Annotation:Pachelbel's Frolics

Find traditional instrumental music

Back to Pachelbel's Frolics


PACHELBEL’S FROLICS. AKA and see "Hornpipe (4)," “Köhler's Hornpipe,” “Laybourn's Hornpipe," "P. Joe's Pecurious Pachebel Special.” Irish, Air. The notes to Iver’s album states the original tune was published as an untitled hornpipe in Köhlers’ Violin Repository vol. 1 (1881-1885), in the key of ‘C’. Seamus Egan learned it from a tape of the late Cape Breton fiddler John Morris Rankin and transposed it to the key of D and Ivers arranged it further to make the resemblance to “Pachelbel's Canon” more obvious. There are some spurious stories that Ivers adapted the tune from a canon by Austrian composer Johann Pachebel, but the above should lay this to rest. Cape Breton fiddler’s know it as “Köhler's Hornpipe” or “Laybourn's Hornpipe” (W.B. Laybourn was the editor and compiler of Kohler’s Violin Repository), and it is sometimes played as a reel (by Buddy MacMaster, for one).

Source for notated version:

Printed sources:

Recorded sources:

See also listings at:
Alan Snyder’s Cape Breton Fiddle Recording Index [1]
Jane Keefer’s Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [2]
Alan Ng’s Irishtune.info [3]




Back to Pachelbel's Frolics