THE SWEETNESS OF MARY/ THE PIPER'S BONNET
The tuning here is DAAEAE. This was originally dreamed up by Dick Gaughan to imitate the Highland bagpipes on guitar- Dick's first attempt had an E on the bottom string. The fourth and fifth strings are in unison, giving a continuous drone while the chanter scale sits on the first and second strings (except for the low G which is on the third). Having said all that, the first of these tunes is not even Scottish, nor indeed a bagpipe tune (it goes beyond the bagpipe scale). It was written by pianist Joan MacDonald Boes, who came from Detroit, a city with a high concentration of Cape Breton exiles. I first heard the tune from a bootleg tape of Alasdair Fraser playing at a fiddle concert in Glasgow. Ironically, when he came to record the tune, it was on the album he did with me- "Return to Kintail" (Culburnie Records). If you play the tune slowly, in this tuning, you will hear lots of strings ringing in sympathy and lots of harmonic overtones, all of which add to the richness of the sound. The second tune is a bagpipe strathspey often played in competitions. I've tried in this arrangement to capture the precise rhythm of the tune (which is far from straightforward) by using triplets and by "hammering on" and "pulling off" to get the Scottish "snap" which characterizes the strathspey form. Often, as is the case here, in four part tunes the third and fourth parts are variations of the first and second respectively.

THE EMIGRANT'S FAREWELL
The tuning here is dropped D (DADGBE). The guitar used was a Larrivee, which I bought in Vancouver. I was captivated by this song the first time I heard it. It was sung by Eithne ní Uállachaín who with her husband, Dundalk fiddler Gerry O'Connor, formed the duo Lá Lugh. As always with instrumental arrangements of songs, it helps to "hear" the singer as you play. The phrasing of this piece is almost entirely derived from Eithne's beautiful, poignant singing. Eithne struggled with depression for many years before tragically taking her own life in 1999. She is much missed.

THE FLANAGAN BROTHERS JIG/ DERMOT BYRNES/ MISS SARAH MCFADYEN
This set is very much a studio creation. The first tune is flatpicked in DADGBE and was learned from the band De Dannan. The brothers in the title were from Waterford in the south east of Ireland. They emigrated to the east coast of the US around the turn of the century and became very successful entertainers in the Music Halls which were then flourishing. After a lengthy career and a multitude of recordings the Flanagans retired and would probably have been quietly forgotten about but for the enthusiasm of contemporary Irish musicians like Frankie Gavin and Mick Moloney. Mick traced the last remaining brother, Mike, to Philadelphia and they began re-releasing the old recordings. The key change in the third part of the tune (B minor/F sharp) is common in French Canadian music but very unusual in the Irish tradition. The middle jig is played fingerstyle in DADGAD (Capo V) and comes from the playing of Donegal accordion player Dermot Byrne who now plays with the band Altan. The percussion accompaniment is provided by drummer and self confessed Hibernian supporter, Mike Travis, very skillfully slapping an Indian clay pot called a ghattam. Back to the flat-pick and to DADGBE for the last tune- a composition of Jennifer Wrigley named for a fine Orcadian fiddler who was for a time one of Jennifer's students. Hazel and Jennifer Wrigley are twins from the Orkney Islands which lie off the north coast between The Shetlands and the mainland. In their duo, Jennifer's fiddle is accompanied by Hazel's swinging guitar and piano accompaniment. Although not as well known as the Shetland tradition, the music of Orkney shares the Scandanavian, and particularly Norwegian, influence that can be heard in the music of Scotland's northern isles.

JACKIE COLEMANS/ THE MILLINER'S DAUGHTER/ RAKISH PADDY/ CONNOR DUNNE'S
These reels are all played in DADGAD (capo II). The first triplet in the first tune is played just with the thumb - down up down. The idea of using the thumbnail in a way akin to using a flatpick seems to be quite revolutionary in steel string guitar playing though I didn't quite see it that way when I came up with the idea. One possible explanation of why it doesn't seem to have been done before (though I'd be glad to hear if anyone wants to claim prior knowledge!) is that many fingerstylists use a thumbpick and I don't. To play an upstroke with a thumbpick is impossible. The technique is quite common in flamenco guitar though not quite in the same way that I do it. The first tune is a common session reel in both Ireland and Scotland, though the tune's origins are definitely Irish. I learned the second tune from the piping of Liam O'Flynn, though, again, it's quite a common tune. Though better known as a full tilt reel, "Rakish Paddy" is actually an Irish version of a four-part Highland bagpipe strathspey called "Cabhar Feidh". This tune was also recorded by Pierre Bensusan on his album "Musiques", though his version is very different to mine. The last tune was learned from the plaintive, soulful fiddling of Martin Hayes so I'm assuming its origins are, like Martin's, in East Clare- though I could be wrong.

THE HUMOURS OF BARRACK STREET/ THE LETTERKENNY BLACKSMITH
Two Irish reels flatpicked in dropped D tuning (DADGBE). In playing these tunes I was attracted to the syncopated rhythm of the first and to the unusual chord pattern in the second. I first heard "Barrack Street" as part of a remarkable suite of music called "Timedance". Played by the group Planxty, it was commissioned by RTE, the Irish broadcasting organization for the 1980 Eurovision Song Contest…….sound familiar? The guest keyboard player with the band was one Bill Whelan who some years later was to compose the music for "Riverdance" for exactly the same slot in Eurovision. The tune is associated with the legendary Seamus Ennis, whose pipes, a flat set pitched in C, were passed on, after his death, to his star pupil Liam O'Flynn and are still played by Liam to this day. The second tune was pinched from a band from Co. Clare called Fisher Street who made one album in the early nineties for Mulligan Records and then seemingly disappeared. On the album the "bass" line is provided by Patsy Seddon's electroharp (made by Camac in Brittany). I fell in love with the sound of it on the first Síleas album from 1986 and it was a great pleasure to have Patsy play on the album.

AR BHRUACH NA LAOI
This is a slow air from Ring in Co. Waterford in the Southeast of Ireland played in Dropped D tuning. Again, the phrasing is derived from singing- this time Liam O'Maonlai of the band Hothouse Flowers. As well as being a great rock singer and songwriter, Liam is very much at home with traditional music and is a fluent Irish speaker. A few years after making this recording I had the pleasure of performing the song with him on one of a series of TV shows called Tacsi. This particular day in the studio I had the Larrivee guitar to hand and it's sustain seemed to suit the slow airs- this was recorded immediately after The Emigrant's Farewell. The key to the arrangement is in giving the right "weight" to each note. This type of song, "sean nos" (or "old style" in English), is completely without rhythm- you have to "feel" how the tune should hold together and also how each phrase should be ornamented. This part of Waterford is one of the Gealteacht or Irish-Speaking communities to be found scattered around the island. If memory serves, even the road markings in Ring are in Irish. The far south of Ireland (Munster) is home to a very ancient poetic tradition and is the source of many of the great slow airs, usually in the form of songs, that instrumentalists are drawn to adapt, whether for the pipes or flute or even... guitar.

THE SNOWY PATH/ THE HARPERS CHAIR
Two slip jigs. These are dance tunes in 9/8 time. The tuning is DADGAD (capo II). The band Altan recorded the first tune on their "Harvest Storm" album (Green Linnet Records). It is a composition of their guitarist Mark Kelly. Mark learned a great deal of traditional music from the Dublin whistle player Donncha O'Briaín, to whose memory the tune is dedicated. O'Briain battled against great physical hardship in order to play at all... The second tune was written by harpist Maire Ní Chathasaigh, from Bandon, Co. Cork, who often performs in duo with her husband, English guitarist Chris Newman. Both of these tunes are in two parts with a key change from first to second. The Snowy Path modulates from D major to F# minor and The Harper's Chair from D to A major. I seem to have a weakness for tunes with changes of key. In DADGAD it is all too easy to fall into the trap of playing only in D. The second tune, like others written by Maire, suits the uillean pipes. The triplet on the low D in the first part of the tune is called a "cran" in piping. On guitar you can get a similar effect by combining the down stroke with the right thumb with a pull-off using the left index finger- or you can try playing all three notes with the right thumb.

GAVOTTE DE MARCEL/ DANS FISEL
Three tunes from Brittany in DADGAD (capo III). The first was learned from Soïg Siberil during my first tour of Germany in 1994. Soïg was playing with the band Pennou Skoulm which included many of my favourite Breton musicians; fiddler Jacky Molard, the driving force behind many of the important developments in Breton music and key member of the bands Gwerz and Den; flute player, Jean-Michel Veillon, previously a member of Kornog and Den, who pretty much introduced the wooden flute to their tradition; Christian Lemâitre, also a former member of Kornog, with whom I would later work again when I accompanied the Celtic Fiddle Festival on their 98 US Tour. I had been listening to Breton music, especially the above named bands, for years before this tour and I still remember the excitement of meeting these musicians for the first time and, in particular, trying to find the common ground between the guitar of M. Siberil and my own. The connections made on that tour have carried on to this day with my involvement in the Alain Genty Groupe (featuring most of the above players) and the trio with Alain and Soïg. For many years now my live set has included compositions of Siberil's and his sense of melody is a great inspiration. On the second day of the tour Soïg taught me the above gavotte- a common dance form in Brittany- and we played it in the traditional Breton "call and response" style. This involves two musicians (or sonneurs) taking turns phrase by phrase, playing the tune without rhythm while the dancers assemble then suddenly hitting full tempo as the dance begins. This derives from the playing of the bombarde, an incredibly loud Breton oboe. In order to keep the music continuous two players are required: one plays while the other draws breath, the two dovetailing their lines at the interchange. This format is also carried over to Breton singing- the style is known as "Kan ha Diskan". Soïg's modesty prevented him from pointing out that he actually composed the gavotte so he went uncredited on the album- I'm happy to record here that the tune is "comp. Siberil, arr. Siberil/McManus". The second two tunes are in the same kan-ha-diskan style. I first heard them at a concert in Lorient in 1993 featuring Gwerz and Barzaz, at that time probably the two most important groups in Brittany. I was fortunate to be there as this was the only time the two ensembles performed together- a busy night for Alain Genty, bass player with both bands! The "Fisel" is a faster style of gavotte- the form has a repeated two bar phrase then a repeated four bar phrase which is a variation on the first. The singer on that occasion was Yan-Fañch Kemener who has done an enormous amount of work keeping Breton-language song at the forefront of their cultural revival.

HECTOR THE HERO/ THE GIRLS AT MARTINFIELD
Air and Reel in DADGAD (capoII). The first tune is a composition of the great James Scott-Skinner, the Strathspey King, from Banchory in Aberdeenshire. Scott-Skinner is one of the most significant figures, both as performer and composer, in the history of Scots fiddle music. He died in 1927 at the age of 86, having toured the United States the previous year! The tune was written to commemorate a soldier from Dingwall, Rosshire in the North East of Scotland. Hector seemingly rose through the ranks at such a rate as to rouse the jealousy of some of his colleagues. He died in mysterious circumstances in Paris. His statue is a prominent landmark in Dingwall. I play the tune in the key of E major, which would have met with derision from Scott-Skinner- the proper key being A. The first pass through the tune is entirely in false harmonics. These are accomplished by gently stopping the string twelve frets above where the right hand frets the same string. Classical players achieve this by stopping the string with the index finger and plucking with the middle, leaving the thumb free to pluck bass notes. This, I find impossible! So, I pluck with the thumb and stop with the index. The bass notes are played with the LEFT hand either by plucking the open string with the middle finger or by hammering on. The second pass through the tune is more straightforward! The reel is a composition of Phil Cunningham- written whilst recovering from a car accident in which his right arm was badly damaged. So it started out as a finger exercise and grew more complex as his arm recovered. The opening phrase has a burst of four triplets- the first one involves just the thumb. It seems unheard of in steel string acoustic playing to use the thumb on the upstroke but I couldn't see any other way of playing this. It has now become a feature of my playing.

THE JOHNSTOWN REEL
Slow Reel DADGAD CapoII. Composed by flute player Rebecca Knorr, who plays it on the album, this was one of the first tunes I learned in the Edinburgh session scene - though the final details were nailed in Galicia. The guitar part is based round a descending then ascending figure in the bass for the first part and some major and minor seventh chords for the second.

WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD/ CHARLIE HUNTER'S/ THE HUMOURS OF TULLA
Song/ Jig/ Reel DADGAD Capo III. The hit single! The Louis Armstrong tribute came about just from playing major triads up and down the neck in DADGAD tuning. I started randomly putting a bit of rhythm into what was a bit of an exercise and it started sounding familiar. Having pushed it a bit further in terms of bass line and chords, I came up with the arrangement on the album. It was intended as a bit of fun- and it still is. Charlie Hunter was a piano player from the island of Mull in the Hebrides. The opening of the tune- one arpeggio after another- is great for this tuning. The Humours of Tulla is a steal from one of my great heroes, Tony Cuffe. Tony moved to Boston form Scotland around the same time as I moved to Scotland from England. I am assured these events are unrelated. I had heard Tony's only solo album (When First I Went to Caledonia, 1988 Iona IRCD 011) when I was in England and was completely amazed at the arrangements of traditional tunes for fingerstyle guitar, particularly the triplets which I struggled in vain to replicate. My mistake was my hand position, which has now shifted so that the heel of the hand is now resting on the bridge of the guitar. It seems that this gives a better angle of attack for getting the ring, middle and index fingers to pluck the string in quick succession. In trying to play this I had assumed Tony was playing in DADGAD as were most of the people I listened to at the time. Actually, the tuning he always uses is DADADF#. We were introduced to each other by Tony's former Ossian bandmate George Jackson in Glasgow in 1995 and played some tunes together- the best way to make friends I think. We have played together several times since and it's always a treat to hear him. The segue back into "Wonderful World" was the subject of much debate, internal and otherwise. I'm glad I kept it!