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[oggiesnr]

Play a reel or a hornpipe at two thirds speed and listen to what you're actually playing, are those dotted quavers precise, the crotchets of equal length, the emphasis on the beat?  Playing slower means you have to be precise.  It's much, much harder.

Steve

[Theo]

And,  whatever speed you play at in public there should be some headroom. If you play at no more than three quarters of the the maximum speed you are capable of then your playing will be relaxed and effortless. 

[waltzman]

Play a reel or a hornpipe at two thirds speed and listen to what you're actually playing, are those dotted quavers precise, the crotchets of equal length, the emphasis on the beat?  Playing slower means you have to be precise.  It's much, much harder.

Steve

I don't quite get this.  It's not harder to play slower.  If that were the case then all beginners would start out a break neck speed and then gradually slow down as they got better.  What is difficult is the precision that gives the lift.  It's difficult at any speed, to my mind, but to learn the precison you have to start out at slower tempos before you can bring it up to dance tempo.  What often happens is giving up precision for speed and in that case I think fast and sloppy may be easier than slow and precise.

[Stiamh]

Play a reel or a hornpipe at two thirds speed and listen to what you're actually playing, are those dotted quavers precise, the crotchets of equal length, the emphasis on the beat?  Playing slower means you have to be precise.  It's much, much harder.

Steve

I don't quite get this.  It's not harder to play slower.  If that were the case then all beginners would start out a break neck speed and then gradually slow down as they got better.  What is difficult is the precision that gives the lift.  It's difficult at any speed, to my mind, but to learn the precison you have to start out at slower tempos before you can bring it up to dance tempo.  What often happens is giving up precision for speed and in that case I think fast and sloppy may be easier than slow and precise.

Nicely put, Waltzman. I do think it's a good idea for anybody who has made a certain amount of progress - that is, after you think you can play at reasonable tempi - to slow things down and reassess your playing. At slow speeds any uncertainty about the rhythm and flow of a tune is glaringly obvious. It's not harder to play more slowly, but to be able to play a dance tune slowly and make it sound satisfying and convincing to listen to at that tempo is IMO an essential accomplishment, or at least something to strive for. (And I don't mean turning a dance tune into a cure for insomnia, looking for hidden depths that aren't there!)

[LJC]

The slower you play, the more notes you can fit in. It might sound a bit of a crazy statement, but in my opinion, the key to playing slowly is to have enough going on in the tune to keep it interesting (for yourself and the audience). Busy but unhurried is how a friend described it.

I think its a different matter for beginners where playing slow is necessary to build up coordination and dexterity.

@waltzman - many beginners I teach do play too fast. The most common thing is playing the easy bits really quickly and then stumbling slowly over the hard bits. It's then a process of having them slow everything down to the same speed so that the tempo and rhythm is even and consistent.

Playing too fast gets messy and dull, playing too slowly drags and is dull. There is a range of happy speeds for all tunes.

[oggiesnr]

I wasn't advocating always playing at slow speeds.  What I meant was that every so often it pays to slow a tune down down (whilst practising) and listen to what you're playing, is the precision actually there or are you masking a lack of precision with speed.  I still think it is harder to play precisely more slowly because you cannot mask any faults in a blur of notes (my bad habit when playing tin whistle).

Mind you I saw Martin Hayes last year and he redefines playing slowly and guess what? it didn't matter because it was probably the best two hours I've ever spent listening to Irish music.  There was more life, bounce and vitality in one of his "slow" reels than in the whole of most sessions.

Steve

[george garside]

And,  whatever speed you play at in public there should be some headroom. If you play at no more than three quarters of the the maximum speed you are capable of then your playing will be relaxed and effortless. 

to which I would add - never play faster than you can!

george

[george garside]

To which I would add - and continue at your own pace letting the speed junkies surge ahead. They might even learn from the experience 

Indeed!

george

[cboody]

Speed, once you leave the issue of dancing behind, is often a matter of comfortable technical proficiency.  Really super players can often play very fast but still include all sorts of wonderfully musical things in what they are doing.  Seems to me the rest of us should try to do the musical things at tempos that are reasonable for the type of tune and not worry too much about flying along.  Of course if you play like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_Va0ojp-Dk

You can do anything you darn well please....

[oggiesnr]

Except speed it up it would seem   Watched it twice - rock steady and dancable 

As is this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0mV6fcvkv8&feature=channel.

Great stuff

Steve

[Peter G]

Re John Whelan: 'Champion'! So how young do you have to be to be a junior? 

