Bride's March (The)

 BRIDE'S MARCH, THE. AKA and see "A Scottish March." Shetland, Air (3/4 or 12/8 time). Shetland, West side. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB. Cooke (1986) finds that Stickle's version of "The Bride's March" is similar to the Northumbrian song air called "The Rock and the/a Wee Pickle Tow." According to Stickle (who related the story to the collector Pat Shuldham-Shaw), the melody was a processional tune used to accompany the wedding party from the kirk after the marriage. "From almost every house passed on the way," related Stickle, "there would come a fiddler on the doorstep who would play this tune as the procession passed." Cooke remarks that if the locals were aware of the traditional text of the song, it must have been the cause for some levity, "and, at the same time, could serve as a warning to future young wives, for it takes the form of an 'auld wife's' lament of the difficulties of learning the wifely art of spinning." John Playford published the tune in his Musick's Handmaid (1678) under the title "A Scottish March," which suggests to Cooke that the piece may well have been used as a bridal march in Scotland at an earlier time. Source for notated version: John Stickle (Shetland) [Cooke]; Peter Fraser (Shetland) [Anderson & Georgeson]. Printed sources: Anderson & Georgeson (Da Mirrie Dancers), 1970; p. 11. Cooke (The Fiddle Tradition of the Shetland Isles), 1986; Ex. 32 (b), p. 84.

X:1 T:Da Bride's March L:1/8 M:12/8 K:G e|:gde gde gab {ab}age|gdB A2g fga e3|gde gde gab|{ab}age| gdB (3ABc A2 BAG G2z:|c|:BGA Bgd (3BAB d BAG| {EF}E D2 D2g fga A2c|{c}BGA Bgd {c}BAB d {c}BAG|EGA BdA {c}BAG G2z:||

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