wormbower - Posted - 02/23/2010:  19:12:30

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I've was traveling this weekend, and enjoyed some quality time with my iPod on today's flight home. I listened to almost my entire 84-track collection of John M. Salyer tunes, which I downloaded from Digital Library of Appalachia. While Salyer is among my favorite fiddlers (Trouble on My Mind, Jeff Sturgeon), I have to admit that I hadn't listened to many of his original recordings.

They're amazing! I new that Salyer was renown for his crooked tunes, but I never realized just how many crooked tunes he had, and just how crooked many of them are! These tunes are an absolute treasury. It's amazing to me that they aren't played more in jams and modern recordings. So, as my part to get Salyers wonderful crooked tunes back into wider circulation, I offer here the entire DLA Salyer collection to you as a single 86 MB zip file. These tracks aren't anything that you can't get for yourselves at the Digital Library of Appalachia, but if you've downloaded from that site before, you know it's pretty labor intensive, and the tune files are completely untagged. I've manually titled and tagged them all here.

I hope that if you enjoy exploring these tunes as much as I am, you'll use this thread to report to us on your findings (part structure, crookedness, etc.), and maybe post your own musical interpretations of them. Even more, I hope you'll take them to your jam sessions.

Paul

wormbower - Posted - 02/23/2010:  19:35:14

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To help you start exploring, here are some random notes I jotted on the plane today about some of the tunes:

Fish on a Snag (Crooked version of Mississippi Sawyer--A part crooked; B part straight)
Getting Upstairs--crooked
Gilda Roy-crooked?
Give the Fiddler a Dram-crooked?
Irish Boy-crooked
Jenny Get Around-crooked!!
John Cole-weird! This sounds familiar (Bruce Molsky? Alan Jabbour?)

[edit: I see now that Bruce Molsky does play John Cole on his Poor Man's Troubles album)

Leather Britches--3 parts: AABCC (all regular 8 measure parts)
Love Somebody=Soldier's Joy
Martha Campbell-way crooked
Mike in the Wilderness--similar to Jeff Sturgeon--very cool, 3 parts
Old Hen Cackled (AA(8measures)B(8measures)C(4 measures))
Polly Grand-3 parts?

Paul

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Edited by - wormbower on 02/23/2010 20:08:28

bj - Posted - 02/23/2010:  20:03:43

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Thanks, Paul!

I didn't know Mike in the Wilderness came from Salyer.

RobBob - Posted - 02/24/2010:  09:39:14

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I can't open the link to the zip file. Got any suggestions?

leroyleroux - Posted - 02/24/2010:  09:48:02

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What does it mean, 'crooked'?

ironworker - Posted - 02/24/2010:  10:46:09

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reckon when i sent you his Jenny Get Around, i was carrying coals to Newcastle, eh?

always glad to find another John Salyer fan- underplayed, under-rated. your short list of tunes is a good
example of his personal style.

michael ford

wormbower - Posted - 02/24/2010:  11:19:06

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quote:

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Originally posted by RobBob

I can't open the link to the zip file. Got any suggestions?

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Hmm. You might try downloading it again. Occasionally these big files seem to get corrupted on download. Have others been able to get it and unzip it successfully?

Paul

wormbower - Posted - 02/24/2010:  11:23:49

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quote:

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Originally posted by leroyleroux

What does it mean, 'crooked'?

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A crooked fiddle tune is one that doesn't contain the "standard" 8 or 16-measure/2 or 4 beats pet measure parts, which make "straight" fiddle tunes easily danceable (to those who can dance...). The can have extra measures, or even extra beats in some measures. They keep you on your toes!

Paul

harwilli55 - Posted - 02/24/2010:  11:28:30

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Wow...thank you so much for doing all the hard work and sharing it. What a great collection !!! I hadn't heard John Salyer before, am enjoying the introduction to his fiddling. This will be a great addition to my tunes and styles to learn.

Thanks.

Leroy....crooked means that a tune does not necessarily follow the 8 measure AB format. Their may be half measures added....or more....and also subtracted.....just depends on the fiddler.....and it always drives the guitarist crazyily insane !!!

Harlan

wormbower - Posted - 02/24/2010:  11:29:05

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quote:

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Originally posted by ironworker

reckon when i sent you his Jenny Get Around, i was carrying coals to Newcastle, eh?

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I guess so! . But now that I've rediscovered Jenny, I need to go back to study that other one you sent me more carefully.

Paul

Christy - Posted - 02/24/2010:  12:23:20

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Downloaded, extracted, and opened just fine.

Thanks a lot!

Tobias - Posted - 02/24/2010:  12:54:26

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One of my favorite fiddlers.

Some information about him here:
brucegreene.net/story_john_slayer.php
oldtimemusic.com/FHOFSalyer.html

I allways have found the photo of him amusing. He looks like an insurance salesman. :-)



Tobias

fiddlepogo - Posted - 02/24/2010:  13:32:01

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quote:

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Originally posted by RobBob

I can't open the link to the zip file. Got any suggestions?

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Maybe you're using the shortcut I tried at first- right clicking the link and choosing
"save link as"- that works for me downloading mp3's from the Fiddle Hangout,
but it didn't work here.
You have to left-click the link to go to the page, then click the download icon.


THEN it'll download.

bluemule_77 - Posted - 02/24/2010:  15:18:21

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Thanks, Paul! I'm on my way to download the collection. We appreciate your work in putting this together... as you say, the DLA can be time-consuming!

Brian

SMDTMTL - Posted - 02/24/2010:  15:21:59

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On that download problem, also you have to allow cookies from the download site... (Mediafire.com)...

