Annotation:More Power to Your Elbow

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MORE POWER TO YOUR ELBOW (Comacds tuile le do uilleann). AKA and see "Coalminer's Reel (The)." Irish, Reel. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB (O'Neill/1850 & 1001): AA'B (O'Neill/Krassen). See also Ryan's/Cole's reel "Farrell O'Gara's Favorite" for a version in the key of 'A' major, and, in the same volumes, "Pretty Jane's Reel" and "Stick it in the Ashes." "Macroom Lasses" is also a related reel. The reel was recorded under this title in 1929 by The Flanagan Brothers, Joe, Louis and Mike.

Martin O'Reilly, from a photograph by Father Fielding in Dublin. A half-tone print was inserted as a frontispiece in O'Neill's Dance Music of Ireland (1907).

Source for notated version: "O'Reilly" [O'Neill]. O'Neill's source may have been blind Galway piper Martin O'Reilly, whom O'Neill sketched for his Irish Minstrels and Musicians (1913, pp. 239-240, picture on p. 241). O'Reilly was a stand-out performer at the Belfast Harp Festival of 1903, and the annual Feis in 1901, but his notoriety was short lived and he died in the Gort poorhouse some few years later.

Printed sources: O'Neill (Krassen), 1976; p. 146. O'Neill (Music of Ireland: 1850 Melodies), 1903; No. 1477, p. 273. O'Neill (Dance Music of Ireland: 1001 Gems), 1907; No. 705, p. 124.

Recorded sources: ACO Records G15553 (78 RPM), The Hibernian Trio (The Flanagan Brothers), 1929. Viva Voce VVCD007, The Flanagan Brothers - "The Tunes We Like to Play on Paddy's Day" (reissue recording).

See also listing at:
Alan Ng's Irishtune.info [1]




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