Bodhrans and Titanic

[snopes]

I was just reading something that suggested the scene(s) in James Cameron's Titanic showing Irish steerage passengers dancing to the beat of the bodhrán (a handheld, shallow Irish drum with a goatskin head) were anachronistic because there is no evidence that the "traditional" bodhrán existed or was used in Irish music prior to the 1960s.

Since I know nothing about the subject, that's all I can say.

- snopes

According to Wikipedia...

"The Bodhrán was used during the Irish rebellion of 1603, by the Irish forces, as a war drum, or battle drum. The use of the drum was to provide a cadence for the pipers and warriors to keep to, as well as anounce the arrival of the army. This leads some to think that the Bodhrán was derived from an old Celtic war drum."

Sounds pretty plausible, but then again, we all know the accuracy level of Wiki is fairly questionable.

[Ramblin' Dave]

That scene is anachronistic in that the first-class passengers would never have been allowed to mix with the lower-class ones, due to health concerns. (First class passengers had to have some sort of doctor's certificate assuring that they were healthy, others didn't.) But I've never heard any objection to the drums before.

[Jay Tea]

Nobody really knows much about the history of these drums, and there are many theories, most of which carry little water (or beat!), but as far as the modern useage of the drum is cioncerned we have more authoritative knowledge as it's in living memory, and yes, it would seem that Titanic did pre-date the modern popular use of the bodhran...

Sean O Riada

The bodhran found its place in the traditional music of recent times largely through the work of Sean O Riada and Ceoltóirí Cualann, in which the late Peadar Mercier played the instrument. One of Mercier's colleagues in Ceoltóirí Cualann was Eamon de Builtéar. They often played together at sessions in the youth hostel in which Mercier worked in north Wicklow.
Eamon de Buitléar told me that the bodhran was played in some parts of Kerry and that following its use in Sive, John B Keane's play staged in Dublin's Abbey Theatre in 1959**, others gradually took up the instrument. Keane had heard it played by mummers from the Listowel hinterland. [According to the stage script, the instrument used was referred to as the tambourine, beaten with a stick]. In 1960 O Riada used the instument for the incidental music in the Abbey's production of Listowel writer Bryan Mac Mahon's The Song of the Anvil.
But the earliest evidence of the tambourine in Irish music comes from the watercolour painting "A Shebeen in Listowel," dated c.1842. Now on loan to Listowel Library, the painting by artist Bridget Maria Fitzgerald depicts an interior scene in which a flute player is accompanied by a youth playing the tambourine.
The "poor man's tambourine", which the modern bodhran closely resembles, is seen in a 1947 photo taken by folklorist, the late Kevin Danaher, of three young mummers in west Limerick. Two of the boys are playing the instruments which appear to be made of circular wooden bands used by farmers for separating wheat from chaff, or even used on building sites for removing larger stones from sand.On one of the instruments there can be clearly seen one of two slits in the timber for holding it while sifting.

[jw]

Josh Mittleman's site would be a good authority.
This album claims to have bodhrán music going back to 1927, which is close enough to the Titantic years to make it possible.

Sean O'Riada was mainly responsible for introducing the bodhrán into mainstream Irish Traditional music.

Until the 1960s, it was uncommon outside southwestern Ireland; it was introduced to modern traditional music to Sean O Riada, who used it in his arrangements for Ceoltóirí Chualann and the Chieftains.

[Aud 1]

We know that's Gaelic Storm playing but I got the impression that in the context of the movie was more of a jam session not an organized group. There are examples of flat single sided drums like that from a lot of places and times. The viewer is the one calling it a bodhran.

[Zachary Fizz]

My father and my uncles used to go for a drink at "The Shebeen", and the "John B Keane", in Listowel in the early 1970s, and I'm sure my dad wouldn't have stood for anything but the Everly Brothers or silence in those days. So we can safely conclude that the bodhran was less popular in Listowel at that time.

OTOH, I recall walking down to the stream which lies not far to the south of Kilmorna with my dad one morning, and asking him about the place up on the other side of the valley, and him saying "That's Duagh, where they make the bodhrans". So evidently it was known for them then. I used to sit on a five barred gate and contemplate the mystery that was Duagh, never having gone there, you see, though mostly I sat up there to get away from my little brother who was very irritating to me in those days but who could not yet climb. We get on much better now and it's many years since I have sat astride a five barred gate.

Duagh is near enough to both Listowel and Athea to have supplied the bodhrans mentioned in Jay Tea's link.

[unbroken]

My uncle once released a solo bodhran album (called, imaginatively, 'An Bodhran').

I'd say it's scintillating listening.

