O'Neill's Music of Ireland - Over 1,000 Fiddle Tunes - New and Revised

New York: Oak Publications - A Division of Embassy Music Corporation, 1976. New and Revised . Trade Paperback. Good. 9' X 12. WeInstein, Iris - Boook and Cover Design. 254 Pages with a Comprehensive Seven Page Index. Light wear to covers at the spine, corners, and edges. The interior music pages are flawless. This is the new and revised edition with over 1,000 Jigs, Reels, Hornpipes, Long Dances and Marches in a newly printed and corrected collection of the dance music of Ireland. Includes an introduction on the history of Irish music and tips on playing with an authentic feeling. Included are settings from the playing of Michael Coleman and the Sligo Fiddle Masters. In keeping with Frances O'Neill's philosophy - his last book was released in 1916 - the editor's goal was to update and improve O'Neill's own work by drawing on the many outstanding recorded and contemporary settings that have become popular during the last fifty years. Krassen has also attempted to apply many of the characteristics of Sligo fingering to settings of less common tunes, with the aim of making them more appealing to those enchanted by the charms of Sligo fiddling. Although the Krassen was particularly anxious to include in the settings as many beautiful touches taken from the great players as possible, this intention was somewhat restricted by the format of the book and limitations of space. In a work of this size it is only possible to go through each tune once. This precludes the possibility of including many fine variations. Yet, it is the subtle art of variation that makes the playing of Michael Coleman and other great players so consistently exciting. The best players slightly alter their setting of a tune almost every time they play through it. This means that particular flourishes are used judiciously over the course of a performance, rather than being crammed all together in one run-through. Although the editor was concerned with the problem of over-embellishing the transcriptions, it was often found desirable here to utilize flourishes from several different settings in order to produce one composite version. While some of the resulting transcriptions may appear slightly overcrowded with ornamentation, Krassen was deeply aware that everything could not be included. Nevertheless, it was considered preferable to graft on certain fine touches taken from the playing of Michael Coleman and others in order to convey stylistic nuance, rather than continue the trend of publishing bland, skeletal settings. Contents in Six Parts: Jigs, Slip Jigs, Reels, Hornpipes, Set Dances, and O'Carolan's Composition.