Paul, thanks for sharing all your work on these tunes... I'm downloading now and looking forward to listening.. love the crooked stuff

catman - Posted - 02/24/2010:  17:07:45

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Thanks Paul. I had some, but not all, of this stuff. The download and extraction took mere seconds. What a nice gift to us all.

Current fave: Old Hen Cackled. But there are so many....

bsed - Posted - 02/24/2010:  17:59:33

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Paul---you Cad!
You didn't list my favorite Salyer crooked tune: Lost Boy!

wormbower - Posted - 02/24/2010:  21:02:39

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quote:

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Originally posted by bsed

Paul---you Cad!
You didn't list my favorite Salyer crooked tune: Lost Boy!

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Ok, then YOU tell us about it (with your own sound clip)!

Paul

bosco - Posted - 02/24/2010:  21:38:36

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You made my day, Paul. I have caseette tapes of Salyer but my cassette player does't do job anymore.
Bosco

fiddlepogo - Posted - 02/24/2010:  21:38:41

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Downloaded and opened- THANKS!!!

Quite right- going through DLA can be a lot of work!!!
(of course, it's nothing compared to what they had to go through to make the originals!!!)

bosco - Posted - 02/25/2010:  01:39:46

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And Tobias, thanks for the link. I even didn't know that Bruce has website.
Bosco

ironworker - Posted - 02/25/2010:  09:41:29

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that's funny,bruce- we're in the middle of a discussion here in richmond about his Lost Girl/Lost Boy.
listen to them back to back and you'll see not only what a fine fiddler he was, but that he had a fine sense
of humor as well.

(my feeling is still stronger for Lost Girl)

michael ford

Midwest_Fiddler - Posted - 02/25/2010:  11:03:53

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Thanks for the Salyer files. He certainly was a fine fiddler.
Chirps

wormbower - Posted - 02/25/2010:  12:04:18

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Thanks everybody. I'm glad to know so many others are enjoying these tunes as much as I am. Hey Chirps, maybe we'll hear some of these tunes again on Volume 6?

Paul

SMDTMTL - Posted - 02/25/2010:  13:45:41

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Been listening the the tunes most of today... lots of great, great stuff... One that's jumped out at me is "Little Bobby"... Listening to it
again now, I'd bet one of the reasons it's grabbed me is that it's unaccompanied.... it's a sweet tune...

thanks again Paul..

harwilli55 - Posted - 02/28/2010:  06:49:09

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On my way to a house jam last night(hour + drive), I was listening to the John Salyer tunes I had just downloaded. Imagine my amazement when the lead fiddlers started playing his stuff and talking about his style !! The whole evening was pretty much devoted to the tunes on that list....of course with diversions or excursions to other long gone fiddlers.

One of the best discussions was of the origins of " Ricketts Hornpipe " and " Durangs Hornpipe". Michael " Ironworker" Ford can fill the details in since his grasp of history is much better'n than mine, plus he was sitting next to me with his fiddle in hand.

Yep...on the way home....I listened to the whole collection again....you betcha !! Thanks again so much for sharing your work and making it so easy for the rest of us to learn from Salyer.

Harlan

wormbower - Posted - 02/28/2010:  06:57:51

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Ah, my work here is done! Warms the heart.

Paul

bsed - Posted - 02/28/2010:  13:32:35

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quote:

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Originally posted by wormbower

quote:

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Originally posted by bsed

Paul---you Cad!
You didn't list my favorite Salyer crooked tune: Lost Boy!

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Ok, then YOU tell us about it (with your own sound clip)!

Paul

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I'll call that bluff, Sir!
Here you are: hangoutstorage.com/fiddlehango...22007.mp3

I have to say I was shocked when I listened to this again, because I've been playing it (I'd say) quite a bit differently lately.

wormbower - Posted - 02/28/2010:  14:03:24

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Woohoo--that's a keeper, for my "Bruce Sedloff" playlist! And thanks for the slow tutorial version. This is exactly why I started this thread--you only have 83 more to record now.

But you didn't tell us about Lost Boy. Structure, gotchas, history, other renditions, why you like it, etc.

Paul

Brendan Doyle - Posted - 02/28/2010:  17:02:27

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On the topic of the annoyance of downloading and labeling tracks from the Digital Library of Appalachia:

A friend of mine who works for Google (and who is a fine multi-instrumental musician) took out his laptop on a cross-country flight last year and wrote a program to download the entire library track-by-track, extract the accompanying information from the page that links to each track, and relabel the tracks by the actual tune names while inserting all the relevant information into the MP3 tags of each track. When he got to our house, he ran the program, and subsequently gave us a DVD containing the entire library in its "new and improved" and much more useful format. I suggested that he send a copy to the folks who maintain the DLA so that they could upgrade their site with minimal work, but I guess he hasn't gotten around to that yet. It's nice to know really smart people! (And smart to know really nice people, which he also is, despite his sardonic sense of humor.)

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Edited by - Brendan Doyle on 02/28/2010 17:02:51

wormbower - Posted - 02/28/2010:  18:10:33

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I don't suppose he'd share that program?

Paul

Brendan Doyle - Posted - 03/01/2010:  04:57:58

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quote:

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Originally posted by wormbower

I don't suppose he'd share that program?

Paul

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Hmm. Well, I don't know; I don't even have a copy of the program myself, and I don't know what environment it runs in. But maybe I'll email him to urge him to send the "improved" version of the library files themselves to the DLA folks and see if they'll replace their current music files with his labeled and tagged versions with all the info incorporated.

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Edited by - Brendan Doyle on 03/01/2010 04:58:30