UPWARD ARPEGGIOS
The first four arpeggio-like upward runs of notes in the notation of the bass of
Féachain Gléis can be envisaged as ornamentation of the main 'melody' notes of the
bass part (located as the lowest pitches of each run rather than the highest). The
notes following the main notes in the runs can be seen to belong to the 5ths & 4ths
of their respective dyads or triads. The first treble note after each bass 'arpeggio' in
the notation forms part of a smoothly connecting pattern of ascending (or perhaps
originally descending) 5ths & 4ths, reminiscent of the patterns found in the first half
of Port Priest and Cumha Iarla Wigton.
In our earliest notation of Féachain Gléis, the last and highest pitch of the first four
bass chords seems regularly longer, a quaver instead of a semiquaver. The highest
note is again repeated at the octave in the subsequent treble runs.
Thus the first two pairs of bass and treble runs both contain four pitches rising to the
note D. The third bass and treble runs include three pitches rising to the note A and
the fourth bass and treble runs also include three pitches before the striking the
note G. Notably the last note of the third and fourth pairs is not notated as being
held a full quaver, and this is probably because the note does not belong to the
chord and is not to be stressed.
Bunting substantially recreates the melody of the Féachain Gléis by the time of
publication despite claiming in the 1840 Introduction that it 'is given as he played it'
there. Some of Bunting's alterations to pieces can be quite dramatic in nature and
quantity and the phenomenon seems generally more progressive than reversive.
Changes to these bass chords made in subsequent notations disrupt the smoothly
ascending dyads. With the exception of the chord founded on B which Bunting
never changes and which always has four notes, the three other opening bass
chords are changed into examples of lán chrobh (+,1,2,3) on G or A which match
the intervals given in Bunting's published fingering charts, ie., descending 3rd, 4th &
5th.
This may show Bunting artificially altering the arpeggios to become more
stereotypical with respect to his published details of fingerings for right hand chords.
This same artifice may exist in his footnote concerning 'an error in the engraving'
which would also relate to his published details concerning right hand chords.
Féachain Gléis