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[summerstars]

Albert's Last Dance (A Cutting) particularly the B music which upsets guitarists as they strum along 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YirC4LmWbpo

oh Yes!   That is another tune on the bucket list - and promoted to quite near the top

[Thrupenny Bit]

Blimey Helena, I'm taken a-back at your recent experience.
A point made by Roy Dommett at one of his many morris workshops - over here we are very ready to adopt new ideas ( and therefore let go of older ones). This saw a massive adoption and absorption of the Minstrel song and genre before WWI and Big Band during WWII so our traditions such as morris were cast out. Modern rock/pop now superceeding Big Band.... and so it goes on.

A session regular here is Redwing, in fact a brilliant tune demonstrated slowly here by Gavin Atkin in a recent thread.
It came across the pond as others have though it's origin faded for most players and now simply known just as a tune. If it's connotations don't grate, it's a nice relatively simple tune to play.
Q

[Winston Smith]

"Perhaps because some things should never have been in the first place/should be left behind/have no place in modern society?"

So, should we not be accompanying singers singing about the oppression of the working classes, child labour, seaport harlots, national "heroes" like Nelson and Wellington in their warring ventures, etc. etc. ad infinitum?
The folk music world will disappear!

[Thrupenny Bit]

Jesse,
Here are two excellent tunes that fall to the fingers well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RyY7WDmkog

When starting up I found it utterly inspirational .... and still do!
Q

[george garside]

Fortunately, those associations don't exist over here. It's a tune not a song.

Oh yes they do. I have heard it sung recently and sung with 'that' word it in.

It's a shame things can't be accepted for what they are, not what they might have once been.

I play tunes   with  both orange and green  origins  , not because of their history  but because I like the tunes and for no other reason.  I also like some of the orange marching accordion bands   even though they do not represent my own  religious backgraound.. 

george

Perhaps because some things should never have been in the first place/should be left behind/have no place in modern society?

[Tone Dumb Greg]

A session regular here is Redwing...

'tis a small musical world, sometimes. Redwing is the tune I was going to record for last month's theme, American tunes.

The A part of this tune was one of the first tunes I learnt when I was learning the piano, aged 12, or so. It wasn't called Redwing in my bokk, though, it was "The Happy Farmer" in my book of beginners tunes by Schumman called Album Fur Dei Jugend
http://imslp.org/wiki/Album_f%C3%BCr_die_Jugend,_Op.68_(Schumann,_Robert)

I might still get around to a late posting.

[Thrupenny Bit]

yes, it was on my mind to record it for American tunes......it's a cracking little tune!
Q

[Jesse Smith]

The A part of this tune was one of the first tunes I learnt when I was learning the piano, aged 12, or so. It wasn't called Redwing in my bokk, though, it was "The Happy Farmer" in my book of beginners tunes by Schumman called Album Fur Dei Jugend

Oh, there's a blast from the past! I remember playing that on piano as well, probably around the same age or a little older.

[Tone Dumb Greg]

To finish off what I was going to say about Redwing,  Q says, it's a cracking little tune and he's right. However, the original tune I learned, the Frolicking Landworker is a much less developed version of the melody. Less worthy, you might think, but I love the way it falls under the fingers and it would make a rather good morris tune. I love playing it. Were this thread a theme OTM I would consider it a good candidate for me.

[baz parkes]

Fortunately, those associations don't exist over here. It's a tune not a song.

Oh yes they do. I have heard it sung recently and sung with 'that' word it in.

It's a shame things can't be accepted for what they are, not what they might have once been.

Perhaps because some things should never have been in the first place/should be left behind/have no place in modern society?

I danced border for many years and was well aware of the song's heritage. You may lament history, but you can't ignore it. "The past is a foreign country...they do things differently there..."

[Tone Dumb Greg]

Fortunately, those associations don't exist over here. It's a tune not a song.

Oh yes they do. I have heard it sung recently and sung with 'that' word it in.

It's a shame things can't be accepted for what they are, not what they might have once been.

Perhaps because some things should never have been in the first place/should be left behind/have no place in modern society?

I danced border for many years and was well aware of the song's heritage. You may lament history, but you can't ignore it. "The past is a foreign country...they do things differently there..."

but if I never played anything which might be construed by someone, somewhere, as being politically correct my repertoire would be very limited.

[Jesse Smith]

Were this thread a theme OTM I would consider it a good candidate for me.

Ha ha, sounds like a great theme of the month: "lousy tunes that are fun to play!"

[baz parkes]

Fortunately, those associations don't exist over here. It's a tune not a song.

