TOW#27: The Lady's Plaything

[nigelgatherer]

Tune of the Week No.27:
The Lady's Plaything



I first learned this tune when I was playing in an amateur folk group in the 1990s. It came from Matt Seattle’s excellent book ‘The Border Bagpipe Book’, but is found in Aird’s collection (c1780) as General Howe’s March. It has an unusual B part which contains twelve bars instead of the usual eight. Below you can download PDF in standard notation and tablature, as well as a bad recording of me playing it with the group in the 1990s, along with The Tailor's Shirt.

• PDF in Standard Notation with harmony
• PDF in Standard Notation and Mandolin Tablature
• MP3 (The Lady's Plaything/The Tailor's Shirt)
  

[Jack Campin]

The dedicatee:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_How...count_Howe

I didn't realize until a recently reactivated thread on Mudcat just how much of Aird's early collections relates to the war with America. "Staten Island" (in the next volume) almost certainly commemorates the battle where we came closest to putting the jumped-up seditious little pillocks in their place:

http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=7666

God bless King George and confusion to the rebels. Or something.

[Tosh Marshall]

Here is my attempt, I found this a bit tricky but battled through it in the end. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pI7RyOJU2cA
Jack, many thanks for the history lesson!
I see YouTube have changed their uploader which has problems...hint - if it ain't broke, don't fix it.......

[nigelgatherer]

Here's another (YouTube) version of it, featuring another band I was involved with in the 1990s, The Skeerwud Band:

The Lady's Plaything/The Farr Away Wedding/Brose and Butter

I liked to think of Skeerwud as a folk equivalent of the Duke Ellington Band, but perhaps not... We were led by an inventive Ulsterman, Johnny Cradden, who was a big influence to me in music. He announces the set and plays guitar. I can be seen playing mandolin in the front row.

[nigelgatherer]

Tosh - that's excellent! Just how I hear the tune in my head. Watching the video brings questions to my mind: do you learn the tune off by heart before you record it?

[John Kelly]

Good playing of the tune, Tosh. It's a rather lovely little number and a new one to me.
Nigel, that was a great performance by a big group, your Skeerwud band. i like the way the tune began, with guitar then percussion - I was wondering how you'd get a big group to start together without a conductor, but the arrangement worked well here with the guitar intro.

[Tosh Marshall]

Thanks Nigel and John for the kind words, I've been struggling lately but I'll get through it, lack of quality time.
Nigel in answer to your question, yes, I do learn the tunes off by heart before recording them, that way I don't have to look at the music and can concentrate on what I'm doing, although sometimes I make one mistake, then I make a million!!!!!! Time for a cup of tea, relax ones self and then go back to it later! It's a fun process and a great way to learn. I really enjoyed this tune and the middle four bars on the B part are interesting.
I'm with John on Skeerwud, amazing big sound by the various instrumentation and I can relate to the Duke Ellington association, it is a big band ! Great stuff.

[Trish Santer]

Great to see the Skeerwud band again! Before I joined them, but some weel-kent faces there - and sadly one or two no longer with us.