The Arran Boat Song

[Joanne Iles]

A friend of mine who plays the Irish tin whistle sent me some sheet music to learn this so we can play together when we meet in Spain this winter. I recorded this video for him my first time right through with the E drone to help me! It’s a Scottish tune & goes nicely with Inisheer (Irish) and Scarborough Fair (English) to make a proper UK medley!(sorry I don’t know any Welsh tunes!)

[Joanne Iles]

There’s a beautiful version of this on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/zTa0AM6-GCw?si=8c6cCEHiqkIpSiAk

[Jocelyn Martens]

Thanks for sharing, Joanne. Powerful tune, and way to put it out there as your getting to know it. I like your medley idea of 3 tunes too 🧡

[Joanne Iles]

Here’s an update 7 days on! Hopefully improving! I’m just trying to work out where I should slur and where to separate to get the best sound

[Jocelyn Martens]

Great work, Joanne 👍🏼🎶 I love the flow you have with this song. Neat aspect to focus on aswell… your slurs sound effective and smooth. Enjoy experimenting with that. I find my slurring will change with various tempos.

[Joanne Iles]

Thanks Jocelyn! I think some parts of the tune sound & flow more smoothly when slurred but I don’t want to do too much so that it sounds lazy or I start to “lose” notes.
The version on YouTube by the Cunninghams which I shared above, certainly has a degree of slurring.

[Marg Sherringham]

Beautiful playing Joanne, I like your version of this haunting tune, and I think you’ve added just the right amount of embellishments.
I have a very nice 3 part harmony version that I play in a band, but it’s so nice to hear that melody on its own. As Jocelyn said, it’s very powerful.:)

[Steve “Ripton” Nordborg]

I love this tune. I can hear your intonation improvement from the first video unless it was just the drone (which I love now that I learned about doing lessons this way) that was distracting me.

[Owen]

I really love this tune, Joanne; beautiful playing!

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