MIDI Archives
Tradtional Music
To the best of my knowledge, these tunes are all in the public domain. If you find one that you know to be the intellectual property of an artist, please write and let me know so I can remove it from this page. Thanks!
The first three tunes listed here are all quite long, and heavily arranged, like a 'wall of sound'. The third tune is kind of odd: It begins as a straight French traditional tune, and slowly mutates into a kind of Calypso/Trinidad sort of tune.

Terre D' Auvergne usually gets played kind of weepy and maudlin-like. I tried to cheer it up a little. It almost worked.

An English Morris dancing tune. A nice dance, and great tune.

French suite 1
French Suite 2
French Suite 3
Terre D' Auvergne
Froggy's First Jump
An Dro Dogham I don't know what 'Dogham' is, and I don't want to find out! This is a killer tune, interpretable in about a dozen different ways. I chose a driving beat and lots of tempo changes.
The Rocky Road To Dublin
A very popular tune among Irish dancers and musicians. This is a slip jig in 9/8. I tried to get away from standard voicing, with some success.
Hewlett
These are tunes by Turlough O'Carolan, arguably the most famous irish composer and harpist of all time. O'Carolan tended to write really sweet melodies... I think these two are great examples of his style.
Lord Inchiquin

Abbott's Bromley Horndance (AKA Richardson's Tune)
The town of Abbott's Bromley in England has been performing a wonderful dance to this (and many other) tunes for several centuries. They have a web-site that details the history and particulars of the dance, as well as photos of the dance and the musical score for this tune. Pipe and Bowl has been performing the dance at renaissance faires, breweries, and other unlikely places for about twenty years. This is not only a great tune, but also an awesomely mystic dance that has survived from antiquity. The arrangement is mine, but I tried to get the feel of the harmonies I hear when we perform the dance.
Lark in the Morning
'Lark in the Morning' is the name of a dance camp, a music camp, and a music store. It's also the name of this Irish jig.
Polkacide
This arrangement wasn't named after the band of the same name (though they are cool). I decided on the name because there's six polkas contained in this arrangement... which is close to terminal polka-osity, especially if you dance to it. I wrote the fifth polka (which is a kind of interlude). The other five are of celtic extraction.
Beggar Boy
The next three tunes come from 'The English Dancing Master', first published in 1561. 'Beggar Boy' is kind of sinister.

This tune is very sweet.

The melody of 'Mayden Lane' is unchanged from the original... the other voicings are a
little more modern though.
Glory of The West
Mayden Lane
Sleights
'Sleights' is a really cool sword dance Pipe and Bowl Morris performs. The music is comprised of four different tunes. The band usually doesn't get to play it like this.
Here's a couple of nice french tunes, complete with weird sound effects: Are you SURE those mushrooms were truffles? :)
Two Bourrees
Broom Man In the context of the song that goes with this tune, the 'Broom Man' is a cannoneer whose job it is to swab the cannon bore with a long brush or broom. An 18th century English tune, from The Beggar's Opera. This tune is known to Contra and English Country Dancers as 'Jamaica.' I took a decidedly Contradance- style approach to this tune.
Britches Full Of Stitches I don't know whether this tune is Scottish or Irish. I do know that it's a favorite of celtic players. This is one of my favorites, too.
One of my favorite bagpipe tunes. A Scottish march tune. (Of course, all bagpipe tunes are march tunes... bagpipers march to escape the noise.)
The Athole Highlanders
The Fisherman's Friend An American hornpipe from New England. The Celtic roots of this tune are readily discernable.
My friend Malaika turned me on to this tune. I think it's an American tune, but I'm not certain about that. Wherever this tune comes from, it's nice.
Granite Mills
The Brunos like to play these two tunes together. The first one is Danish. We call it "Danish Wedding March" because we don't know it's real name, and that's what it sounds like. The second tune is one we picked up from Pat MacSwyney. It's called 'Brabant Mars,' a Dutch guild march.
Two Marches
It seems to me that there's actually two interpretations of this tune. The first is an English Country dance called "Stingo" and the second is a song called "The Oyle of Barley." Stingo is a great dance, and Oyle of Barley is a hilarious song about a nobleman trying to get a barmaid to go home with him and sleep with him, 'and love me then and lay with me, and leave me then quite early.'
Her response throughout is basically, 'sod off, idiot!'
Stingo, or The Oyle of Barley
There is a country dance that accompanies this tune, or vice-versa. The dance is staid and flirtatious: the dancers get many opportunities to kiss their partners in this dance. I think of the dance as 'The Mononucleosis Shuffle.' The tune is also known as Doves Figary. Go figure.
Chestnut
'Beaux' (pronounced 'bohs' -- the plural of 'beau') are dandies. There's a morris dance that goes with this tune called 'Shooting', which might be indicative of how morris dancers feel about 'beaux.'
Beaux of
London City
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