The 63 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from the second of three sets of manuscripts written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for fiddle pupils, and donated to ITMA by Paud Collins from Knockacur, Knocknagoshel, Co Kerry. For more tunes, further information and copies of the original manuscripts, see Pádraig O’Keeffe Resources at ITMA.
Nicholas Carolan, Treasa Harkin & Jackie Small, 19 April 2014
To mark World Fiddle Day 2021 ITMA invited fiddle player Andrea Palandri to select his favourite tunes from the Caoimhín Mac Aoidh Pádraig O’Keeffe collection and other Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscripts in the ITMA collection. The 21 interactive scores on this page are accompanied by split screen videos of Andrea playing each tune.
For more information on the learning resources available please see here.
The 69 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from 16 different miscellaneous Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscripts which were given to Caoimhín Mac Aoidh by various people over the years.
Three of the manuscripts are dated, the earliest is from April 1941 and the latest dates from October 1953. Some of the tunes were written on the inside of open cigarette packets etc. The collection is made up of 16 manuscripts in total and contains the greatest number of melodeon tablature tunes in Caoimhín Mac Aoidh’s Pádraig O’Keeffe Collection.>
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript downloadable as one PDF.
The Miscellaneous collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 123 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from one of five sets of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for his pupil Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor. They have been transcribed from O’Keeffe’s unique form of fiddle-music tablature. The tunes in this manuscript (O’Connor Manuscript E) date from 3 October 1933 to 2 May 1934.
The O’Connor manuscript collection was sourced from Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor (née Horan) of Knockhorrin, Scartaglin. She originally lived at Dirreen, Scartaglin as a young girl when the manuscripts were written. Mrs O’Connor lent the collection to Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in 1984 and once copied they were returned to her in full. They consist of five school jotters which Mac Aoidh labelled, in no particular order, A, B, C, D, and E .
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The O’Connor collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 35 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from one of five sets of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for his pupil Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor. They have been transcribed from O’Keeffe’s unique form of fiddle-music tablature. The tunes in this manuscript (O’Connor Manuscript D) date from 31 August 1932 to 1 December 1932.
The O’Connor manuscript collection was sourced from Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor (née Horan) of Knockhorrin, Scartaglin. She originally lived at Dirreen, Scartaglin as a young girl when the manuscripts were written. Mrs O’Connor lent the collection to Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in 1984 and once copied they were returned to her in full. They consist of five school jotters which Mac Aoidh labelled, in no particular order, A, B, C, D, and E.
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The O’Connor collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 38 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from one of five sets of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for his pupil Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor. They have been transcribed from O’Keeffe’s unique form of fiddle-music tablature. The tunes in this manuscript (O’Connor Manuscript C) date from 29 November 1932 to 15 February 1933.
The O’Connor manuscript collection was sourced from Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor (née Horan) of Knockhorrin, Scartaglin. She originally lived at Dirreen, Scartaglin as a young girl when the manuscripts were written. Mrs O’Connor lent the collection to Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in 1984 and once copied they were returned to her in full. They consist of five school jotters which Caoimhín labelled, in no particular order, A, B, C, D, and E.
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The O’Connor collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 25 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from one of five sets of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for his pupil Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor. They have been transcribed from O’Keeffe’s unique form of fiddle-music tablature. The tunes in this manuscript (O’Connor Manuscript B) date from 28 January 1935 to 9 September 1935.
The O’Connor manuscript collection was sourced from Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor (née Horan) of Knockhorrin, Scartaglin. She originally lived at Dirreen, Scartaglin as a young girl when the manuscripts were written. Mrs O’Connor lent the collection to Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in 1984 and once copied they were returned to her in full. They consist of five school jotters which Mac Aoidh labelled, in no particular order, A, B, C, D, and E.
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The O’Connor collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 40 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from one of five sets of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for his pupil Mrs Catherine O’Connor. They have been transcribed from O’Keeffe’s unique form of fiddle-music tablature. The tunes in this manuscript (O’Connor Manuscript A) date from 19 May 1934 to 6 February 1935.
The O’Connor manuscript collection was sourced from Mrs Catherine (Kitty) O’Connor (née Horan) of Knockhorrin, Scartaglin. She originally lived at Dirreen, Scartaglin as a young girl when the manuscripts were written. Mrs O’Connor lent the collection to Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in 1984 and once copied they were returned to her in full. They consist of five school jotters which Mac Aoidh labelled, in no particular order, A, B, C, D, and E .