Oh yes they do. I have heard it sung recently and sung with 'that' word it in.

It's a shame things can't be accepted for what they are, not what they might have once been.

Perhaps because some things should never have been in the first place/should be left behind/have no place in modern society?

I danced border for many years and was well aware of the song's heritage. You may lament history, but you can't ignore it. "The past is a foreign country...they do things differently there..."

but if I never played anything which might be construed by someone, somewhere, as being politically correct my repertoire would be very limited.

I think we sort of agree...

[Jesse Smith]

but if I never played anything which might be construed by someone, somewhere, as being politically correct my repertoire would be very limited.

Agreed, but there is a difference between a song that might be construed as politically incorrect (e.g., a whole host of bawdy songs like "The Black Joak") and a song that is just plain offensive today. This is the offending verse of "Not for Joe" in case you're not familiar:

There was a little ******
and he grew no bigger
so they put him in the wild west show.
He tumbled out the window
and he broke his little finger
and he couldn't play the ol' banjo.

I can't sing that in public, absolutely not in the US and I suspect it wouldn't go over well in the UK either. I still like the tune and would like to learn to play it at some point. All I'm saying is that for me the tune is "soiled" a bit by these words.

Didn't mean to hijack my own thread... 

[Tone Dumb Greg]

The tune isn't the song, though. I play the tune because it's fun to play. Not because of any connotations. To pick a couple of other (not very good, but what comes to mind right now) examples, I also play a tune called Croppies Lie Down, which is about killing catholics (which I think is pretty offensive, but it's a great tune) and one called King of the Fairies, which convoluted logic has referenced to the homosexual tendencies of Bonnie Prince Charlie. I don't care about the political correctness, or otherwise of these tunes. I just like to play them.

Anyway, it's another topic. In my defense, King of the Fairies is another tune that falls under the fingers rather pleasingly.

[Jesse Smith]

I also play a tune called Croppies Lie Down, which is about killing catholics (which I think is pretty offensive, but it's a great tune) and one called King of the Fairies, which convoluted logic has referenced to the homosexual tendencies of Bonnie Prince Charlie. I don't care about the political correctness, or otherwise of these tunes. I just like to play them.

That's interesting, I hadn't heard about that with King of the Fairies, I assumed it was just a reference to Oberon or someone like that.

I once saw a YouTube video (might have been Gavin actually) where he played a tune called Down With the French and introduced it by saying it must mean he gets on well with French people, that he's down with them, right? I thought that was pretty funny.

[Tone Dumb Greg]

I also play a tune called Croppies Lie Down, which is about killing catholics (which I think is pretty offensive, but it's a great tune) and one called King of the Fairies, which convoluted logic has referenced to the homosexual tendencies of Bonnie Prince Charlie. I don't care about the political correctness, or otherwise of these tunes. I just like to play them.

That's interesting, I hadn't heard about that with King of the Fairies, I assumed it was just a reference to Oberon or someone like that.

I once saw a YouTube video (might have been Gavin actually) where he played a tune called Down With the French and introduced it by saying it must mean he gets on well with French people, that he's down with them, right? I thought that was pretty funny.

Ha, ha! Croppies Lie Down was played, at Wellington's command, for the Allied troops triumphal march into Paris on 17th July, 1815. Legend has it the bands started to play the Downfall Of Paris (an even better tune), but Wellington stopped that because it was a tune purported to support the worker's revolution.

[Thrupenny Bit]

Jesse - I never knew there was a song attached to the Not for Joe tune....
and certainly not a little ditty like that.
The point being, there are lots of tunes where the actual symbolism ( or real reason for their scripting ) that lies behind them simply isn't known. It's lost in time. We often genuinely innocently play them cos they are good tunes.
Not too sure where that leaves this discussion 
Q

[Winston Smith]

"Not too sure where that leaves this discussion"

Of course you do, Q! If there are "Tunes that you enjoy primarily because they feel good to play", then you keep on playing them. I know that "Sticks and Stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me", and I'm even more certain that Tunes will never hurt anyone, unless they particularly want them to. (Especially if they're played on a melodeon!)

[Thrupenny Bit]

There is a tune sometimes heard at a session nearby.
It's a resonably good little tune but I could never and would never play it due to it's title. I couldn't call it out loud.
Perhaps it's the difference between innocently doing something that has no overt connotations and consciously doing something that could obviously offend.
 I never wish to offend anyone. Life's too short.

....but this is a looong way from Jesse's question regarding good little tunes to play.
Q