The Ladies’ Hornpipe, The Davy Hornpipe, and the Trumpet Hornpipe

The Ladies' Hornpipe is a pipe hornpipe in D. The tune is attributed to Captain Donald Ross "D.R." MacLennan (1901-1984), the less famous younger half-brother of Pipe Major G.S. McLennan (one of the seminal figures of Highland bagpiping), and a cousin to the almost equally famous Highland dancer and piper William McLennan. (It was William McLennan who impressed fiddler/composer J. Scott Skinner, and who died in Canada while on tour with him.) D.R. MacLennan originally entitled the piece Joe McGann's Fiddle, although it was published in the Scots Guards (1954) settings as The Ladies Hornpipe, without composer credits. The tune is popular with Cape Breton fiddlers. (source TuneArch)

The Davy Hornpipe, in G, is the tune used by the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society for dancing 'The Sailor.' The other hornpipe for the dance, also in G, The Silver Star (aka. Twilight Star) is in the Cape Breton Fiddlers Collection, and originates from Ireland.

The final tune page for 2021-2022 is a draft arrangement of The Trumpet Hornpipe. It combines the melody and harmony from Ralph Sweet's fife arrangements, and Ed Pearlman's comments about the final ending, namely keeping the descending chromatic cadence for the last time.

--Alan Wilson