Tunes of the Munster Pipers 401–515

James Goodman (1828-1896) from the Dingle area of West Kerry, a Canon of the Church of Ireland, Professor of Irish in Trinity College Dublin, and an accomplished performer on the Irish or uilleann pipes, compiled a highly important manuscript collection of Irish traditional music in the 1860s. Drawn to a great extent from the oral tradition of Munster, and partly from other manuscripts and printed sources, the collection has now been published for the first time.

This first volume of over 500 song airs and dance tunes, edited by Dr Hugh Shields from the manuscripts, contains all the melodies which Goodman himself noted down from the pipers and other performers of his native province, together with an essay on his life and career based on new research. These tunes provide musicians and scholars with a unique body of Irish music from the south-west region and give unrivalled insights into the traditional music and song of Irish-speaking pre-Famine Ireland.

Dr Hugh Shields (1929-2008), Fellow Emeritus of Trinity College Dublin and former Senior Lecturer in French in the college, collected and studied traditional music from the 1950s, especially in Ireland and with particular emphasis on Ulster. He published many articles and sound recordings on the subject, and his Shamrock, Rose and Thistle: Folk Singing in North Derry (1981) and Narrative Singing in Ireland: Lays, Ballads, Come-All-Yes and Other Songs (1993) are standard works.