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=               Scales and Modes in Scottish Traditional Music              =
=                                  Jack Campin                              =
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Other Key Changes
=================

Art music has heavily influenced most forms of popular music, but has had
little impact on Scottish traditional idiom.  One feature common to almost
all British popular song since 1800, and almost totally absent from Scottish
music, is changes of tonal centre while keeping in the same mode ("change of
key" in more usual terminology).  Pieces that do this, and have managed to
enter the Scottish repertoire, still sound decidedly different from the main
body of tunes composed in the modal system.  This sentimental song from the
late 1790s modulates to A (in art-music theory, the "dominant") in bars 5
and 6:

X:0
T:The Blue Bell of Scotland
G:song
M:2/4
L:1/8
Q:1/4=80
K:D
A|d2cB|A2Bc/d/|FFGE |D3 :|
A|FDFA|d2Bc/d/|cAB^G|A2Bc|
  d2cB|A2Bc/d/|FFGE |D3 |]

This tune was originally in D all the way through - it's a 19th century
pipe reel also known as "The 72nd's Farewell to Aberdeen".  This version,
popularized by Jimmy Shand, goes into G major briefly in the second part,
with the original C sharps replaced by C naturals.  (A dragon was a kind
of kite, it must have blown away).

X:0
T:The Boy's Lament for his Dragon
M:2/4
L:1/16
Q:1/4=108
K:D
dB|A2d2 d2ef |gfed f4|g2B2 B2cd|efec A4 |
   A2d2 d2ef |gfed f4|g2B2 fedc|d4   d2:|
fg|a2A2 A2=c2|B2G2 A4|A2d2 A2d2|edcB A2
fg|a2A2 A2=c2|B2G2 A4|A2d2 fedc|d4   d2:|

One of the few examples of such change of key (again, from D to A) that still
manages to sound like a traditional tune is this:

X:0
T:Miss Susan Cooper
G:reel
C:Ronnie Cooper
M:C|
L:1/8
Q:1/2=108
K:D
(3ABc|dfed B2dB|A2FA  DAFA|ABde fa^ga|g2fd eAce|
      dfed B2dB|A2FA  DAFA|ABde fafd |eAce d2 :|
  dB |Bcde fBBB|def^g a2gf|eAce a2^ga|g2fd eAce|
      dfed B2dB|A2FA  DAFA|ABde fafd |eAce d2 :|

One genuinely old tune that does a similar modulation, from A minor to
E minor, is this one, well-known in Scotland since about 1700 though it
may be from England originally:

X:0
T:The Drummer or Good Morrow to your Night Cap
G:reel
S:William Campbell: New and Favourite Country Dances, book 19
M:C|
L:1/8
Q:1/2=104
K:AMin
B|ABcA E2E^F|GABc dBGB       |ABcA E2Ef|edcB A2A:|
B|c2ce d2de |c2ce d/c/B/A/ GB|c2ce d2df|edcB A2A:|

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==  (c) Jack Campin         http://www.campin.me.uk/        November 2009  ==
==        11 Third Street, Newtongrange, Midlothian EH22 4PU, Scotland     ==
==                                                                         ==
==              these pages: http://tinyurl.com/scottishmodes              ==
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