[Skeptic]

I don't know about the drum and the Titanic, but there is a definite error with a song sung in the film Ryan's Daughter, which was set in the prelude to the Irish War of Independence, (approx 1918). In the film several men in a bar are singing "The Banks of My Own Lovely Lee" which was not written for about another ten years.

[High Eight]

Folkie joke:

"If you chuck a bodhran and a banjo off the top of the Empire State Building, which would hit the ground first?"

"Who cares?"

[llewtrah]

A proper bodhran is made with dogskin rather than goatskin. Dogskin has fallen out of fashion in recent times. I have obviously spent way too many summers listening to folk music at the Cropredy Festival.

[Tarquin Farquart]

Originally Posted by llewtrah

A proper bodhran is made with dogskin rather than goatskin. Dogskin has fallen out of fashion in recent times. I have obviously spent way too many summers listening to folk music at the Cropredy Festival.

A proper bodhran is a bodhrán

(how pendantic am I?)

[Jay Tea]

Originally Posted by llewtrah

A proper bodhran is made with dogskin rather than goatskin. Dogskin has fallen out of fashion in recent times. I have obviously spent way too many summers listening to folk music at the Cropredy Festival.

In what sense 'proper'? I mean, we've basically established that they've not been a fixture in folk music for long enough for there to be any 'proper' authoritative knowledge of the things, and it stands to reason that these things would have been made with whatever skin was handy, and I wouldn't say goatskin drums sound and better of worse than, say, greyhound skin...

[llewtrah]

Originally Posted by Jay Tea

In what sense 'proper'? I mean, we've basically established that they've not been a fixture in folk music for long enough for there to be any 'proper' authoritative knowledge of the things, and it stands to reason that these things would have been made with whatever skin was handy, and I wouldn't say goatskin drums sound and better of worse than, say, greyhound skin...

Some of the bodhrán players I've watched would no doubt beg to differ. Many performers liked to give 10 minute talks before playing anything (the uncharitable among us might say this is so the audience can stick a finger in one ear and go into full folkie mode). Apparently dogskin sounds different . If true, it's probably due to the different thickness, elasticity and strength of the different types of skin. I don't think any of the bodhráns on sale there were dogskin, probably goat and kid.

I like the bodhrán. Trivia: one of the Coronation St actors play it -the guy who played Eddie, Hilda's lodger IIRC - and I saw him play at Cropredy one year. I'm also very fond of the Irish brass harp and anything written by Turlough O'Carolan. Chieftains are good too. It probably goes with having Irish blood a couple of generations back on mum's side of the family (mum herself can't stand Irish folk music and I discovered it by accident in my early 20s).

[Jay Tea]

Interesting. I'd agree that many drummers might favour dogskin but I don't think anybody should tell you with a straight face that dogskin is required for the drum to be considered 'proper'. Each drum finds a specific range (or 'voice') as a result of how it's played, how often, how it's warmed and left to relax and how it's looked after generally. These factors are more important than the skin used, but yeah, everybody has their favourites...

[Richard W]

Originally Posted by llewtrah

Many performers liked to give 10 minute talks before playing anything (the uncharitable among us might say this is so the audience can stick a finger in one ear and go into full folkie mode).

Why do folk aficionados do that "sticking one finger in your ear" thing? Do they really do it, or is it just a joke stereotype?

I'm sure I've asked before but either nobody could answer, or the answer was much duller than I was expecting so I forgot.

[Tarquin Farquart]

Originally Posted by Richard W

Why do folk aficionados do that "sticking one finger in your ear" thing? Do they really do it, or is it just a joke stereotype?

I'm sure I've asked before but either nobody could answer, or the answer was much duller than I was expecting so I forgot.

I've seen them do it. It's used with doing unaccompanied singing, to get the right pitch (why they need to have a finger in the ear to do I don't know)

[Skeptic]

Originally Posted by llewtrah

A proper bodhran is made with dogskin rather than goatskin. Dogskin has fallen out of fashion in recent times. I have obviously spent way too many summers listening to folk music at the Cropredy Festival.

I can't imagine any dog being big enough for its hide to cover a bodhran.

[Eddylizard]

Originally Posted by Skeptic

I can't imagine any dog being big enough for its hide to cover a bodhran.

According to Wiki, the bodhran varies between 10" and 26" in diameter.

I can imagine being able to get a one foot (slighly larger to allow for attaching to the frame) diameter piece of hide from a dog to make a small bodhran.

Imagine the area around the mid-back to the belly on a large dog - the saddle if you will.

[llewtrah]

I've seen enough obese labradors to say "plenty of skin on that dog to cover a bodhrán" !