Annotation:Raftery's Hornpipe

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RAFTERY’S HORNPIPE. AKA and see “Limerick Junction.” Irish, Hornpipe. Caoimhin Mac Aoidh (1994) explains that O’Neill’s source was a fiddler named Joe Timoney, known in Donegal as Joe Phaedar Sheain O Tiomanai, who was born and raised at Min a tSamhaidh, Fintown, Donegal, and who was the great-great-great-great-great grandson of the renowned poet Tadhg An Fhile O’Tionamai An Aighe. Timoney emigrated to the United States at the beginning of the 20th century and arrived in San Francisco just after the great earthquake of 1906.

O'Neill (1922) identifies the tune as a variant of an unnamed hornpipe played by Chicago fiddler Edward Cronin that O'Neill named "Limerick Junction" after Cronin's native town in North Tipperary.

Source for notated version: J.P. Tamony, San Francisco [O'Neill].

Printed sources: O’Neill (Waifs and Strays of Gaelic Melody), 1922; No. 362.

Recorded sources:




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