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The O’Connor collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 210 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from a set of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for his pupil Pat O’Connell (known locally as Páitín Connell) a small farmer from the townland of Cordal, Co. Kerry. Páitín kept his manuscripts in two biscuit tins in his kitchen. He was a near neighbour of Pádraig and remembered him with great affection. He lent Caoimhín Mac Aoidh his collection in full. Caoimhín was unable to photocopy this collection but he copied the music tablature meticulously using stencils and Rotring drafting pens.
Caoimhín Mac Aoidh writes:
Of all known existing individual collections of O’Keeffe’s fiddle tablature Paddy ‘Páitín’ O’ Connell of the townland of Cordal is the most comprehensive both in numbers of tunes and in terms of time span.
The music occurs on music paper, cigarette packs, school jotters, loose papers etc. It contains the earliest written piece of all the manuscripts, a reel called The Flowing Bowl, a version of The Piper’s Despair which bears no relation to O’Neill’s version of The Flowing Bowl. The tune was written on October 2nd, 1931. The latest tune in the collection, The Wonder Hornpipe was written on October 31st, 1962, less than five months before his death. The greatest period of writing seems to have taken place during the mid-1940’s.
The music transcriber for this current project worked from three different sources for these scores:
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The O’Connell collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 14 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from a set of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for his pupil Jerry McCarthy. Jerry played frequently with O’Keeffe before emigrating to New York where he spent some time working with Denis Murphy in the New York Zoo along with Rory O’Connor a whistle player from Doolin.
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript downloadable as one PDF
The McCarthy collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 37 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from fair copy transcriptions made of Padraig O’Keeffe’s music tablature by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh.
Caoimhín Mac Aoidh writes:
The McAuliffe Collection was sourced from Nicky McAuliffe by Máire O’Keeffe who passed them on to me. These manuscripts were not photocopied but were transcribed directly off the originals. Given his interest and abilities on the fiddle they were offered to Nicky by local past pupils of Padraig’s. It can be dated at least from January 14th, 1951 to December 23rd, 1951.
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The McAuliffe collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 91 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from a set of manuscripts originally written by Pádraig O’Keeffe. The Horan Collection was sourced from Mrs. Katie Horan (nee O’Brien). It can be dated at least from 5 June 1942 to 22 March 1949. As with the O’Connor Collection it contains the information on how to read the tablature and ornament the tunes in terms of rolls and Pádraig’s notion of “trills”.
Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available.
The Mrs. Katie Horan (nee O’Brien) collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 14 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from a set of manuscripts originally owned by Mickey Duggan a former pupil of Pádraig O’Keeffe. Some of the original manuscripts are in Pádraig O’Keeffe’s music tablature system. The tune ‘Sean Ryan’s wonder hornpipe’ is written in staff notation. Contemporary transcriptions of the individual tunes in this manuscript are also available as a downloadable PDF.
The Duggan collection is one of seven Pádraig O’Keeffe manuscript collections sourced by Caoimhín Mac Aoidh in the early 1980s. The manuscripts mainly belonged to Pádraig O’Keeffe’s pupils, and in a limited number of cases to others. Mac Aoidh photocopied the manuscripts where possible and returned the originals to their owners.
The 77 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from one of three sets of manuscripts written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for fiddle pupils, and donated to ITMA by Paud Collins from Knockacur, Knocknagoshel, Co Kerry. They have been transcribed from O’Keeffe’s unique form of fiddle-music tablature. It is clear from the manuscripts that he was a conscientious and imaginative teacher who continuously shaped the music that he taught to the proficiency level of his pupils. As his notation was used primarily as a memory-aid for pupils following on from his personal tuition of them, it sometimes lacks essential rhythmic and other information. The re-creation here of some song airs particularly is therefore to a degree speculative. For more tunes, further information and copies of the original manuscripts see Pádraig O’Keeffe Resources at ITMA.
Nicholas Carolan, Treasa Harkin & Jackie Small, 19 April 2014.
The 88 interactive scores on this page have been transcribed by ITMA staff from a copy-manuscript made of music written for an accordion pupil by the Kerry music master, musician and composer Pádraig O’Keeffe (1887–1963) in his own unique accordion notation. Although O’Keeffe was famous as a fiddle player and fiddle teacher, he also a teacher of other instruments, including the button accordion.
