Henry Atkinson manuscript

The Henry Atkinson manuscript is an early violin tunebook written in Northumberland. The title page carries the inscription, in a fine hand, Henry Atkinson, his book, 1694. 1694 is presumably the date the book was begun. A small 5 is apparently written below the 4, suggesting that the book was continued into the following year. Matt Seattle has written that elsewhere in the book there also appear the names Ralph Atkinson and Elinor Atkinson, which may help in the identification of the book's compiler - indeed, in 1694, one Henry Atkinson, a hoastman (coal factor) of Newcastle, married Eleanor Forster.^[1] He may be the book's compiler, though it should be understood the name is a common one.

The title page also carries a later annotation in another hand Wm. A. Chatto, 1834 - who wrote a note accompanying the manuscript which states that Henry Atkinson ... was a native of the county of Northumberland, and lived in the neighbourhood of Hartburn, though there is no independent confirmation of this. Chatto also added titles for some tunes, unnamed by Atkinson, which he was able to identify. It is the earliest fiddle tunebook to have survived from northern England, and hence an important source for the Music of Northumbria in that period.

There is more than one handwriting in the manuscript, both for the music and for titles - compare for instance Chickens and Sparrow Grass ^[2] and Flower of Yarraw.^[3] There is also considerable variability in the accuracy of the notation, so that whereas some tunes are meticulously detailed, others are very vague and inconsistent as to barring and note durations.

The maunuscript is now in the possession of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne, and is held in the Northumberland Record Office. It may be viewed online on the FARNE archive, with notes by Matt Seattle, at http://www.asaplive.com/archive/index.asp. Some 13 of the tunes were transcribed in detail, including the bowings and ornaments, in Seattle's book Morpeth Rant,^[4] now unfortunately out of print.

Contents

The book contains over 200 tunes, including early versions of several characteristic north-eastern and Border tunes, including Brave Willie Forster which is now used for the song Bobby Shaftoe, as well as Flower of Yarraw which since the Jacobite uprisings has been known in Northumberland as Sir John Fenwick's the Flower amang them, and two distinct versions of Gingling Geordie, both variation sets, which survives to this day as the long variation set for Northumbrian smallpipes Wylam Away. The tune I was young and lusty when I kent ye appears again, in a different mode and with variations for Border pipes, in the William Dixon manuscript from 40 years later; its title survives in the lyric of the song Sair fyel'd hinny, which is still sung in the region today, though to a different melody. One of the tunes, an unnamed common-time hornpipe, appears again as the Shepherd's Hornpipe in Robert Bewick's manuscripts, where it seems to be derived from an Irish version, and is current to this day in Northumberland - Billy Pigg recorded a Scottish version of it, The Cairdin' o't. Many of the tunes are explicitly in fiddle settings, with the bowings and ornaments clearly marked; Prince Eugin's March has extensive double stoppings, and another, London's loyalty, is an early example of scordatura notation. Some other tunes, though written out for fiddle, are apparently pipe tunes, with their characteristic range and figuration: Curds and Whey and The Lad that keeps the Cattle are examples.

The manuscript also includes tunes current in both the southern English and Scottish music of the time, including some from Playford's publications. Some of the tunes were very new at the time the book was being written - The Boyne, a new Jock March presumably commemorates the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, and England's Lamentation for the late Q. Mary must have been written after her death at the end of 1694. The manuscript includes a version of Purcell's Britons, Strike Home!, from Bonduca which was first performed in October 1695, and which Atkinson presumably copied out after this point. Several of the tunes are similar to versions published by Playford in 1698, but may have been circulating aurally before publication.

Many of the musical forms used are no longer common, such as minuets, gavottes and bourees and a saraband. Other forms, such as triple-time hornpipes, or jigs with 6-bar strains, are less current now than then, though examples of these are still played in the region.

References