Monthly Archives: September 2019

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A.B.Hornpipe / Turel’s Hornpipe

Two hornpipes of which I have grown very fond. ‘A.B.Hornpipe’ is from a manuscript, dated 1799, which belonged to William Mittell of New Romney in Kent. Some of Mittell’s tunes were included in a book, William Mittell His Book, edited by Blowzabella melodeon player Dave Roberts. The rest – including this one – are on the Village Music Project website.

‘Turel’s Hornpipe’ is from a somewhat later source – a manuscript compiled  between 1848 and 1850 by fiddle player and shoemaker William Winter (1774-1861), now published as William Winter’s Quantocks Tune Book by the Halsway Manor Society. You can read more about Winter and his music in this Musical Traditions article by Geoff Woolfe. and you can purchase the book (with an accompanying CD featuring Nancy Kerr, Miranda Rutter, Tim van Eyken and Rob Harbron) from the Halsway Manor online shop. Highly recommended.

 

A.B.Hornpipe / Turel’s Hornpipe

Played on G/D anglo-concertina

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Gracious Lady / The Peruvian Boy

Two more tunes from the Winders of Wyresdale. Both are in F in the original manuscript, but I play them in G and D respectively.

‘The Peruvian Boy’ is from the H.S. Jackson MS, and the only references I can find to this tune on the internet all point back to this single source.

‘Gracious Lady’ is from James Winder according to Andy Hornby’s book, although this page at abcnotation.com has it coming from Edward Winder (and is shown in 4/4 not 2/4). I hadn’t been able to find any other versions online (although do check out this performance of a completely unrelated Irish tune by the same name). However the “similar tunes” feature at abcnotation.com points to a very similar tune in D, ‘Lord Randall’s Bride’, which appears to be a Scottish tune – here’s another version in G, transcribed from an Adam Rennie 78.

Gracious Lady / The Peruvian Boy

Played on G/D anglo-concertina

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The New Grinders / New Drops of Brandy

Two more tunes from Andy Hornby’s collection The Winders of Wyresdale. Check out the ‘Winder Family’ tag for more on this blog.

I used these a few years ago at a West Country Concertina Players’ weekend in Somerset. By the end of the weekend I’d decided that ‘New Drops of Brandy’ (from James Winder’s MS) was OK, but not significantly more interesting than the old ‘Drops of Brandy’. However I think ‘The New Grinders’ (from the H.S. Jackson MS) is a rather fine tune.

Incidentally, having seen Andy Hornby do a presentation on the Winders earlier this year, I can confirm that – as I thought – the first syllable of their surname rhymes with the wind in windmill, not winding.

The New Grinders

New Drops of Brandy

Played on G/D anglo-concertina