Category Archives: Slip Jig
Elizabeth Kelly’s Delight (Ador)Â Â
This slip jig, “Elizabeth Kelly’s Delight,” is tune #68 in Breandán Breathnach’s (1912–1985) Ceol Rince na hÉireann 1 (1963).  It is on Edel Fox’s CD The Sunny Banks (2013).  She’s a great concertina player. The alternate title “Catherine Kelly’s” is from Martin Hayes, on his CD Under the Moon (1995).  Some say that it’s a […]
The Snowy Path (D)
“The Snowy Path” slip jig was composed by guitarist Mark Kelly, of Altan. Play it nice and clear and not too fast. This is a good tune to learn by ear.  The tune starts on F#.  You can listen to it on Altan’s CD Harvest Storm (1992), with a flute solo by Frankie Kennedy. You […]
Drops of Brandy (D)
“Drops of Brandy” is a solid but simple slip jig often played in D or G.  It is #448 in O’Neill’s 1001 (1907), in G. It is in Phil Rubenzer’s Midwestern Irish Session Tunes (2000) in both D and G (pp. 219-20). James Merryweather, author of Merryweather’s Tunes for English Bagpipes (1989, pg. 47), holds […]
Foxhunter’s Jig (D)
“Foxhunter’s Jig” is a slip jig. The title of this four-part slip jig concerns, of course, an over-hill-and-dale foxhunt. Thus, a few desultory comments are in order. The earliest known notation of this tune is c. 1847, where it is entitled “Dublin Gigg-a-Jigg” (in A) – both are old spellings of “jig,” and“gigg-a-jigg” is the hoary […]
Dever the Dancer (Edor)
“Dever the Dancer” is a common session slip jig, and has been recorded many times. It appears in O’Neill’s 1850, tune #1147, and O’Neill’s 1001, tune #431, so it is at least as old as the late nineteenth century. It has long been a popular slip jig in Ireland. As was all too common in […]
A Fig for a Kiss (G)
This slip jig is usually called “A Fig for a Kiss.”  Now, people like to speculate about tune titles, and this one seems to confuse people pretty often, given the things posted about it online — not to mention the very different things that are designated by the word “fig.”  However, it’s actually not hard to understand […]
Kid on the Mountain (Eaeol)
In the slip jig “Kid on the Mountain,” the “kid” in the title is a young goat, of course, not some human child stranded on some high wind-blown wintry mountain in Jaunary.  When I play it I like to think of the kid as traversing a rocky slope on a nice Spring day. Now this […]
Hardiman the Fiddler (Dmix)
The slip jig “Hardiman the Fiddler” is thought to have been named in honor of James Hardiman, who was the first librarian of Queen’s College in Galway and author of Irish Minstrelsy: Or Bardic Remains (1831). This tune probably dates back to his time. It shows up in O’Neill’s 1850 as tune #1117, and O’Neill’s 1001 as […]
The Butterfly (Edor)
“The Butterfly” slip jig is very popular among (some) musicians and dancers, and shows up in John Sayles’s much-loved film The Secret of Roan Inish (1994). It is a three-part tune and is played AABBCC. Though commonly called “The Butterfly,” it is claimed to also be called “Bill Grogan’s Goat” or “Barney’s Goat.” As the version of “Barney’s Goat” I looked […]
Give Us a Drink of Water (G)
There are, in fact, two different slip jigs that go by the title “Give Us a Drink of Water.”  Both are in G, and both are two-part tunes. The first is #1530 in O’Neill’s 1850 (1903), #1131 in O’Neill’s 1001 (1907), and #420 in David J. Taylor’s Music for Sets: the Blue Book (1995). The […]