This collection has been simmering for some
years: It was originally planned as a follow-up to our 2001 production,
Lafayette’s Ghost, as look homeward after our exploration
of European regimental music. But we were drawn astray for several
years by a project of Christmas material, entailing a CD and
live concerts. We needed a homecoming. Here then is our celebration
of the living art that is fife and drum, spanning the 18th to
21st centuries—from North America, the Isles, and the Continent—proving
that the music of these simple instruments is alive and well
In America.
Read the review of In America, as it appeared
in Pan - the flute magazine
You may now purchase music scores (Fife or
Flute arrangements) from this album!
Song List
Track Samples
Or, order
by mail the old fashioned way.
Selections
1. La Dardanus/Cotillion #4
2. 15th Massachusetts Quickstep
3. The Eel Pot Tavern/The Village Idiot/Rakes of Kildare/Lord
Gordon's Hornpipe
4. Isle de Madeleine/Point au Pic
5. The Nash Street Reel/Freddy the Flasher/Strange
Jig
6. Pinocchio
7. Bedou's Reel/Bus Stop Reel/Old Joe
8. Big Top!
9. Yankee Doodle
10. Pretty Maid/Polly Oliver
11. Wettsteinmarsch
12. Pouring out the Pickle Jar/Boston Quick Step/Michael
Wiggins/Mississippi Quick Step
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13. In April's Wake/The High Reel
14. Jug a Dut (drum salute)
15. When She Cam Ben She Bobed
16. The Barber's Pole/The Old Church Hornpipe/Witch
Hazel/The Navvie on the Line/The Locomotive
17. Hector the Hero
18. Mairi's Wedding/Arniston Castle/Fair Maid of Barra/The
Clumsy Lover
19. The Navy Hymn
20. America the Beautiful
21. The Road to the Isles/Ceilidh Umbrella/Drummond
Castle/Miss Susan Cooper
22. Lakes of Pontchartrain
23. The Sweetness of Mary |
Track Samples
The Eel Pot Tavern - MP3
(350 KB)
Rakes, Lords & Idiots begins with two tunes
composed by Roy Watrous, The Eel Pot Tavern and The
Village Idiot, and continues with the traditional Rakes
of Kildare and Lord Gordon’s Hornpipe after
a setting by John MacDonagh. Arranged by John
Ciaglia and Jim Clark, MCV offers this set in tribute
to the Ancient Mariners Fifes & Drums in honor of
their 45th anniversary. |
Isle de Madeleine - MP3 (310
KB)
Too Cool Beauties, arranged by John Ciaglia
after a setting by Chris Norman in his fabulous CD called Man
with a Wooden Flute, features a Quebecois waltz
and reel, Isle de Madeleine and Point au
Pic. Let’s dance!
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Pouring out the Pickle Jar - MP3 (370 KB)
Michael’s Pickle Goes to Boston, arranged
by John Ciaglia and Jim Clark, begins with Pouring
out the Pickle Jar, a composition by MCV fifers
Bill Phenix and Jane Law. Next are Boston Quick Step from
The Drummers’ and Fifers’ Guide by Geo B.
Bruce and Daniel D. Emmett (1861), Michael Wiggins from
Riley’s Flute Melodies, and Mississippi Quick
Step, also from Bruce and Emmett. |
Hector the Hero - MP3
(570 KB)
Hector the Hero, composed by the great Scots
fiddler and composer J. Scott Skinner (1843-1927) for
Major-General Sir Hector MacDonald (1857-1903), one of
the most famous Victorian-era British military figures. Arranged
by Jim and Sarah MacConduibh, this version features Betsy
Ketudat on fiddle and George March on Highland pipes. |
Arniston Castle - MP3
(420 KB)
William Wallace Crossing the Rhein, arranged
by Jim and Sarah MacConduibh, has become one of MCV’s
signature sets. The H.M. Scots Guards Standard
Settings of Pipe Music, Vol I/II (Paterson’s Publications
Ltd., London) yielded these fine tunes: Mairi’s
Wedding, Arniston Castle, Fair Maid of Barra, and The
Clumsy Lover. |
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