Celtic/Folk Music On Free Bass Accordion

[Walker]

I was delighted to see some new videos on YouTube, of the very fine Danish accordionist Rune Barslund. He is playing Scottish & Irish tunes (and also his own Celtic inspired creations) using the extra musical possibilities of free bass!

I think this is wonderful as I have been very interested in developing a similar concept, of Celtic music using free bass for quite a while too. I am glad there are at least two of us in the same club (even if we didn't realise it)! I would love to see more folk/traditional musicians using free bass for different music, rather than only classical.

Here's an Irish piece:



And a Scottish one:


Wonderful work Rune! I might even be ready to share my own latest Celtic free bass creation shortly.

 

[saundersbp]

I would love to see more folk/traditional musicians using free bass for different music, rather than only classical.

I found freebass is a perfect companion for a lot of folky tunes and glad to see someone else doing it.
Rune makes a lovely sound (with dollops of post production magic) evoking scented candles, bath salts, celtic body piercing jewellery, neck buffs and shoulder length hair. More please!

 

[Walker]

I like your humour @saundersbp, but this music is nicer than a new age stereotype that haunts Glastonbury Tor. It's an interpretation of the music of the Irish uilleann pipes or the tunes of the fiddle. To me it has style and elegance that endures longer than the post production reverb (though I like that too).

 

[saundersbp]

This music is so much older than the Glastonburyites! I am a succour for Victorian sentimentality and they hit the bullseye with the invention/consolidation of Celtic-ness. We stand on the shoulders of the giants that romanticised a pastoral life that never existed and because it's lovely idea it's worth taking to heart with a bit of British humour. More please, especially in Farrow & Ball colours and even more reverb if possible!

Or this Irish guitar vs banjo duel is rather brilliant?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2QyzHANZBc

 

[CC_PDX]

Thanks for sharing. Those are both lovely! It seems like, on a big box, slower Airs with sustained drones like that can work particularly well. I was also very tempted to go down the free bass route in order to get more precise / sparse harmonies and control what notes play in folk/trad/Irish.

If you play an Irish tune on Stradella with the thirds baked in, it can often sound more like bluegrass (which is fine, too). I could somewhat fake it back a bit toward the Irish sound by only using the single bass notes, but even then, my lightest MM reed combination made that sound quite muddy in combined notes -- that conundrum is actually what prompted my recent question about modifying couplers.

In the end, I opted instead for the super-minimal Darwin bass specifically to 1) Cut the overall weight down considerably to allow for faster bellows response, more rhythmic push-pull for faster jigs, reels, hornpipes, etc. and 2) be able to strip out the thirds in the LH.

My recently-acquired box with the Darwin bass has an option to drop the chords (5ths) which effectively gives you two octaves of free bass, albeit in a different layout. Haven't played around with that too much, but it offers some cool possibilities.

I was delighted to see some new videos on YouTube, of the very fine Danish accordionist Rune Barslund. He is playing Scottish & Irish tunes (and also his own Celtic inspired creations) using the extra musical possibilities of free bass!

I think this is wonderful as I have been very interested in developing a similar concept, of Celtic music using free bass for quite a while too. I am glad there are at least two of us in the same club (even if we didn't realise it)! I would love to see more folk/traditional musicians using free bass for different music, rather than only classical.

 

[saundersbp]

My recently-acquired box with the Darwin bass has an option to drop the chords (5ths) which effectively gives you two octaves of free bass

Some examples attached of things I've found work well in folky tunes (beyond the rhythmic punch of the stradella in dance music or the ubiquitous dreamy scented candle /misty lochs style) are below:

• All around my hat - concealing the 'drone' in the tenor part for the chorus and using bare 5ths for the verse
• Raggle taggle - playing in a single bass part only.
• Bonny ship the diamond - using broken chords omitting 3rd

The nice thing about a freebass in folk music is you really can do whatever you imagine rather than trying to fit it in with a modern system of predefined chords.

 

[dunlustin]

See

Darwin system 3 modèles

Mes accordéons diatoniques - Modèles

www.diatoz.fr

( + Google Tr?)

PS 3rds seem to be the commonest glitch. Also true for guitar, Rock Guitar (see Power chords) and just about any older music.
Even jazz piano often hints at the LH chord with 'shells' / just the essentials say minor 3rd and flat 7 notes. Great to have the choice.
Quite a change from 19th century tutors where harrmonising in 3rds is almost compulsory.

 

[John M]

Some examples attached of things I've found work well in folky tunes (beyond the rhythmic punch of the stradella in dance music or the ubiquitous dreamy scented candle /misty lochs style) are below:

• All around my hat - concealing the 'drone' in the tenor part for the chorus and using bare 5ths for the verse
• Raggle taggle - playing in a single bass part only.
• Bonny ship the diamond - using broken chords omitting 3rd

The nice thing about a freebass in folk music is you really can do whatever you imagine rather than trying to fit it in with a modern system of predefined chords.

Thank you for music sheet attachments. What do the "red" notes signify?
John M.

