Annotation:Floo'er o' Taft (Da)

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FLOO'ER O' TAFT, DA. Shetland, Air (cut time). D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). One part. Collected in 1947 by Pat Shuldham-Shaw from Shetland cooper and fiddler John Stickle, whose great-grandfather, Friedemann (or Fredemann) von Stickel, was a German seaman and fiddler who was shipwrecked near the Shetlands (although local lore, perhaps tongue in cheek, had it that he had been thrown overboard due to his shipmate's exasperation at his constant playing, or perhaps because they just didn't like him). Friedemann settled in the islands and married two local girls in his lifetime. His son, also Friedemann, was born in the 1780's and was also a fiddler. "Da Floo'er O' Taft" is very similar to a Danish and German dance tune called "Seven Steps (The)," and the dance, in Denmarch the Syvspring, also known in England as the Seven Jumps, was known over all North-West Europe, according to Shaw.

Source for notated version: John Stickle, 1875-1957, Lerwick, Shetland, grandson of the younger Freidemann [Shuldham-Shaw].

Printed sources: Pat Shuldham-Shaw, "A Shetland Fiddler and His Repertoire: John Stickle 1875-1957", Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society), vol. 9, No. 3, Dec. 1962, p. 134.

Recorded sources: Topic 12TS442, Brass Monkey - "See How It Runs" (1986).

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