Annotation:Ree Raw (1)

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REE RAW. AKA and see “Butcher's March (1),” “Rub the Bag.” Irish, Jig or March. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABBCC. The title is an Anglicized version of the Irish name Rí an Rátha (King of the Rath i.e. a fairy rath, or fort). Note the uneven length of the respective parts. The melody also appears in vol. 1 of the Petrie Collection (1855), and was one of those included in a manuscript sent to him by one James Fogarty. The latter had emigrated from Tibroghney, Kilkenny, to America in 1852, in the aftermath of the Great Famine, and reported that the tune was peculiar to his native locale, based on a war march air sung by those on their way to the once popular May festivals in Fiddown. After the melody was sung, its tempo would be increased to the jig below, until collapsing on itself; thus the once-a-time meaning of ‘ree raw’ as uproar, confusion or boisterous merriment. Petrie’s suggestion is that the tune was of some antiquity, perhaps harkening back to when chieftains led clans in Ireland.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Levey (Dance Music of Ireland, 2nd Collection), 1873; No. 41, p. 18.

Recorded sources:

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