A Cool Dry Place -- Jamie Ferguson & Rick Lee

A Cool Dry Place -- Jamie Ferguson & Rick Lee

This is a work-in-progress. Thus far 14 tracks recorded in two sessions in early 2008 in Belfast and Dublin, Ireland.

Jamie Ferguson is a fiddler from Killen, Alabama. Rick Lee is a banjo player from Natick, Massachusetts.

Comments are most welcome via e-mail link at ricklee.org

Notes on tunes by JLF

  1. Bucky Mule is a G tune with a lot of C moments (usually a pleasing thing), which I heard Polo Burguiere and John Hermann playing at the Clifftop, WV festival in 2004.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/buckym2o.mp3

  2. Crow Creek/Kansas City Reel (AEAE): (1) Crow Creek was learned from the Nelson family in Blacksburg, VA. (In the recording, I'm struggling to remember tune #2, hehe). (2) "Kansas City Reel" was learned from the Mando Mafia of Charlottesville, Virginia.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/kcr2o.mp3

  3. Puncheon Floor is a G/D tune I got from the Nelson family (Scott, Susan, Ben, and Grey), in Blacksburg, VA.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/puncheo.mp3

  4. Fisher's Hornpipe/Whiskey Before Breakfast/Jump Jim Crow (1) "Fisher's Hornpipe" is a tune that will tug at your allegiances if you're an oldtime player in Ireland! It's a County Donegal tune as far as I know, typically played (there) with lots of "notey" runs for ornamentation. The American style cuts those out in favor of a stronger dance rhythm to the tune--that's my opinion. But live in Ireland long enough, and your fingers and bow arm will really get confused how to play this tune.

    (2) "Whiskey Before Breakfast" is a widespread traditional oldtime tune; I've known it as long as I can remember.

    (3) Jump Jim Crow is a traditional tune. I got it from the album "Gate to Go Through," by Mark Olitsky, Christian Wig, and Dave Rice.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/fiwhjc1o.mp3

  5. Ida Red comes from Ed Haley (blind Kentucky fiddler, deceased) by way of Ed Baggott, from Huntsville, AL. I got it from him at the Clifftop, WV festival in 2006.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/idaredo.mp3

  6. Emo5 - A tune of Rick's first recorded on his CD "Look What Thoughts Will Do."

    Rick writes: "The title Emo5 refers to the banjo tuning (E modal) and the capo position (5th fret) which yield a tune in A/Am. The E-modal tuning is adapted from Doc Boggs. Open strings are eEABE. Thus fretting third string at second fret raises A to B giving open fifths with the first and fifth strings in unison. I use this tuning a lot in sessions capoed into G/Gm or A/Am, or open in Em.

    "The tune was received through my fingers when I picked up the banjo one morning and found it in this tuning from the night before when I had been playing Doc Boggs' Prodigal Son for my first CD, 'Natick.'

    "Jamie's subtle double stops realize an aspect of the tune underdeveloped in its first recording."

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/emo5o.mp3

  7. "Durang's Hornpipe" also comes to me from the Nelson family, Blacksburg, VA. I put in a minor C part in the latter half of this recording, which is the B part to a tune called "Power's Goldmine," written by Kelly Purdue of the Mando Mafia. Sometime in college, Ben Nelson and I started tagging it to the end, just for fun.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/durpowro.mp3

  8. Turnaround is just a tune I made up. It put itself together from all the pieces of tunes that were running through my head one long, otherwise boring weekend in summer 2007, when I sat down and learned about 30 tunes from a mix of Irish / Cape Breton / and oldtime music.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/turnaro.mp3

  9. John Sharp's Three-Way Hornpipe (AEAE): (1) "John Sharp's Three-Way Hornpipe" is also sometimes called "Brilliancy." I first heard it in summer 2004 from Tom Bailey. I can't say who John Sharp is... (2) I tagged on a few times through on Kansas City Reel.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/ds3whpo.mp3

  10. A Cool Dry Place -- "A Cool Dry Place," I made up in summer 2007, while learning tunes from recordings, sitting at the kitchen table. In front of me sat a sack of pinto beans, whose packaging provided a nice name for a mellow tune.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/cooldryo.mp3

  11. Shenandoah Falls- I know this as an A tune, played in cross-tuning (AEAE). My two sources for it treat it pretty differently--there's really lyrical Jay Ungar-style, and then there's the upbeat, square-dance paced version which I first learned, again from the Nelsons. I think you can get more angles out of it in G than in cross-tuned A...

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/shenfo.mp3

  12. Indian Neck -- Rick writes: "This tune was written about a small peninsula near Branford, CT. It was the site of the Hotel Montowese, a huge wooden structure built in the nineteenth century with a steamboat landing on Long Island Sound. Before it burned to the ground in the 1960's, the hotel hosted the Indian Neck Folk Music Festival.

    My tune was written in reminiscence of the beautiful lawns and water's edge. Strangely, the reminiscence was evoked thirty years later while playing banjo with Paiste gongs in northern Germany. Certain overtones from these giant frisbees of bell-metal played the banjo under my fingers and taught me the tune.

    It was first recorded on my second CD, 'There's Talk About a Fence.' Jamie's fiddle adds a spookiness totally appropriate to the place and the reminiscence."

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/inecko.mp3

  13. Grandma's Rag is a ragtime tune in G from Dick Burnett and Leonard Rutherford from Kentucky (from their "Complete Recorded Works (1926-30) CD"). They have some fun crooked raggedy fast tunes.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/gramrago.mp3

  14. Last Chance is a very popular tune in Roundpeak country. I learned it from the Nelsons as one of my first oldtime tunes.

    http://home.comcast.net/~natickmusic/lastcho.mp3