Rhythm Distribution in Recordings
(In Fully Irish Traditional Albums)

Of related interest:
  • Discography: List of the recordings considered here.
  • Recordings by Decade: A graph of the historical distribution of these recordings.
  • Top Ten
  • Top 100 Tunes of the Century.
  • Rhythm Definitions: Comments on how I classify tunes according to rhythm.

This list ranks rhythms by their relative frequency among all tune instances on all fully-indexed, commercial recordings of primarily Irish traditional music in my entire database. The total number of such tune instances is 11,509. Since it ignores whether a tune recording is distinct tune or not, it reveals how often each tune type has been recorded. For example, even if one particular reel was recorded by ten different musicians over time, it still counts that as ten "votes" for the reel rhythm.

This report illustrates the distribution of tune types in commercial albums of Irish traditional music. Since it ignores whether a tune recording is distinct or not, and excludes incomplete albums, it can present the average rhythm distribution per album. The following 30 album codes are excluded from this report: 0, 1, 2, 4MD 2, Arc 1, BF, Boys 13, Ch AIE, Ch BIH, Ch C, Ch JG, CFF 1, CFF 2, Di, FFH, HatW, InTndm, JMcC, JOS 2, KCs, MMcG 3, Nms 2, NP, Plx 7, Srnd, Stpkt, SS 2, SW, Trpsw, TW.

This report, since it excludes some recordings, is slightly different from the report Rhythm Distribution in Recordings (All). Compare also Rhythm Distribution of tune types among all distinct tunes, as well as Rhythm Distribution in Session Tunes.

RhythmNumber of
instances
Average instances
per album
Percentage
of total
Bar graph
Reel5,2961346.0%bar
Double jig2,244519.5%bar
Hornpipe83927.3%bar
Song65225.7%bar
Polka50014.3%bar
Air38213.3%bar
Slide35213.1%bar
Slip jig26812.3%bar
Piece18201.6%bar
March12301.1%bar
Set dance10700.9%bar
Barn dance10000.9%bar
Single jig9700.8%bar
Waltz8900.8%bar
Fling8900.8%bar
Strathspey6100.5%bar
Highland5300.5%bar
Mazurka3100.3%bar
Other1700.1%bar
Schottisch1500.1%bar
Single reel1200.1%bar