G'day again Denis,

I had a look at my copies of Meredith's Folk Songs of Australia - books 1 & 2 ... and only the Book 1 has any comments on the distinctive Mudgee dance tunes collected in the 1950s. I OCRed the full text ... showing he collected widely among the Mudgee dance musicians ... and that there was no "God-given names" for their tunes.

I also like the local reference to teh kerosene-tin dulcimer ... an instrument on which one of the local musician 'busked' for small change during the Great Depression. The square cross-section 4 gallon tins, in which kerosene (... was that something like 'rock oil" for Americans ... and something else for Brits .. ?), for stoves and heaters, was delivered. Anyway, I did make up a playing 'replica' for a workshop i presented at the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney ... using an 18 litre tin that had held Italian tomato paste (restaurant quanity ...) ... ends up somewhere between an "Hawaiian guitar and a tin-plate dulcimer!

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Folk Songs of Australia and the men and women who sang them

John Meredith & Hugh Anderson URE SMITH Sydney 1967

Page 220
There are two tunes known to most Mudgee musicians that have never been encountered elsewhere. They have apparently descended from goldfields musicians and have not been dispersed, although many variations exist throughout the district. A study of these tunes in their variants may provide useful clues to the origin of variants, as obviously all present-day performers must ultimately have learned the tunes from a single source. As neither tune has a name, John Meredith has called them the Mudgee Schottische' and 'The Mudgee Waltz' respectively. Sally Sloane says the schottische bears a resemblance to a tune she used to know as 'The Belle Brandon Schottische'.
George Davis's version follows.

THE MUDGEE SCHOTTISCHE
(Music Block)

One version of this schottische-that of Tom Blackman junior- has already been given; others by Fred Holland and Jim Lyons appear later.

'The Mudgee Waltz' was recorded by George Davis, but John Meredith first heard it played on an instrument peculiar to Mudgee, the kerosene-tin dulcimer, which was made by Cyril ('Bunny') Abbott, a Mudgee man who is an experienced bush-man - and who plays the accordion as well as his bush dulcimer.
He learned it from Tom Blackman junior, who said he had learned it from his father. At first Meredith thought he should call it 'The Tom Blackman Waltz', but Fred Holland mentioned that he had taught it to Blackman senior years before.

The kerosene-tin dulcimer consisted of a four-gallon tin with sound-holes cut into the ends and a broom-handle neck. Strung with three steel-guitar strings in a fairly high register, the dulcimer had a bridge at each end. Two of the three strings were tuned in unison, and the third, for some unknown reason, was sharpened slightly. The method of playing used was strumming with a plectrum and stopping in unison with a steel-guitar 'steel'or similarly shaped piece of iron. The effect was rather like that produced when a banjo-mandolin is played in unison with a fiddle.

THE MUDGEE WALTZ
(Cyril Abbott's version)
(Music Block)

There are two important variations: in one, which Fred Holland insisted was the correct one, most of the notes are of equal value (and the tune is played in what he called a 'running style'), and in the other dotted crochets are followed by a quaver or semi-quavers, giving the tune a jerky movement. End Page 221

Page 222
George Davis played the tune in 'running style' on the button accordion.

THE MUDGEE SCHOTTISCHE (Music Block)
(George Davis's version)

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BobB