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[Stuart Hay]

Watching videos of people playing on YouTube is partly what motivated me to pick up the melodeon and give it a go, so I thought I would make my own humble contribution after precisely 4 weeks of learning. I didn't realise that once you hit that record button it magically wipes your mind of the entire tune you're trying to play but got there in the end  I don't see a lot of beginner videos on here, so hope this is ok...

So here it is, a rendition of William Taylor's Tabletop Hornpipe learned from a mixture of the ABC from Lester's Tune-a-day version and a video from Daddylongles:

https://youtu.be/Si80LJhaDlk

Pretty happy with the result despite the minor hiccup in the first A part. Any feedback is much appreciated!

[Glynn Hodges]

As a newbie to the Melodeon Stuart (I have been playing for about two weeks), I would say that is pretty good for 4 weeks. Well done.
Glynn

[Steve_freereeder]

So here it is, a rendition of William Taylor's Tabletop Hornpipe learned from a mixture of the ABC from Lester's Tune-a-day version and a video from Daddylongles:

https://youtu.be/Si80LJhaDlk

Pretty happy with the result despite the minor hiccup in the first A part. Any feedback is much appreciated!

That's really good after just 4 weeks of melodeon playing. Very steady and clear rhythm too, so well done!

William Taylor's Tabletop Hornpipe has been subjected to the 'folk process' over the years since it was written by Dave Shepherd of Blowzabella. The original key was G minor: not a particularly easy key for a D/G melodeon, so it tends to get played in E minor, as you have it. However, the folk process has also burgered (to coin a phrase) the B-music, the two halves of which was originally different. Dave Shepherd was quite insistent about this.

These days it is nearly always played and perpetuated (especially by Border Morris musicians) with the two halves of the B-music being identical, which is quite sad IMHO, because the original 'different' version of the B-music is quite interesting and readily playable on a melodeon. There was an in-depth discussion of this tune a few years ago on this forum which is well worth reading. See here and all the subsequent posts!

[Fred]

I didn't realise that once you hit that record button it magically wipes your mind of the entire tune you're trying to play but got there in the end

I absolutely know what you're talking about!

Keep going, this sounds good already!

[Stuart Hay]

As a newbie to the Melodeon Stuart (I have been playing for about two weeks), I would say that is pretty good for 4 weeks. Well done.
Glynn

Thanks Glynn! I'll be expecting to see one from yourself in two weeks then 

That's really good after just 4 weeks of melodeon playing. Very steady and clear rhythm too, so well done!

William Taylor's Tabletop Hornpipe has been subjected to the 'folk process' over the years since it was written by Dave Shepherd of Blowzabella. The original key was G minor: not a particularly easy key for a D/G melodeon, so it tends to get played in E minor, as you have it. However, the folk process has also burgered (to coin a phrase) the B-music, the two halves of which was originally different. Dave Shepherd was quite insistent about this.

These days it is nearly always played and perpetuated (especially by Border Morris musicians) with the two halves of the B-music being identical, which is quite sad IMHO, because the original 'different' version of the B-music is quite interesting and readily playable on a melodeon. There was an in-depth discussion of this tune a few years ago on this forum which is well worth reading. See here and all the subsequent posts!

Thanks Steve, funnily enough I'm part of a Border side but we don't dance to this tune (yet!). I just heard our recorder player (recorderist? recorderer?) playing at practice once and though it was a nice wee tune. I only started attempting to add basses to my playing a couple of days ago, it became a lot easier once I realised they fell on the same counts as the dance steps which made it a lot easier for me! Thanks also for the info on the tune that'll make some enjoyable reading once I get in from work, morris has been quite the baptism of fire for me in terms of folk tunes but I'm finding sometimes the stories behind a tune are more interesting than the tunes themselves.