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Music with a Border heart, welling forth in muckle springs from the watershed ridges thrown skywards from Earth's fiery depths to where Alba and Albion touch shoulders.
The band's music is shaped by where we live - the Border rivers and hills, the people and their stories, and the songs, music and legends which grow out of them. The Muckle Springs are both the rivers themselves and the tunes which celebrate a history peopled by saints and prophets, wizards and fairies, lovers and reivers - music which sings, dances and plays its way across the centuries.
Listen as we weave new strands into the tapestry of tales and tunes of bards and minstrels, from Thomas the Rhymer of Earlston to Rattlin Roarin Willie Henderson of Teviotdale. Our sound - pipes, accordion, guitar and middle eastern percussion - has been described as Border lamb with Moroccan spice! Music from here, enhanced with the finest natural ingredients from around the world.
TRACKS
The four tracks here are single takes recorded for us by Paul Rae a short time after our début performances at Denholm Folk Festival, 1 November 2008, which can be seen on youtube. These arrangements continue to evolve and are now joined by an ever growing repertoire, see the review on our blog.
DAMASCUS DRUM (Matt Seattle), named for Hawick's favourite café - http://damascusdrum.co.uk/ - is a Scottish pipe reel in an Arabic mode, Maqam Hijaz on A. Notation is on thesession.org/tunes/display/7675
IRENE'S TUNE (Matt Seattle) is for Irene. Notation is on riddellfiddles.co.uk/teaching/PDF%20Tunes/Irene%27s%20Tune.pdf
DENHOLM LASSES (Matt Seattle) is a traditional-style 4-part pipe jig founded on an outrageous compositional device. HOLY HALFPENNY (arr. Matt Seattle) is an old tune with a place in Irish, Scottish and Northumbrian tradition. A hitherto latent pattern is revealed in the Border pipe version - the player aims to hold the pattern of the whole and allow spontaneity to enter the detail. Notation is in the book Over the Hills and Far Away from dragonflymusic.co.uk
KEELMAN OWER LAND (trad. Northumbrian) is such a beautiful tune that the Keelman in our version takes a longer, slower journey than is usually heard.
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