Annotation:De'il Stick the Minister (1)
Tune properties and standard notation
DE'IL STICK THE/DA MINISTER. See "Deal/Devil Stick the Minister." AKA and see "This is no my ain Hoose," "This is no my ain Lassie," "Sean Triubhas." Scotland, Country Dance or Reel; Shetland, Shetland Reel. D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. The tune is known throughout Scotland and the Shetlands, although in different versions, and is a very old melody from the days when covenanting ministers tried to stop fiddling as a "disreputable practice." A story goes that in one district the minister broke up all the fiddles except for one which a man, who could not bear to see his instrument destroyed, had hidden under a haystack. It was this unknown fiddler who supposedly composed the tune in protest of the destruction. The melody appears (as "Stick the Minister") in the Bodleian Manuscript (in the Bodleian Library, Oxford), inscribed "A Collection of the Newest Country Dances Performed in Scotland written at Edinburgh by D.A. Young, W.M. 1740." It was also included in the music manuscript collection of Northumbrian musician William Vickers (about whom, unfortunately nothing is known). "Deil Stick" is a relative of "This is no my ain Lassie," as is the tune "Sean Truibhas," and a similar melodic theme appears in "This is no my ain Hoose." Emmerson (1972) confirms that "Sean Truibhas," or "Seann Triubhas Willighan," is a set of "Deil Stick." The melodic association continues in the use of the "De'il Stick the Minister" for the dance called Sean Truibhas, so called because it was performed in tartan trousers rather than a kilt.
Source for notated version: A. Peterson (Shetland) [Anderson & Georgeson].
Printed sources: Anderson & Georgeson (Da Mirrie Dancers), 1970; p. 22. Hunter (Fiddle Music of Scotland), 1988; No. 210.
Recorded sources: