Fred Finn's: A Song History

← Back to Browse By Song

"Fred Finn's" is an Irish reel in D major whose title carries the name of Fred Finn, a fiddler from Killavil, County Sligo.[1][2] It also turns up as "Berkshire Heights," "Molly What Ails You?" and "You're Right My Love," and Breandán Breathnach and Bernard Flaherty are both reported to give "Berkshire Heights" in print as its original name.[2] Alan Ng's tune index traces the reel to Fred's father, Michael Finn: one source lists Michael as composer, others name him as the tune's original source, and Ng calls the two sources that credit Fred himself mistaken.[1] A different reel in G major is sometimes called "Fred Finn's No. 2," so the bare title can point to more than one tune.[3]

Painting of a dark-haired young woman in a pink dress seated with a violin in her lap

James McNeill Whistler, The Violin Player, oil on canvas, c. 1890–94. A fiddler, shown for the tune’s association with the Sligo fiddler Fred Finn; it has no connection to the tune.

Fred Finn (1919–1986) came from the Killavil area, nicknamed "Coleman Country" as the birthplace of the fiddler Michael Coleman.[2] A note accompanying a lament composed in his memory, published by the Irish Traditional Music Archive, calls him "a virtuoso fiddle player from Killavil" and holds up his partnership with flute player Peter Horan, also of Killavil, as the ideal of duet playing.[4] Both men played on the 1972 Leader LP Music From the Coleman Country, recorded at Gurteen in March 1971.[5] Breathnach's printed setting in Ceol Rince na hÉireann came from Horan and Finn.[2] The earliest source irishtune.info indexes dates from 1967, and later recordings include the Chieftains' Water from the Well, Kevin Burke and Ged Foley's In Tandem, and Peter Horan's The Merry Love to Play with Gerry Harrington.[1]

Aaron O'Rourke includes it in Irish Session Tunes, Volume 1, a collection of 36 jigs, reels and polkas commonly played at Irish sessions, arranged for mountain dulcimer and published by Fingers Of Steel.[6]

Our book that contains the song "Fred Finn's"

Sources

  1. irishtune.info (Alan Ng): "Fred Finn's" (Tune ID #674).
  2. The Traditional Tune Archive: "Annotation:Fred Finn's (1)".
  3. irishtune.info (Alan Ng): "Fred Finn's No. 2" (Tune ID #2990).
  4. Irish Traditional Music Archive: "Lament for Fred Finn".
  5. Mainly Norfolk: "Music From the Coleman Country".
  6. Fingers Of Steel: "Aaron O'Rourke, Irish Session Tunes, Volume 1".
  7. Image: James McNeill Whistler, The Violin Player, oil on canvas, c. 1890–94. The Cleveland Museum of Art.

← Back to Browse By Song