History of Irish Music

   Ireland is well known as “the land of song”, but actually, there is no serious standard work of Irish music. As O'Curry has said in one of his main works 'Lectures on the Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish': “Much has been confidently written on the ancient Irish music and musical instruments” but still, it is difficult to obtain a general agreement about Irish music.

     We all know that Music is a universal language. So is it, that in the ancient Ireland, the systems of law, medicine, poetry and music, according to Keating, “were set to music, being poetical compositions”. The bards (in irish, Ollamh) play one of the most important roles, because although they were not musicians, they were employees of noblemen, and they were paid for create stories in the shape of poems so they can be learned and transmited easily. And the word “Ogham” is related to musical significance, being Irish the earliest form of musical tablature. As Constantine Nigra writes – “The first certain examples of rhyme are found on Celtic soil and amongst Celtic nations, in songs made by poets, who are either of Celtic origin themselves or had long resided among the Celtic races... Final assonances, or rhyme, can have been derived solely from the laws of Celtic philology”. Obviously, music has also had a great importance in religion, being the perfect background for ceremonies and cults, and later, becoming the psalm tunes in church.

     There are solid proves that the Celts (about 500 years before Christ) have already musical instruments and composed melodies, using letters, the ogham scale and the ogham music tablature. It is not St. Patrick who introduced or taught music to the Irish people because they already have their own alphabet centuries previously. St. Patrick may have introduced the Roman letters to somehow translate the pre-Patrician Irish alphabet. With the Christian culture, the broadest work of music is compiled and composed in manuscripts mainly by monks.

     As for the instruments, Zeuss's Grammatica Celtica (1853) was the first book to give a clue to the nature of many old Irish instruments, but it is O'Curry again who give a list of ten instruments: 

Instrument	Translation	Performers	Instrument	Translation	Performers
Cruit and Clairseach1	Harp or Lyre	Cruitire	Stoc and Sturgan	Trumpets	Stocaire and Sturganaidhe
Psalterium, Nabla, Timpan, Kinnor, Trigonor and Ocht-tedach.	Stringed Instruments	Timpanach	Guthbuinne	Another kind of horns.	Graice
Buinne	Oboe or Flute	Buinnire	Pipai	Pipes	Pipaire
Bennbuabhal and Corn	Horns.	Graice	Feadan	Flute or Fife	Fedanach
Cuislenna	Bag-pipes.	Cuisleannach	Fidil	Fidil	--

¹The Cruit was smaller than the Clairseach and it was also played with the fingers or a bow. The commonest Clairseach is bigger and it has 30 strings.

     Much has been said for the old Irish scale, but in general, there is an agreement on its pentatonic pattern. And the apparent use of the minor mode by the ancient Irish that serves for the liviest dances and on the contrary the use of the major scale for the caoines. But in both, there is a melancholy mood in the tunes.

     And finally, here it is a song by the Chieftains called "O'Sullivan's march" that is a perfect example of Irish music; I hope you enjoy it as much as I do:

Sources: W. H. Grattan Flood, University of Ireland, Fourth Edition “A History of Irish Music” (First edition, 1904).