Tony O’Rourke is a well-known Melbourne musician. Listen in while he attempts to teach Gerry Gaffney traditional Irish music on the guitar. There are over 70 individual lessons, all freely available here or via iTunes.
Accompanying the lessons are downloadable books with commentary, sheet music, tab, and chords.
Tony attended the Newstead Folk Festival, near Castlemaine in Victoria, Australia, in January 2013. Sean Kenan took some photos and gave us permission to publish them here.
Tony O’Rourke plays banjo – Photo by Sean Kenan
Left-to-right: Adrian Clarke (fiddle), Rob Zielinski (fiddle), Sean Kenan(fiddle), Simon Leverton (guitar), Tony O’Rourke(banjo), with piper Pat Lyons looking on. Photo by Sean Kenan.
A listener asks: “Can your lessons be adapted to 4-string tenor guitar playing if it’s tuned DGBE? Looks like the first lesson in Book 1 works fine.”
I play tenor banjo tuned GDAE and some CGDA, but have no experience with DGBE on a banjo.
However, as these are the same highest 4 strings tuning as a guitar, then you would be able to play any tunes that don’t have notes lower than D using the same fingering as you would on the guitar.
What to do with tunes that have notes lower than D? Well, this occurs all the time with instruments such as D Flute, tin whistle, and Uillean Pipes, where the lowest note is in fact D.
What practitioners of these instruments do is extemporise, that is re-create the phrasing of those lower notes (notes that are non-existent on their instruments) and “put in something” to fit the instrument. In other words alter the melody.
The last tune in this clip is Farrell O’Gara, a tune that uses a number of low A & B notes. Played on fiddle and concertina there is no problem, as both instruments contain all the notes to the tune, including low A and Low B.
In the second clip you might be able to hear the flute player re-phrasing the tune to fit the instrument, the flute not having the Low A and Low B. In fact she does it with the next tune also, Lads Of Laoise, which contains both low B and Low A.
I guess it’s worth considering that by using a DGBE as compared to a GDAE tuning you are sacrificing half an octave of notes, that is G, A, B, C and their sharps. But it’s also worth noting that Gerry O’Connor uses a CGDA tuning so he doesn’t have Low G, A, or B in the third clip.
Another advantage of learning GDAE tuning is that it is the same as mandolin tuning, so at some stage in the future if you decide to play mandoline then apart from some adjustment for the smaller fretboard the switch is pretty easy.
Of course there’s nothing wrong with using a number of different tunings. I myself use GDAE on banjo and mandoline, occasionally CGDA on banjo, EADGBE on guitar, and also two open tunings on guitar – DADF#AD (open D) and EAC#EAE (open A).
Hope this helps, good luck with it.
Here’s a video of Tony playing two tunes at the Féile Chois Cuain traditional Irish Music Festival in Louisburgh, County Mayo, in 2012.
Two reels – The Killarney Boys of Pleasure, and The Ashtray on the Altar.
Tom Cussen working on one of his superlative banjos in his workshop
I was lucky enough to land on Tom Cussen’s doorstep the day before RTÉ were due to film the band Shaskeen for a forthcoming documentary, and so it was off to Pat Jordan’s pub in Clarinbridge, and what a great night of music it was. Tom, by the way, makes instruments that are superb to look at and to hear.
Tom Cussen, Maureen Brown, Eamonn Cotter and Charlie Harris at Pat Jordan’s pub in Clarinbridge
I’d met Sean Tyrell briefly many years ago when he was playing with Paddy Keenan in Melbourne. He’s a fine singer and knows his way around a guitar. Eamonn Cotter (flute) was there, as was Charlie Harris (accordeon). I’ve spent many a day learning tunes from their recordings. And of course Tom Cussen, who has had a big influence on my playing, on banjo.
Shaskeen’s new CD – “Walking up Town”
The one person I’d never met was Maureen Brown, a fiddler that Tom used to play with back in London in the 60′s and 70′s. Talk about hidden gems! I know nothing about fiddles but the tone she gets from her instrument is like nothing I’ve heard before. If you ever come across her at a festival she is a “must see”. In a tour of many highlights she was definitely a standout. John Dooley was there. He sang on Shaskeen’s recording in the early years, along with some locals whose names I’ve not recorded.
Shaskeen’s latest CD “Walking Up Town” represents a move back to more “listening” style music and away from their dance music CDs.
More from Tony and Noel at Noel’s sop in Nenagh.
You can see the video on the Comhaltas site.
Tony played banjo, with Noel McQuaid on accompaniment, at Noel’s music shop in Nenagh. Recorded on May 17th, 2012.
You can see the video on the Comhaltas site. Tony says they should have had make-up artists in attendance. Judge for yourself!
Tony O’Rourke is currently in Ireland.
Between 4th and 7th of May, he will be giving a concert and guitar workshop in Louisburgh, Co. Mayo, at Féile Chois Chuain.
From 18th to 20th of May, he will be attending the Galway Fleadh in Clifden, in Connemara.
He’ll also try to get to the Offaly and Mayo Fleadhanna, but his itinerary is flexible.
He also attended the Leitrim Fleadh – unfortunately Gerry was too disorganised to update the website in time for that one (27th to 29th of April).
Keep an eye out for him (he’ll also be selling his CDs, so you can get a signed copy).
The “Yellow Tinker” is a tune in the G mixolydian mode. In other words the scale used is a C Scale but played in the key of G.
The tune is associated with the playing of Galway accordionist Joe Burke , and perhaps because of Burke, it is very popular and widely played.
The first and third parts of the tune are almost pure mixolydian, whilst the second part of the tune is almost pure G Major, although Tony didn’t alter the key signature for the second part, despite there being an argument for doing so. Overall he just felt it was more convenient to leave t
A distinguishing feature of the Mixolydian mode is that the chord progression typically consists of G chords and F chords.
With the small exception of the C chord in bar 20, the entire tune is a three-chord wonder, but the chords are G, D, and F (not G, D, and C).
The “Swedish Jig”’”, sometimes known as Arthur Darley’s, is a most unusual tune.
In the first part of the tune a time signature change occurs in bar 7 from the standard 6/8 to a 9/8, just for one bar, before reverting back to 6/8. In effect you play an extra half a bar.
Also the first part consists of 12 bars rather than the standard eight.
The A part is in D Major, but changes to D Minor for the second part, and then back to D Major for the third part. Both the second and third parts have 8 bars.
The chords are D, A, G, Dm, A7 and Gm.
Polish in origin, mazurkas are not very common in Irish music.
Sonny’s Mazurka is arguably the most well known of the mazurkas played in Ireland.
As mazurkas are written in 3/4 time the rules that you use for waltzes also apply to mazurkas. In this tune most of the bars have a crotchet on the first beat followed by two groups of quavers over the next two beats.
As an accompaniment, a basic strum consisting of a bass note on the first beat followed by full or partial chord strums for each of the next two beats in each bar would be quite sufficient. In other words treat your accompaniment the same way you would a standard waltz.
Note the B Minor chord in Bar 3 of the second part of the tune. D would be quite acceptable but B Minor just sounds a bit nicer to Tony’s ear.
Chords are D, G, A and Bm.