 

[Walker]

Thank you for the link @dunlustin, very informative. I hope to explore the details of Darwin system further!

Also, thanks @saundersbp for the terrific insight on free bass and Celtic/Folk music. I fully agree with your comment here...
​

The nice thing about a freebass in folk music is you really can do whatever you imagine rather than trying to fit it in with a modern system of predefined chords.​

Since we were speaking of the Darwin system, I do think there is a certain evolution occurring in various styles of folk music. I certainly recognise the style referred to here...​

beyond the rhythmic punch of the stradella in dance music​

Yet, I find the stradella bass/chords used as a steady rhythm section in dance music is becoming less dominant here, and the strong Scottish musette tunings are fading, a bit. They are partly being replaced by more 'folky' sounds, with less structured melodies and a greatly reduced bass line. It's not really what I recognise, but hey, things change - I'll get over it. Still, for my Hogmanay Ceilidh this year I'll stick with the Shand formula of traditional music, as described above.

Also regarding:​

or the ubiquitous dreamy scented candle /misty lochs style​

Hands up, I recognise the misty loch style! I find it to be irresistible (nobody's perfect).

However, this description is great - both subtle and informative.​

​

• All around my hat - concealing the 'drone' in the tenor part for the chorus and using bare 5ths for the verse​
• Raggle taggle - playing in a single bass part only.​
• Bonny ship the diamond - using broken chords omitting 3rd​

Out of interest, in the last piece of music I have been working on using free bass (which I have not yet shared), I have been using a slightly different method (can't rule out the scented candles though), to the ideas above. I have been doing a little switch around and writing the simple, single line melody (the tune) on the bass of the accordion (in bassoon voice) and adding a little counterpoint and light harmonies etc. on the treble, above the melody bass (in clarinet voice). This is perhaps another option open to the musician looking to find new ways to express their music.

I now rather think, the title of Celtic Music On Free Bass Accordion, isn't entirely capturing the possibilities and variety of folk styles. It potentially encapsulates a variety of English folk music (which seems to be ever increasing in popularity in TV series such as The Detectorists and the new Wurzel Gummidge), and also Scandinavian tunes or music of the Baltic lands, such as Estonia etc. Who knows, maybe even at some point, if the music becomes sophisticated enough, it transfers from the realms of the folk spectrum and emerges in the pages of the Classical books. The possibilities are endless.
​

 

[saundersbp]

What do the "red" notes signify?

Repeater rows

 

[Walker]

There is something that I struggle with a bit, regarding musical interpretation...

Rune Barslund (above) is a folk musician who plays folk music using the extra possibilities of free bass (sometimes called a classical accordion). I like this direction of musical development. His tunes to me sound awesome, even if they are a little romanticised, or as our @saundersbp might say - there's a whiff of dreamy scented candles...

However, it seems there is another possible direction. For example, we have another Danish accordionist here, Bjarke Morgensen, who is a classical musician, but who reinterprets folk music (amongst other styles) using the full repertoire of classical techniques on free bass accordion.

Here's a piece called Fantasy on a Folk Song from Bornholm.



In some ways the music sounds next level and is massively impressive. However, with the greatest of respect, maybe the dramatic nature of the interpretation is... overpowering. Somehow the charm of the folk music is lost. Did the air from those great powerful bellows just blow-out the dreamy scented candles? Or perhaps it's fanning the flames...

 

[saundersbp]

However, with the greatest of respect, maybe the dramatic nature of the interpretation is... overpowering. Somehow the charm of the folk music is lost.

I agree, all a bit too fussy/precious. If you want to look at the very best Fantasias on a simple melody look closer to home.

 

[Walker]

These engulfing waves of sound are just epic. I could listen to Vaughan Williams non-stop. I hear this piece at work on Classic FM almost every day (I've not graduated to Radio 3 yet). Vaughan Williams, what a giant of a composer!

Butterworth's Bank of Green Willow is great too, but gentler and more smouldering (to start with anyway). You can palpably hear the rolling country idyll here. English Classical music is quite incredible.

Also, in a similar style, the Scottish composer Hamish MacCunn's Land of the Mountain and the Flood, captures something of the majesty of the countryside - again from high above an idealised glimmering loch.



As you say @saundersbp, the Victorians knew what they were doing. This music is a real treasure.

 

[saundersbp]

Very spirited music and new to me! Pure victoriana!

 

[vivdunstan]

Also, in a similar style, the Scottish composer Hamish MacCunn's Land of the Mountain and the Flood, captures something of the majesty of the countryside - again from high above an idealised glimmering loch.

That was the very first tune I played in when I joined the Borders Schools Orchestra aged about 10, as a very lowly second violinist. Quite an introduction to orchestral music, and yes extremely Scottish!

 

[Walker]

Here's a new recording...



I like it! But are some of the bass chords a bit jazzy? I would maybe prefer a little of the melody on the bass, to give a bit more texture and variety to the arrangement...

