back prev next Irish harp terms from Bunting
from Edward Bunting, Ancient Music of Ireland (Dublin 1840)
Irish boilsceann spoken by Gráinne Yeats Scottish Gaelic buillsgean spoken by Tony Dilworth Click the play button to hear it spoken. help This left hand (treble) figure is slightly ambiguous; no stopping indications are given. One possibility is to understand it as a two-part figure, with two instances of it given in the example. Then the two fingers used can slide to the nots above to silence them. Ladhar lair is the same figure for the right (bass) hand. Simon Chadwick 2008 Bolsgan ('in English characters' Bulsgan) - Swelling out These probably respresent mis-spellings, rather than authentic dialect variants, of (Ó Dónaill) boilsceann, 'bulging part of something; middle' (variants boilscean, boilsceán, builsceann). The only indication of what the word means occurs on p.31, where we are told that Boilsgean means 'Swelling out' and Builsgean 'A third in music'. Colm Ó Baoill 2002
Click the play button to hear it spoken. help
This left hand (treble) figure is slightly ambiguous; no stopping indications are given. One possibility is to understand it as a two-part figure, with two instances of it given in the example. Then the two fingers used can slide to the nots above to silence them.
Ladhar lair is the same figure for the right (bass) hand.
Simon Chadwick 2008
Bolsgan ('in English characters' Bulsgan) - Swelling out
These probably respresent mis-spellings, rather than authentic dialect variants, of (Ó Dónaill) boilsceann, 'bulging part of something; middle' (variants boilscean, boilsceán, builsceann). The only indication of what the word means occurs on p.31, where we are told that Boilsgean means 'Swelling out' and Builsgean 'A third in music'.
Colm Ó Baoill 2002
