On this page, you will find links to a collection of files where I teach some of the Gaspesian music featured on this site. I teach tunes by breaking tunes into their component phrases and playing each phrase a couple times really slow.
I'm a real strong advocate of learning fiddle music by ear. I find the page makes us focus too much on just the "notes" and not enough on the music and we don't listen to what we play as closely. Also, learning by ear is relatively easy when a tune is broken down into short phrases and played slowly. Apart from being the traditional mode of transmitting these tunes through the generations, learning by ear will make it much easier in the long run to learn new tunes, develop variations on them, and in general improve our grasp on the style. That being said, you will find a few transcriptions below.
I'm still learning this music myself and so for anything you decide to learn from my recordings, I'd like you to take with a grain of salt. I really want to encourage you to give the original recordings of Erskine, Cyril, Hermas, and others many repeated listenings to internalize their feel for the music.
From Erskine:
Untitled Harmonica Tune (Fiddle Arrangement)
The Coleman Reel
Father Morris' Tune (Notation)
Untitled Grondeuse (Notation)
The Shannon Reel
Stirling Castle
Grandmother's Reel
The Golden Wedding Reel
The Spruce Knot
The Cockawee
The Caribou Reel
Douglastown Brandy
Pat Feeney's Reel
From Cyril Devouge
A Batch of Tunes: Arty Savidant's Tune, Roland White's Tune, Leslie Devouge's Tune
