Annotation:News from Tripoly

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NEWS FROM TRIPOLY. English, Country Dance Tune (3/2 time). B Flat Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. The melody and dance instructions ("Longways for as many as will") were first printed in 1702 by Henry Playford in the Dancing Master, supplement to the 11th edition [1]. It was retained in the long-running series through the 18th and final edition of 1728, then printed by John Young, heir to the Playford publishing concerns. "News from Tripoly" also appears in Walsh & Hare's The Compleat Country Dancing Master (1718, and in later editions by John Walsh, father and son, of 1731 and 1754). Graham Christian (2015) notes the tune had appeared in the 8th edition of Playford's Apollo's Banquet as a "Hornpipe by Mr. Morgan," whom Christian believes probably referred to Charles Morgan of Magdalene College, Oxford.

Christian also explains that the title "News from Tripoli" did not refer to any particular event from that North African country, but derived from "the chattering culture of coffeehouses. 'News from Tripoli'...was a catchphrase used to introduce a particularly sour state-of-the-world humor of the toastmaster variety" (p. 79).

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Barnes (English Country Dance Tunes), 1986. Christian (A Playford Assembly), 2015; p. 79.

Recorded sources:

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