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Discussions => Tunes => Topic started by: Dazbo on March 05, 2017, 12:57:33 PM

Title: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Dazbo on March 05, 2017, 12:57:33 PM
I'm learning this tune but one note doesn't sound correct. The music I have is in one Sharp but not sure of the key. In bar two of the B part is an F (the only F in the tune).  It's notated as an F# but it sounds wrong. Scouring the internet most have it as a F# but I have seen it as a natural F and even a G in a 9/4 version that looks like a set of variations. I've tried all three and none sound right to my ears.

Help :-[
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Roger Howard on March 05, 2017, 01:33:30 PM
On the Northumbrian pipes, it's usually played as in G, with the F# you mention, in 9/8. I think the slight dissonance, if that's the right term, on the F# is part of the feel of the tune, so it seems right to me. I haven't come across the tune without it, I don't think.

The tune goes under a variety of names and variants, though.

Roger
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: TomB on March 05, 2017, 01:37:55 PM
This is the way I've always played it and I've not heard anyone play it differently.

X:
1
M: 9/8
L: 1/8
K: Ador
cde cAA cAA | cde cAA B2G | cde cAA cAA | Bcd dgd B2G:||
cde gee gee | cde gee f2d | cde gee gee | Bcd dgd B2G:||
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Steve_freereeder on March 05, 2017, 02:02:14 PM
Yes - I agree with Roger and Tom; also Tom's abc notation is correct.
The tune is in A Dorian, which basically means the scale of G major (i.e. with an F#) but starting on A.

The tune comes from the Northumbrian small-pipes repertoire, from the days before keyed chanters were invented, so just a plain six eight-hole chanter which played diatonically in one octave from G4 to G5: G A B C D E F# G.

Lovely, austere tune. That F# really makes it special.

Edited to correct the number of holes on a simple NSP chanter, which of course has 7 finger holes and a thumb hole at the back.
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Chris Ryall on March 06, 2017, 10:49:06 AM
To my ear the A music is indeed on the A tonic, and so truly 'dorian'.

Then I hear its 'B' part move to a tonic of C - that's Lydian mode of G and indeed 'very special'  - and sure enough - in comes the bright, and typically 'lydian'  F#, eventually ringing out as a 'characteristic note', but also implied as the first 2 'B' bars linger on the notes of C major arpeggio.   
 
But that's to play on a melodeon and to pick one's drone.  H..P is actually a bagpipe tune. They don't get such choices  :||:

If you don't get the same 'feel' - try playing an F natural in the 'B' part .. which is what most folk tunes are expected to do in such a cadence? And I think the source of OP's 'it sounds wrong' issue?

F# it is :P, magnificently and obstinately  ;)  [edit] Several 'dots' scores on t' Iinternet and there it is, stuck in the place it might 'stick out' most, right in the middle of 'B' section. Furthermore Midford scores it as a 2 note crochet, when all else is in quavers >:E  this is no passing note or 'accident'!
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Dazbo on March 06, 2017, 12:20:43 PM
Thanks chaps, F# it is then  >:E I shall just have to try and smuggle it past my wife when I practice.

A small confession but I am actually learning it on bagpipes - not Northumbrian unfortunately but a nice student Border set by Jon Swayne.
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Roger Howard on March 06, 2017, 05:25:39 PM
I've just tried it my Swayne pipes - it sits nicely on them, like many of the "old" tunes, I suppose.

Off topic: they are lovely pipes, though, aren't they? Absolutely solid in tuning, and much easier to set the drones than with NSP. Lovely pipes made by a lovely man.  :D

Roger
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Dazbo on March 07, 2017, 09:17:18 AM

Off topic: they are lovely pipes, though, aren't they? Absolutely solid in tuning, and much easier to set the drones than with NSP. Lovely pipes made by a lovely man.  :D

Roger

Yes, I love playing them - I'm just not very good at it yet  :'(
Title: Re: Peacock follows the Hen
Post by: Roger Howard on March 07, 2017, 12:39:32 PM
Neither am I!

Roger
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