Annotation:Happy to Meet Sorry to Part
Back to Happy to Meet Sorry to Part
HAPPY TO MEET {AND SORRY TO PART} ("Is Sultmar An Casad's/Teagmail's Uaigneac An Sgarad/Scaramain" or "Ríméad ar Chastáil"). AKA and see "Jemmie/Jemmy the Gom," "Sorry to Part." Irish (originally), New England; Double Jig. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB (Cole, O'Neill/1915): AABB (Breathnach, Flaherty, Miller & Perron, Tubridy): AABA (Howe): AABB' (O'Neill/1850 & 1001): AA'BB' (Taylor). O'Neill could find no previously published version in Irish sources, though he did find one printing in an American volume of miscellaneous dance music (Irish Folk Music, p. 101). However, it was included (and easy to find) in Boston publisher Elias Howe's 1000 Jigs and Reels (c. 1867, which included many Irish compositions, along with Scotch, American and "Ethiopian" melodies), in a section of tunes from the playing of Jimmy Norton, "The Boss Jig Player." Norton was presumably a band-leader or principal instrumentalist in the eastern Massachusetts area in the mid-1800's. See also the related "Priest's Jig"/"Port an tSagairt" and the slip jig "My Mind Will Never be Easy." "You'll Go a Hunting No More" is a a more distanced member of the tune "Happy to Meet" tune family.
Source for notated version: flute player Jim Conroy, 1969 (Co. Galway) [Breathnach]; accordion player Joe Fallon (b. 1935, Collooney, Co. Sligo) [Flaherty]; Bob Spence, "a fellow boarder, 1870" [O'Neill]; set dance music recorded at Na Píobairí Uilleann, late 1980's [Taylor].
Printed sources: Breathnach (CRE II), 1976; No. 28, p. 17. Cole (1000 Fiddle Tunes), 1940; p. 55. Flaherty (Trip to Sligo), 1990; p. 102. Howe (1000 Jigs and Reels), c. 1867; p. 50. Miller & Perron (New England Fiddlers Repertoire), 1983; No. 23. O'Neill (O'Neill's Irish Music), 1915; No. 177, p. 97. O'Neill (Music of Ireland: 1850 Melodies), 1903; No. 807, p. 150. O'Neill (Dance Music of Ireland: 1001 Gems), 1907; No. 78, p. 29. Ryan's Mammoth Collection, 1883; p. 83. Taylor (Music for the Sets: Blue Book), 1995; p. 30. Tubridy (Irish Traditional Music, vol. 1), 1999; p. 30.
Recorded sources: Cló Iar Chonnachta CICD 165, John Wynne & John McEvoy - "Pride of the West" (2007. Learned from Roscommon flute player Patsy Hanly, who had the tune from fiddle and flute player John Joe Gardiner of Ballymote, County Sligo). RCA 60939, Chieftains - "Another Country."
See also listings at:
Alan Snyder's Cape Breton Fiddle Recording Index [1]
Jane Keefer's Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [2]
Alan Ng's Irishtune.info [3]