Annotation:Matthew Briggs
X:1 T:Matthew Briggs M:6/8 L:1/8 R:Jig S:Aird, Selection, vol. II (1785) Z:AK/Fiddler's Companion K:A Dorian ABA a3 | gef g3 | cdc edc | B2g dBG | ABA a3 | gef g3 | e3 deg | edB A3 :| |: cdc efe | d2d (ded) | (cdc) (edc) | B2g dBG | cdc edc | deg a2g | e3 deg | edB A3 :|]
MATTHEW BRIGGS. AKA and see "Drummond Castle." English, Scottish; Jig (6/8 time). A Dorian. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. The melody also appears in the music manuscript collection of Cumbrian musician John Rook (Waverton, 1840). The tune would appear to be Scots in origin, for it was first 'published' in David Young's Drummond Castle Manuscript (1734) under the title "Drummond Castle." There was a musician named Matthew Briggs who is credited with a tune setting in Adam Thomson's ballad opera The Disappointed Gallant; or, Buckram in Amour (Edinburgh, 1738), Air 8, where it is noted that it is "Buckram's own Tune set by Matthew Briggs", beginning: "Welcome, my Friends, to poor Sandy Buckram's House." Whether there is a connection between Briggs and the "Drummond Castle" jig is unknown, but the time period coincides with David Young's manuscript. The air also appears in Crotch's Specimens of various styles of music referred to in a Course of Lectures read at Oxford and London, and adapted to keyed instruments by W. Crotch, Mus. Doc., Prof. Mus. Oxon. Crotch, who was Principal of the Royal Academy of Music (London) from 1823-1832 delivered lectures on various types of national music from 1800-1804 and 1820, and had them bound in three volumes, familiarly referred to as "Crotch's Specimens". The Irish "specimens", in which section this tune was placed, are contained in volume 1.
