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 12,819. Since it ignores whether a tune recording is a 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 29 album codes are excluded from this report: 4MD 2, Arc 1, BIABH 3, 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, OMcA, 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
Reel5,9141346.1%bar
Double jig2,498519.5%bar
Hornpipe93327.3%bar
Song71725.6%bar
Polka57114.5%bar
Air41413.2%bar
Slide38813.0%bar
Slip jig29612.3%bar
Piece19801.5%bar
March13301.0%bar
Set dance11700.9%bar
Barn dance11200.9%bar
Single jig11200.9%bar
Waltz10200.8%bar
Fling9500.7%bar
Strathspey6500.5%bar
Highland6300.5%bar
Mazurka3800.3%bar
Other2100.2%bar
Single reel1600.1%bar
Schottisch1600.1%bar