The manuscript has been donated to ITMA by Paud Collins from Knockacur, Knocknagoshel, Co Kerry, himself an accordion pupil of O’Keeffe’s as was his brother Dan. Three sets of fiddle manuscripts written for Paud’s brother Jer also form part of the donation, and have been made available in facsimile and as interactive music scores on the ITMA website (see Pádraig O’Keeffe Resources at ITMA) The fiddle manuscripts were written by O’Keeffe himself, but the accordion manuscript was copied for her brothers from O’Keeffe’s originals by Paud Collins’s sister Tess Drudy (who did not herself read the tablature).
In this copy-manuscript O’Keeffe displays a relatively little-known facet of his talents – an impressive knowledge of the accordion system available in his day and of the appropriate repertory for it. The manuscript embodies a creative and graded approach to teaching the instrument. Though the approach required is much different from that required for the fiddle, O’Keeffe’s first instrument, he is adept at modifying tunes in order to suit both the accordion and the level of proficiency of his pupils, and in placing tunes correctly in the most appropriate places in the instrument’s range. His fingering patterns are generally accurate and pupil-friendly.
For the transcripts presented here it is assumed that the target instrument for the notations in the manuscript was a single-row 10-key accordion or melodeon. O’Keeffe’s tablature would have been valid for an instrument pitched in any key, and there might well have been variety in the pitch of instruments played by his pupils. For convenience, in the transcripts given here, the key of D is adopted as the home key of the instrument.
In making the transcripts for these interactive scores, pragmatic decisions were made regarding problems in the manuscript. Some content in the scores is conjectural due to missing content and/or legibility problems in the manuscript. Some of these problems might be due to copying errors, since the manuscript is not in O’Keeffe’s hand.
In some scores where the tonic note is G or A, the note C natural is given because it is standard for tunes in the key of the relevant tune (G major, A minor). This note was not available on the instrument for which the manuscript probably was written. In the manuscript it was probably C sharp that was intended in those cases. These instances are indicated by an editorial note in the relevant scores.
In the case of one tune in the manuscript there was not enough information to enable the tune to be deciphered – that tune therefore was omitted.
Jackie Small, Treasa Harkin & Nicholas Carolan, 13 May 2014
The 51 interactive music scores on this page have been notated from one of three sets of manuscripts written by Pádraig O’Keeffe for fiddle pupils, and donated to ITMA by Paud Collins from Knockacur, Knocknagoshel, Co Kerry. There are 191 tunes in all in the three sets of manuscripts. For all tunes, further information and copies of the original manuscripts, see Pádraig O’Keeffe Resources at ITMA.
Nicholas Carolan, Treasa Harkin & Jackie Small, 19 April 2014
Early forms of sound recording were ‘acoustic’, that is, the sounds produced by singers and musicians were directed into a horn and cut mechanically by a vibrating needle into a groove on a cylinder or disc. The resulting playback sound was constricted and relatively unnatural. But in the mid-1920s the introduction of electric microphones and ‘electrical’ sound recording brought a great increase in fidelity of sound. It also enabled a much greater sound dynamic to be captured, and this had a particular advantage in recording large ensembles like dance bands.
Larger Irish-American bands, of the kind that had been playing in dance halls in the eastern cities since the late 19th century, took advantage of the new medium, and the recordings they made began appearing from 1926. They featured the full band ensembles, as in their performances in the halls, and also the band vocalists and instrumental soloists. The selection presented here from the collections of the Irish Traditional Music Archive represents ensembles from New York, Boston and Chicago, which comprised mainly Irish-born musicians playing traditional music. Combinations of instrumental sounds never before heard in Irish music were heard on these recordings, which give us our first insights into large Irish ensemble playing.
By way of contemporary contrast and contextualisation, the selection concludes with an ‘Irish’ song by the famous Irish-American Bing Crosby and a rendering of one of the most famous Irish melodies by what was possibly the most famous of the American big bands.
With thanks to record donors Jim Brophy, John Cullinane, Ciarán Dalton, Vincent Duffe, John Loesberg, Mrs Walter Maguire, Dan Maher, Matt Murtagh, & Kieran Owens.
Nicholas Carolan & Danny Diamond, 1 December 2011
