Skye Waulking Song- Essay – Flashcards

-Tonality only fully established at the end of the intro, just before singer enters. -Chord sequence= Em - G until full band enter and changes to C - G - Em - G. Gives the song a melancholy tone until full bad enters.

After full band enters, whole song is predominantly uses major chords giving a more uplifting feeling.

Dotted rhythms throughout give a lilting feel (reflects the process of waulking)

In the instrumental, emphasis put on 2nd and 5th notes of a bar to keep rhythmic interest.

Vocals hold main melody, moves in steps although has a wide range in pitch, sometimes going into quite low alto notes- unusual for a female singer.

When uillean pipes and accordian take over the melody, differ from vocals: -taking wider steps between notes -using Fsharp of Gmajor key which vocal melody avoided

Wordsetting is for the most part syllabic: one syllable per note.

Nonesense syllables are often melismatic: many notes to a syllable

Structure's roots in trad. Celtic folk music: no official chorus because of superstition that it was unlucky to repeat a whole line.

Western influence can be seen: -some verses treated like chorus, e.g verse 4 where whole band suddenly come in and backing vocals added. -instrumental section 3/4 of the way in where uillean pipes and accordian play melodic solos reminiscent of a guitar solo.