[Stiamh]

You can do anything you darn well please....

Are you saying that's a fast tempo? Because to me, it's a very nice, relaxed pace. About 112 bpm, I'd guess.  Lovely tempo, lovely playing.

And I wish I could smile half as convincingly when playing. 

[cboody]

You can do anything you darn well please....

Are you saying that's a fast tempo? Because to me, it's a very nice, relaxed pace. About 112 bpm, I'd guess.  Lovely tempo, lovely playing.

And I wish I could smile half as convincingly when playing. 

No, I didn't think it was fast, but rather that if you can play with that sort of rhythmic precision and musical content you can probably do what you wish because you have total control of your instrument (and probably of the musical styles you choose to play)

[Chris Ryall]

Ireland can be - well, Irish  The renouned flute player James Galway was "All Ireland Flute Champion" at junior, intermediate and open levels all at the same time, but that's another story. Yup, another rock steady dancable set just as I remember it from my 2 trips to the Wet West Coast. Isn't there beauty in that?

This awful racing thing seems to be peculiar to 'English' Irish music. (Though I hear the Paddies still do it in the Curragh of Kildare)  

[Rob2Hook]

Lovely laid back recordings.  I thought the speed was great and just allowed the ornamentation to work - so he ain't gonna try to go faster!

I use a few ornaments in my regular playing for a NW side which allow me to assess the speed for the dance.  If I'm struggling with the ornaments, some of the dancers will be struggling with the speed.  The same tune in a session and I drop the ornamentation or it gets bent out of shape.

Rob.

[Chris Brimley]

It seems to me that there are many dimensions to playing tunes, and speed is merely one of them.  Talking about speed alone can miss the point, and I would suggest that the problem with all-out speed is where a player can't get the emphasis right any more.  If you want to play music for dancing, as many of us do, then the trick is to play in a way that catches and emphasises the movement of dancers' legs and feet in an infectious way, and understanding how that is done is probably an art more than a science.  Listening to the excellent vid of John Whelan and Felix Dolan, it's interesting how John is clearly very influenced by Felix's playing (and he often nods in his direction with a smile!), although Felix's style is actually very quiet and pretty laid back.  I would guess that the recording has deliberately downplayed the volume of the keyboard, but that John could hear it more clearly while he was playing.

Despite what disco music appears to assume, dancing does not involve hard-as-nails attack immediately on the beat, it's actually much more subtle. The box matches that, and that's IMO why it works so well (although funnily enough Irish playing tends to be smoother and less 'attacky' than English).   I also think that's why pianos complement dance music so well, and violins, flutes, and bass guitars are much the same.  (And maybe also the tuba, GbH?)  Drums, mandolins, or acoustic guitars, which have more immediate attack, don't quite give the same effect. (A well-strummed acoustic guitar can approach it, but IMO it still gives a slightly messier feel to the sound.)

[GbH]

(And maybe also the tuba, GbH?) 

I guess so.  Other than the odd try, I've never attempted to play one seriously, nor have I ever been involved in dancing in any form.  So, I'm not really the best person to ask.

My own brass playing has mostly been limited to the much smaller baritone horn.  It uses the same fingering as a tuba, but has a very different mouthpiece and serves a completely different role within an ensemble.

[oggiesnr]

If you can find a copy may I reccomend John Doonan "Flute for the Feis" (sadly a "Bulmerised" Trailer LP) as an LP to listen to.  It is what it says on the cover, music for competitive dancing.

I saw Pat Nealy (my mentor) play for the dance (as I have JD). He played five tunes all day (about six hours playing) and at the end his time was as rock steady as when he started.  He saw his role as providing music for the dance and the lassie who danced last had to have as good a chance as the one who danced first and it was his job to make sure that she had the same music.

Steve

[Stiamh]

From an Irish player's point of view it's a bit odd to think about the ability to "put in" ornamentation being dependent on tempo. For most players what tends to called "ornamentation" isn't an optional extra that you can fit it if the tune is slow enough and can't manage if the tune gets fast. All the various graces are just part of the way you choose to shape the melody and they are not going to get dropped at fast tempi. The ability to execute them has to be a reflex anyway and I'd say that they are not what makes playing at insane speeds difficult.

[Anahata]

If you can find a copy may I recommend John Doonan "Flute for the Feis"

Seconded!
A fabulous album, which unfortunately I don't have any more, but I'm sure I still haven't escaped its influence.