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Annotation:Little Stack of Barley (1)
X:1 T:Stáicín Eórnadh, An T:Little Stack of Barley [1], The M:C| L:1/8 R:Hornpipe S:James Goodman music manuscript collection (mid-19th cent., County Cork, p. 69) F:http://goodman.itma.ie/volume-one#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=72&z=658.0989%2C761.438%2C7374.2874%2C4466.6667 F:at Trinity College Dublin / Irish Traditional Music Archive goodman.itma.ie Z:AK/Fiddler's Companion K:G B>d|e>fed B>edB|A>GA>G A>cBA|GFGA B>ABd|e2 AA A2 B>d| efed BedB|A>GA>G AcBA|G>FGA B>dA>B|G2 GG G2:| |:d>c|B>GB>d g2 fg|a>gfd e2 .d.d|g>fe>d B>GBd|e2 AA A2 fg| a2 f>d g2 fe|d>BA>G A>cBA|G>FGA B>dA>B|G2 GG G2:|
LITTLE STACK OF BARLEY [1], THE ("An Staicín Beag Orna" or "An Staicín Eorna"). AKA and see "Evening Was Waning," "Little Mary Cassidy," "New Bedford Reel (2)," "Patrick Condon's Vision," "Stack of Barley," "Stacks of Barley." Irish, Hornpipe. E Minor ('A' part) & G Major ('B' part). Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. There is a special couple dance to this tune (played in hornpipe time) in which the partners face each other and use the ‘barrel’ hold. It is sometimes customary to dance the Stack of Barley after the ceili dance The Siege of Ennis. Two hornpipes are played as an accompaniment with the first being “The Stack of Barley,” considered the signature tune for the dance. The title supposedly refers to that part of the barley harvest that was kept aside for the making of Irish poitín (literally, small pot, also as poteen/potheen).
The famous County Sligo émigré fiddler Michael Coleman (1891-1945) recorded this tune in New York in a medley with "Stack of Wheat (The)." Accordion player Joe Burke (b. 1939), originally from Coorhoor, above Loughrea in County Galway, remembers playing with the Leitrim (parish) Céilí Band for set dancers in the 1950’s at Irish dance venues in London, and was impressed by the “thousands of people” who danced the sets and old-time waltzes at the halls. Later he played gigs in New York, Chicago and Boston, playing on a circuit for Bill Fuller’s dance halls along with piano player Felix Dolan and fiddler Paddy Killoran. They dressed formally and had a fifteen minute spot between the Fintan Ward Band’s sets, giving them time to play “The Seige of Ennis,” “Stack of Barley” and an old-time waltz (Vallely & Piggott, Blooming Meadows, 1998). Bronx, N.Y., fiddler and fiddle teacher Martin Mulvihill (1986) remarked: “Old Irish dance” and “There are several versions of this tune. This one I learned from the lilting of my grandfather.”
The title appears in a list of Maine fiddler Mellie Dunham's (1856-1931) repertoire. The elderly Dunham was Henry Ford's champion fiddler in the mid-1920's. Montreal fiddler J.O. La Madeleine used "Little Stack of Barley [1]" for the first two parts of his three-part "New Bedford Reel (2)," attaching a strain of "Green Fields of America" as the third part.
See also note for "annotation:Stack of Barley" for Canadian versions.