We tend to think of Irish trad tunes as being ancient, and indeed some of them are.  But there is also an unbroken tradition of musicians composing new tunes and playing them alongside the old ones. You can be a part of that tradition.

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This course will teach you to start creating your own tunes. We will focus on particular tune types and keys, talking about the expectations and conventions of Irish tunes. (Once you know the rules, you can decide to break them, of course!)

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You do not need to read or write music notation for this class. However, if you prefer to use music notation, you can approach the class in that way. Hopefully students will be willing to share their work with the class, either by playing it themselves live, playing an audio or video recording they have made before class, or sending a notated score to the instructor for her to play.

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All melodic instruments welcome. Please note that we will be focused on dance tunes (jigs, reels, etc.), not on songwriting, which is a different course!

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The class meetings will be recorded, and students will have access to the recordings for at least three weeks after the class.