For traditional musicians and folk music enthusiasts, the name and his manuscript collection, often referred to as The Great Northern Tunebook , represents a treasure trove of 18th-century dance music. This substantial collection, jotted down around 1770, provides a fascinating and detailed snapshot of the repertoire of a fiddler in North-East England over 250 years ago.
This is the core value of the manuscript. It contains early versions of tunes that are now considered the standards of the Northumbrian Small Pipes repertoire. Tunes like “The Keel Row” and “Blow the Wind Southerly” have roots that intertwine with this era. Vickers provides us with the 18th-century chord structures and melodic contours of these songs, often differing slightly from the versions we hear today. For traditional musicians and folk music enthusiasts, the
: The collection gained widespread recognition after it was edited by Matt Seattle and published as The Great Northern Tune Book by Dragonfly Music in 1986–1987. A more recent single-volume edition was co-published by the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS) and the Northumbrian Pipers' Society (NPS) in 2008. Musical Content and Varieties It contains early versions of tunes that are
Would you like to know more about William Vickers or the historical context of the Great Northern Tunebook? : The collection gained widespread recognition after it
The tunebook features a rich assortment of time signatures and dance rhythms, including: