Irish Traditional Music Tune Index
Tune ID# 1402 (Never Was Piping So Gay)

RhythmBars8-bar phrase structureMode
Reel32AABBG Major
Transcription of first 2 bars of Never Was Piping So Gay
 about these two bars

These two bars are the start of the transcription in the book ER (details in the Bibliography below).

Where do you get the tune titles?
Titles given to this tune in the sources listed below (plus notes of mine about this tune):
Never Was Piping So Gay (composed by Ed Reavy)
What do the "track#tune" codes mean?

cd Discography

Here are all recordings of this tune considering only the indexed recordings. I have discovered by careful listening that these sources are in fact musically the same tune, regardless of the tune titles they use, key changes, retuning, etc. They are listed in order of when they were recorded.

Year
Recorded
Track
#Tune
[Album code] Artist. Title. Primary musicians (instruments). Album details
and contents
~196724#1[CmA 1] various. The Coleman Archive Vol. 1: The Living Tradition. View album details
~19961#2[PCln] Pat Cloonan. Pat Cloonan's Thanksgiving. Patrick Cloonan (accordion).View album details
~20029#2[BCw] Brian Conway. First through the Gate. Brian Conway (fiddle).View album details
~20054#1[InTndm] Kevin Burke and Ged Foley. In Tandem. Kevin Burke (fiddle), Ged Foley (guitar, vocals).View album details

Bibliography

Here are all transcriptions of this tune under any title whatsoever – considering only the indexed books – listed in chronological order. I have discovered by careful comparison that these are very similar to this tune as played on the recordings listed above.

As tune #3 in [ER] Joseph M. Reavy (compiler). The Collected Compositions of Ed Reavy. [available]
As reel #622 in [HN] Henrik Norbeck. Henrik Norbeck's Abc Tunes. [available]
As reel #361 in [Cobb] Dan Cobb. Cobb's Music of Ireland. [available]

If you are considering using the above transcriptions to help you learn this tune, I invite you to check these practical Tips for Learning Irish Traditional Music. See also: So why do you bother indexing books and abc?

Year of the oldest source for this tune, considering the recordings and transcriptions listed above (note that I concentrate on sources after 1900): 1967