Annotation:Girl of the Big House (The)
X:1 T:Girl of the Big House, The M:6/8 L:1/8 R:Jig S:O'Neill - Dance Music of Ireland: 1001 Gems (1907), No. 998 Z:AK/Fiddler's Companion K:D {G}F2D {A}G2E|AGE EDD|{G}F2D {A}G2E|AGE d2z| {G}F2D {A}G2E|AGE EDD|D=cA GFE|{G}FDD {F}EDD:| |:ABA AGF|GAG GFG|ABA cAG|Add d2e| fed cAG|FGF GFE|dcA GFE|{G}FDD {A}EDD:||
GIRL OF THE (BIG) HOUSE, THE ("An Cailín Na Tig Moir" or "Cailín an Tí Mhóir"). AKA – "Girl of the House." AKA and see "Housekeeper (The)," "House Keeper (The)." Irish, Double Jig or Air. D Major (Levey, O'Neill): D Mixolydian (Breathnach). Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB (Levey, O'Neill): AABB' (Breathnach). The title may refer to the maid of the manor. The tune is usually called "The Housekeeper" in English, says Breathnach (1976). Petrie (who printed it in his first collection, 1855) notes it was a once a very popular dance tune in the counties of Cork, Kerry and Limerick, "in all of which it is considered to be very ancient, and to have been originally used as a march." Goodman prints a different setting under the title "House Keeper (The)", while Levey gives it as "Girl of the House (The)." Alan Ward, in the booklet to the recording "Music from Sliabh Luachra," concludes that the Denis Murphy/Julia Clifford version came from Tom Billy Murphy:
"... as, for instance, the characteristic rapid notes linking the end of the second part with the re-commenced first part [i.e. two groups of quadruplets played in the time of three] follow the same pattern as those linking the second and third parts of the well-known jig from Tom Billy transcribed as no. 48 in CRE2 and played by Denis and Julia on SAG ['The Star Above the Garter']."
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