Mel Bay

Arranger: Tom Hanway
Format: Book with Audio Online
Instrumentation: 5 String Banjo

O'Carolan's best-loved harp tunes are notated in a contemporary style that makes them accessible to all instrumentalists. This ideal collection with accompanying audio lays bare 20 classic Irish compositions for melody and backing players using standard notation and chords. For all 5-string banjo players, fretting and picking-hand fingerings are included in the transcriptions which match the play-along tracks. This is Hanway's fourth collection demonstrating Celtic fingerstyle banjo in G tuning. It is part of a Celtic 5-string series that includes Mel Bay's Easy Irish and Celtic Tunes for 5-String Banjo: Best-Loved Jigs and Reels and Mel Bay's Easy Irish and Celtic Melodies for 5-String Banjo: Best-Loved Airs and Session Tunes. Tom Hanway's pioneering work, Mel Bay's Complete Book of Irish & Celtic 5-String Banjo, was acclaimed by Bluegrass Unlimited magazine (1999) "as 'the bible' for any 5-string player with an interest in this joyous music." The current collection breathes life into the Gaelic classical melodies of Ireland. Access to online audio download.

Song List:

• Beauty in Tears (Llwyn Onn / The Ash Grove)
• Blind Mary
• Bridget Cruise (Third Air)
• Captain O Kane (The Wounded Hussar)
• Carolan's Concerto (Mrs. Power)
• Carolan's Cottage
• Carolan's Draught
• Carolan's Dream (Molly MacAlpin)
• Carolan's Ramble to Cashel
• Carolan's Receipt (Dr. John Stafford)
• Eleanor Plunkett
• Fanny Power (Madame Trench)
• Henry MacDermott Roe (First Air)
• Lord Inchiquin
• Morgan Magan
• Planxty George Brabazon (Second Air)
• Planxty Hugh O Donnell
• Planxty Irwin (Colonel John Irwin)
• Princess Royal, The (Miss MacDermott)
• Sheebeg and Sheemore