Let's just say that when I saw "Ice breaker céilí" on the schedule for this afternoon, I was not necessarily looking forward to it. Now, I don't know what a céilí is, but I do know what an icebreaker activity is and, after years of working with teenagers and less-than-motivated teacher teams, I was expecting something that involved a name game, post it notes, balloons, string and possibly an obstacle course.
Turns out... céilí (pronounced KAY-lee) is a Gaelic social gathering which usually includes dancing. Up until now, my dancing experience has been limited to weddings where I have had too many White Russians, the Mather Teacher Talent Show and the occasional Grateful Dead cover band concert. But, always the team player, I pressed on determined not to be the worst one out there. I’m not sure that happened, but I did have a super fun afternoon learning some Irish set dances. While Michael Flatley certainly doesn’t have anything to worry about, suffice to say if someone stopped me on the street and demanded that I show them the Waltz of Limerick, the Siege of Ennis and Shoe the Donkey I could do it! I hope that happens before tomorrow though because I am afraid that there is a small chance that I may forget them.
I actually did learn something musical during my fit of physical activity. Much folk music, certainly Irish traditional music, was written for some purpose. Much “art music” is written for its own sake and is designed to be heard primarily in a concert setting. Other music was written for religious services, weddings, funerals, songs to be played while working and, in this case, for social dances. It is actually very important to keep that in mind when learning and playing this type of music. Someone will be moving to your music. This should inform the rhythm and certainly the tempo. filddle players are notorious for speeding though things. It’s fun to see a hot-shot filddle player play something that is 100 miles per hour, when in reality many things should be slowed down so that they are at a reasonable tempo to dance to.
My experience here will afford me the opportunity to hear and work with many famous Irish musicians. While many of the names are unfamiliar to me as a non-Irish player, I can certainly appreciate the accomplishments and abilities of these folks. The lecture that I listened to today was by Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin who spoke on a historically famous collection of Irish tunes. He is a professor, musicologist, recording artist and many other things. He is a phenomenal pianist. I could have listened to him play for hours. Most of his subject matter is far too specific to note here, but one of the themes that he kept touching on was the idea that the traditional tunes are actually a living thing. The collection of tunes that were notated in this, the first, famous collection were only a snapshot of a tune and how it might have been played in the 18th century. The tradition was constantly changing, songs were being added, forgotten and then reintroduced. He even talked about different instruments and how they came to be known as Irish “traditional” instruments. I thought that he was extremely open minded for someone of his position. Often people who are academics or traditional “purists” seem very inflexible towards things and avow that certain things have to be done the “right” way. If you’re not doing something a particular way, then that is “wrong”. It is not part of the style, tradition or genre. He was very cognizant of the fact that the tradition was always changing and adapting and music can move in and out of the tradition.
That was all a precursor to the couple of sessions that I went to later in the day and into the evening. A session is basically vernacular for a group getting together to play music. House sessions are often more informal and then, of course there are sessions at pubs which can be fast and furious. A nice feature of this school is that the students can immediately put into practice the material they learn in a real-world setting, or in this case, a real pub setting.Folk music is music of the people and while there is traditional music played in concert settings, it is meant to be played in social groups and in public by amateur and professional musicians.
I got together with some of my fellow students for a house session that was very lovely. We played 10-15 songs, some of which I knew and could play along. It was moving along at a moderate pace, people were calling songs and asking if people knew them. There was plenty of opportunity to know what was being played (I was actually taking notes).
This all changed when the session at the pub started. I don't know if it was a typical session for a pub in Ireland, I think that it was probably larger than normal since there were so many music students nearby. Anyhow, I found it very exhilarating. There were fiddles, Irish flutes,, Irish flutes, bodhrán, a concertina, whistles, guitar and button accordions which they refer to as a "box". There isn't really any calling of songs, people just start to play and then everyone who knows the song jumps in. Oh... and they play songs in groups of 3 called sets so, often they will seamlessly transition from one song to the next because certain songs are customarily played in sets with certain other songs. The songs go zipping along. I found that, more often than not, if you ask someone who just finished a song what that song was called, they don't know the title- even though they just got finished playing it. I stopped trying to take notes at this point.
So that was going well until someone moved a table and people would come up one at a time and dance along with the music. That was quite something to see as everyone is smushed together in the corner of the bar. Needless to say, I imagined that I was having an authentic Irish experience at that point until, after one of the sets, one woman started to sing. She sang a capella, a long, lamenting ballad during which the entire bar was silent. The next time it happened, a different woman did the same thing, only she sang in Gaelic. That was about the time that I thought I should put my fiddle away and stop pretending.
I'll try again tomorrow.
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