Irish Traditional Music Tune Index
Tune ID# 887 (If There Weren't Any Women)

RhythmBars8-bar phrase structureMode
Barn dance32AABBD Major
Transcription of first 2 bars of If There Weren't Any Women
 about these two bars

These two bars are the start of my transcription of how this tune was played – the first time through – on the recording CA (details in the Discography 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):
If There Weren't Any Women / Where Would the World Be without Women (3rd in set Germans on CA) (also in G)
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
~19839#3[CA] Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh and Frankie Kennedy. Ceol Aduaidh. Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh (fiddle, vocals), Frankie Kennedy (flute).View album details
~20012#2[AtR 2] At the Racket. Mirth-Making Heroes. John Carty (fiddle, banjo), Brian McGrath (banjo, piano, keyboards), Seamus O'Donnell (flute, saxophone, vocals), Garry O'Briain (guitar, mandocello, piano), Brid Dooley (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 misc #50 in [MM] Martin Mulvihill. First Collection of Traditional Irish Music.

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): 1983