| G | A | B | D | E | G | |||
| A | B | C♯ | E | F♯ | A |
and a drone bass (one tone that does not change and is played all through the piece) which makes it hard to get the same effect on the piano. Scotch bagpipes are heard in districts where the milk-maids and serving folk get together in the “ingle,” and still “lilt” in the good old-fashioned way.
The thing that makes us know Scotch music from any other is a queer little trick of the rhythm called the snap in which a note of short value is followed by a dotted note of longer value, instead of the other way around which is more commonly found. Thus:
but the two ways are always combined, thus:
and so on. If you want to make up a real Scotch tune yourself, just play this rhythm up and down the black keys of the piano from F# to the next F#!
Many of the lovely poems of Robert Burns have been set to old Scotch airs. He saved many of the old songs, for he gathered the remains of unpublished old ballads and songs, and snatches of popular melodies, and with genius gave life to the fragments he found. In his own words, “I have collected, begged, borrowed and stolen all the songs I could meet with.”
Canadian Folk Songs
Canada has the folk songs of the habitant which are French in character. They are very beautiful and full of romance and many of them can be traced back to France. Many, however, were born in Canada and reveal the hearts of people who lived in the great lonely spaces of a new country.