Despite being open to just about every genre of music, I have always had a bizarre allergy to traditional fiddle music.
I absolutely cannot explain it.
It’s not the instrument itself; after all, a fiddle is just a casual-Friday version of a violin. And I have nothing against the stunningly beautiful country of Ireland or its musicians, who have been featured time after time (after time after time) on this blog.
I even like the idea of fiddle music: fast-paced, happy, lively tunes played in a small venue, meant to get people dancing…I can easily get behind all those things. But somewhere between the idea of fiddle music and the reality of it, it all goes wrong for me. Some strange combination of timbre, tempo, and stomp-clapping somehow always made the whole experience, for me, less than the sum of its parts.
Which is why I was beyond excited to discover the Martin Hayes Quartet, and this gorgeous, slow-building, fiddle-tastic song from their 2017 album, The Blue Room.
What makes this a beautiful song:
1. The blurring of fast and slow. “The Boy in the Gap” is a traditional song, a “reel,” which is usually up-tempo, whirling, ebullient. In the Martin Hayes Quartet’s version, we can still hear the whirling, but it’s as if we experience it in slow motion.
2. The blurring of social classes. Folk music has always been a medium for expressing the everyday struggles of the working class. This album was recorded in Ireland’s stately Bantry House, now a museum but for centuries lived in by the type of people who would certainly never have allowed folk music to be played within its walls.
3. The blurring of idea and reality. This version of “The Boy in the Gap” is far too relaxed to incite ale-aided revelry in an Irish pub. But it suggests revelry, in the way an impressionist painting might suggest water lilies. It’s a month-long visit to Ireland, as remembered in a dream ten years later.
I mentioned earlier that I like the idea of fiddle music; well this song is what the idea of fiddle music sounds like.
Recommended listening activity:
Sneaking the Irish “O” prefix onto your last name in your email signature.