources:

- JC's ABC Tune Finder - if you know the name of the tune you're looking for, this search engine will find links to almost every version of it available on the web, in a variety of formats (PDF, .jpg, ABC notation).  ABC notation is a form of code that can translate letters into sheet music that's commonly used for folk music of various kinds.  If you find ABC code from a tune you want (such as thesession.org), you can copy and paste it into this tune converter [http://www.concertina.net/tunes_convert.html ], and then save it in a variety of formats.
 
Danielle sent me some very useful online resources for traditional music, specifically some tunebooks--here are a couple in .pdf format:

--The County Champaign Irish Tune Collections Online: 
Three volumes of tunes played at sessions in Champaign, IL

--The Blarney Stone Pub Session tunebook: 

Here's a fantastic website hosted by a flute player from Co. Clare with a huge number of tunes available to listen to via online streaming, or for download: http://irishflute.podbean.com/  No sheet music, but learning tunes by ear is a very important skill in trad music anyway.  

Here's another great PDF format tunebook online, which can be downloaded and printed at http://uilleannobsession.com/docs/john_walsh_session_tunes.pdf  -
this is probably a good thing for everyone to bring with them, as there are many standards in here.  

You can also download the dots and/or hear sound files for many of tunes at one of the following websites:



All the best,
Mark

--
Mark A. Stevenson, Assistant Professor
Department of Sociology & Anthropology
Weber State University
1299 Edvalson St.
Ogden, UT 84408-1208
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