Dedicated to Arch Stanton!
Two scottishes from page two of the book. Just a reminder for US listeners, a scottish is NOT Scottish. And it’s not a schottische. It’s a scottish, a French couples dance, medium tempo, in four. These are two scottishes played on my A flat organetto.
This is #94 in the Bal Folk Tune Book Project. A beautiful three part waltz that is very much in G, until you get to the third part and there’s an extended bit in D minor! I ask you! So fun.
Recorded on June 20, 2020, this is the first time I played with another human since the shut downs started in March. Brigid came up the day before Father’s Day and — though it wasn’t her intention — it was her gift to me. We used two phones to record, one near her facing me, and the other near me facing her. This way, both instruments can be heard well — I am very pleased with the outcome!
Dedicated to Melissa Hinnen!
(Also, I flub the ending for the sake of authenticity. Yeah. That’s it. Authenticity!)
Something of a theme for this entry in the Bal Folk Tune Book Project. I noticed that a number of mazurkas I play have a characteristic of beginning the B section with the IV chord. It creates a lovely sense of levitation and, if the song were telling a story, I think that’s when you would know the two of them were really in love!
It happens often enough in mazurkas that I am beginning to think this is a defining trait of a subset, but it doesn’t only happen in mazurkas. As I was recording the mazurkas, I remembered the tune, “Mominette” (by Maxou, in the tune book as untitled #26), which also goes to the IV chord at the B section and is quite lovely (especially as the A section has a ominous tone. Will things work out??? Yes, yes they will. You know because of the IV chord.)
Also, with the mazurkas, the first is a sans nom tune that I began to call “Hannibal’s Mazurka” some years ago (I was teaching the ancient Romans at the time). If anyone knows a different name, let me know. I can be taught!
Two bourrées for the Bal Folk Tune Book Project (#78 and 53). You can see the dust motes going by in the morning sun.
L'Accordeonaire 