Rumours

I've not played for a few days. No particular reason, other than the usual limit to hours in the day and wanting to do other things more than I wanted to pipe.

Fiddling around with various tune pairings. Still having problems with associating tunes with their names, so the Professor decides to play tune A, the mice begin on tune B, but in the style of tune A, thanks to the "help" of the old prof. This generally means playing tunes faster or slower than I would normally. I do this a lot with McIntyre's Farewell. Now McIntyre could just be taking his leave after a visit, but somehow I have always assumed that this is his final farewell, and he has shuffled off this mortal coil. I therefore pay the tune lament-wise, slow and stately. But when I think I'm playing the Trail I play it good and fast, because the Trail is a jig.

I've always played the Trail then the Captain, because that's the order they appear in, in the book. But as the Trail speeds up  they work less well together in that order: fast to slow doesn't work for me. (Does it ever? I can't think of an example). So I wonder about playing Captain and the Farewell slowly together, but can't decide which would go first, and somehow ending one tune I can't recall the other. I have the same problem trying to put the Trail with Flett: I simply can't remember how the next tune goes. I even though about the Trail and Loch Bee but the moment it occurred to me every note of Bee was apparerently erased from my musical memory... Maybe this means these tunes don't want to belong together.

Then I play some tunes slower on A than I do on D and I wonder if some tunes might take different partners on A and D: I still like the thought of Flett and the Whaling Song, but only if played fast, and the Whale still doesn't feel right on A.

There's a session this weekend and I feel I should get some pairings sorted.

P.S. The mysterious tune that keeps morphing in to the Heights of Cassino turns out to be Balmacara (or possible the Falls because I'm still not sure which is which).