Annotation:Planxty Scott

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PLANXTY SCOTT (Pleraca Albanac). Irish, Air or Planxty (6/8 time). D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. It is not known what source Francis O'Neill (1903) used for this tune, which he attributes to Irish harper Turlough Carolan (1670-1738). Donal O'Sullivan (1958), who researched Carolan's compositions, could find no evidence that it was a work of Carolan's, but did include it as an untitled tune in his work on the bard, as there was stylistic similarity to the bard's compositions. Bonnie Shaljean, writing in the Appendix to the 2001 edition of O'Sullivan's Carolan, finds that the first half of the air closely resembles the final three lines of "Soft Mild Morning," an air that appears in Belfast musician and collector Edward Bunting's 1840 collection. Bunting had collected the air from two ancient harpers, Charles Byrne and Denis Hempson, but tinkered with the air by extending it and adding sixteen bars at the start of the piece. Francis O'Neill gives the second half material of "Soft Mild Morning" as his first strain.

Shaljean also finds the second strain material derived from the Northumbrian tune "Sir John Fenwick's the Flower Amang Them All", which was not part of the Irish harpers' versions collected by Bunting. She concludes it is unlikely that this part of the tune was ever part of the old Irish harp repertoire.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Complete Collection of O'Carolan's Irish Tunes, 1984; No. 179, p. 123 (untitled). O'Neill (Music of Ireland: 1850 Melodies), 1903; No. 684, p. 125. O'Sullivan (Carolan: The Life, Times and Music of an Irish Harper), 1958, No. 177 (also notes in Appendix, p. 362).

Recorded sources:

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