Annotation:Welcome Charlie Stewart

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WELCOME, CHARLIE STEWART(, YOU’RE WELCOME). AKA and see “Charlie Stewart (2),” “McAlman’s Reel,” “Queensbury House,” “Taking a Wife,” “Ye're Welcome Charlie Stewart.” Scottish, Canadian; Reel. Canada, Cape Breton. D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). ABCD (sometimes played only first and last turns of this version) [Dunlay & Greenberg, Dunlay and Reich]: AAB (Skye). The title refers to the Jacobite Prince Charlie (Stewart). MacDonald’s Skye Collection (1887) has the tune in two parts, as does Robert Bremner’s Collection (1751-1761) where it appears under the title “Queensbury House.” Dunlay and Greenberg (1996) find several tunes with similarities; in the Inverness Collection (Book II) “There’s Nae Luck About the House” has a second part that is similar to Buddy MacMaster’s second turn, and the editors believe it may have become attached to “Welcome, Prince Charlie” because the melodic contour of the first parts of both tunes is similar. They also find the second part of “Up and War Them a’ Willie” is almost the same as the first part of the “Welcome” tune. Donald MacLellan’s “Taking a Wife” is a crooked or irregular version of “Welcome, Charlie Stewart.” See notes for “Annotation:Ye're Welcome Charlie Stewart” for more history and Scottish versions of the piece.

Source for notated version: Buddy MacMaster (Cape Breton), who had the last turn from Joe MacLean who found it in a collection [Dunlay & Greenberg, Dunlay and Reich].

Printed sources: Dunlay & Greenberg (Traditional Celtic Violin Music of Cape Breton), 1996; p. 82. Dunlay and Reich (Traditional Celtic Fiddle Music of Cape Breton), 1986; p. 55. MacDonald (The Skye Collection), 1887; p. 45. Shears (The Cape Breton Collection of Bagpipe Music), 1995.

Recorded sources: Cape Breton's Magazine Tape, Mike MacDougall "Mike MacDougall's Tape For Fr. Hector." Celtic CX 054, Donald MacLellan (Appears as “Taking a Wife”).