 

[boxplayer4000]

I like this version and find it close to what I think the composer, Burns, would have approved of. It’s been kept simple and not over arranged with complicated chords, bass lines or harmonies. In fact the very opposite of the treatment given to Burns in a fairly recent BBC tribute where a large, badly formed and arranged orchestra played melodies I’ve known all my long life and managed to make them unrecognisable.

 

[hais1273]

I find this to be a gorgeous version of Fantasia on Thomas Tall www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihx5LCF1yJY, it's worth listening to earbuds or earphones and wallowing in the beautiful harmonies and technical musical goings on. I love it.

Over in the Breton world many Fest-noz ( Bal folk) bands have a brief flirtation with a jazzy feel. This works well enough for listening to, well sometimes. Some bands release a "jazzy" album and often revert a more "straightforward" style. Speaking as a dancer, I want a good steady rhythm and tempo and clear articulation to accent the different parts of the dance.
Musicians need to be aware that interesting musical shenanigans don't always work for the dancers, someone I know vaguely wrote a nice enough tune for a Breton Hanter-dro. Fine to listen too, but really not great to dance to, in fact for dancing it didn't really work at all he used a lot of left hand drones and block chords which didn't really get the feet going. The tune or the player lacked rhythm in the melody. Maybe in ensemble it might have worked with one or two other musicians playing a rhythm part. Personally, I find a simple stradella approach works well for most dances.

 

[Walker]

I like this version and find it close to what I think the composer, Burns, would have approved of. It’s been kept simple and not over arranged with complicated chords, bass lines or harmonies. In fact the very opposite of the treatment given to Burns in a fairly recent BBC tribute where a large, badly formed and arranged orchestra played melodies I’ve known all my long life and managed to make them unrecognisable.

I'm 90 percent with you! There is much to agree with and simplicity certainly is a wonderful thing.

But I struggle with this, just a little bit :

find it close to what I think the composer, Burns, would have approved of

Here's how I read it...

Maybe Burns did know the tune but maybe he didn't...

Indeed, Burns wrote the poem Ae Fond Kiss in 1791, however he did not compose the melody. Our friend Rune has credited John M. Diack of Glasgow (1869 - 1946) with the tune. To be fair, he was an interesting Victorian gentleman of Classical training, who amongst other achievements was founder of the Glasgow Bach Choir (1906) and the Scottish Country Dance Society in 1923. However, this venerable gentleman did not compose the melody either! We have to look a little further back and to a different neck of the woods than where Burns or Diack hailed.

The Highland fiddle player, Captain Simon Fraser of Knockie (1773 to 1852) was a composer and collector of old tunes and Mo riun an diugh mar an de thu was collected in The Simon Fraser Collection, of music of the Highlands and Isles from 1715 to 1745. His work (essentially writing down/discovering old tunes) was not published until 1816, but the tune of Gaelic name is essentially the melody we hum out today.

So Burns may well have approved of the way his poem was set to music. But we don't really know who wrote the melody and, if the Glaswegian, Diack put the two together, it was most certainly long after Burns passed away. Also, one might consider that the accordion (either stradella bass with Scottish musette or straight tuned & free bass etc) being a rather modern invention, would be completely unknown to Burns. Certainly some of the chord progressions in the tune above are not that 'traditional' - in the modern sense of the word, as emerged in the Scottish (accordion) dance band style - that is around a century old, give or take...

But seeing as the Highland fashion was woven by such clever Victorians as Diack, maybe it doesn't matter where in the mists of time a clearer understanding of the tune lurks.

What would I do? Well, I would go back to the harp for inspiration as it is indeed a far more ancient instrument than the accordion or even the fiddle, and is characterised by more elegant and artistic musical output than the typical dance music of the accordion (that has become a tradition). I would love to hear the accordion try to replicate a clarsach as the low gentle air is plucked on the strings while the sweet chords embellish the tune from above. Ah, heavenly.

Like I say, there's more than one way to achieve simplicity...​

 

[Walker]

I find this to be a gorgeous version of Fantasia on Thomas Tall www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihx5LCF1yJY, it's worth listening to earbuds or earphones and wallowing in the beautiful harmonies and technical musical goings on. I love it.

Over in the Breton world many Fest-noz ( Bal folk) bands have a brief flirtation with a jazzy feel. This works well enough for listening to, well sometimes. Some bands release a "jazzy" album and often revert a more "straightforward" style. Speaking as a dancer, I want a good steady rhythm and tempo and clear articulation to accent the different parts of the dance.
Musicians need to be aware that interesting musical shenanigans don't always work for the dancers, someone I know vaguely wrote a nice enough tune for a Breton Hanter-dro. Fine to listen too, but really not great to dance to, in fact for dancing it didn't really work at all he used a lot of left hand drones and block chords which didn't really get the feet going. The tune or the player lacked rhythm in the melody. Maybe in ensemble it might have worked with one or two other musicians playing a rhythm part. Personally, I find a simple stradella approach works well for most dances.

Totally agree. For dance music, keep it simple and keep it stradella!

By the way, that Fantasia is staggering!