Where the Hurdy Gurdy Led
I heard hurdy gurdy music from the middle ages a couple of days ago. It was primal, passionate and invoked ancient body memories that provoked and seared the present moment with its power. I’ve searched the play lists online at WABE Public Radio, Atlanta, but haven’t yet found the piece of music I heard.
I THOUGHT A HURDY GURDY WAS A BARREL ORGAN with a handle the organ grinder turned while his monkey passed the hat. It turns out this instrument was called a hurdy gurdy during the 18th century. The hurdy gurdy I was searching for is a different instrument. It’s sometimes called a wheel fiddle, is at least 800 years old and is having a resurgence. If you don’t know the instrument, you can see and hear it at this video link. The music is nicely rendered, but lacks the intensity of the performance I heard several days ago.
My youtube search for hurdy gurdys took me to Eluveitie’s Inis Mona video. Inis means “island” in Gaelic. The island I saw in the video was familiar and the song emited the same elusive power I’d experienced while listening to the historic hurdy gurdy music. I searched for the location of Inis Mona and found this explanation - “ It’s a Welsh island. Now called Isle of Anglesey. Original name is Ynys Môn. Welsh pronunciation: [ˈənɨs ˈmoːn]”. I’d visited the Isle of Anglesey during the summer of 2003 enroute to meet my friend W. A. Sessions , a remarkable writer of Welsh descent, who was completing a biography in London called Henry Howard, The Poet Earl of Surrey, A Life.
The Swift ferry - named for the Irish writer Jonathan Swift - took me from Dublin to Holy Head where I spent the night in a bed and breakfast run by a gentleman who quietly informed me he was an hereditary druid. In the morning I walked a path that ended at a standing stone near cliffs that overlooked the Irish Sea – not far from a bird sanctuary. Later that day I arrived on Anglesey. My hostess at the B&B spoke of the Irishmen who’d come there. She noted they were "hard workers and like Welshmen drank". I visited the ruins of an Irish community and remembered I’d once believed I was part Welsh, but had learned from family documents that my Hughes origins are clearly confined to what is now Northern Ireland.
Nevertheless, commentary about the meaning of the lyrics to Inis Mona and the lyrics themselves set me to wondering. Perhaps my gene pool includes Irish who traveled across the sea to Inis Mona to be trained as druids. Druidic musings aside, what I ponder most is my inability to write until now about any of my experiences in Wales. A combination of awe and lingering sorrow kept me silent until my search for an ancient hurdy gurdy tune led me to write my first words on the subject.
I THOUGHT A HURDY GURDY WAS A BARREL ORGAN with a handle the organ grinder turned while his monkey passed the hat. It turns out this instrument was called a hurdy gurdy during the 18th century. The hurdy gurdy I was searching for is a different instrument. It’s sometimes called a wheel fiddle, is at least 800 years old and is having a resurgence. If you don’t know the instrument, you can see and hear it at this video link. The music is nicely rendered, but lacks the intensity of the performance I heard several days ago.
My youtube search for hurdy gurdys took me to Eluveitie’s Inis Mona video. Inis means “island” in Gaelic. The island I saw in the video was familiar and the song emited the same elusive power I’d experienced while listening to the historic hurdy gurdy music. I searched for the location of Inis Mona and found this explanation - “ It’s a Welsh island. Now called Isle of Anglesey. Original name is Ynys Môn. Welsh pronunciation: [ˈənɨs ˈmoːn]”. I’d visited the Isle of Anglesey during the summer of 2003 enroute to meet my friend W. A. Sessions , a remarkable writer of Welsh descent, who was completing a biography in London called Henry Howard, The Poet Earl of Surrey, A Life.
The Swift ferry - named for the Irish writer Jonathan Swift - took me from Dublin to Holy Head where I spent the night in a bed and breakfast run by a gentleman who quietly informed me he was an hereditary druid. In the morning I walked a path that ended at a standing stone near cliffs that overlooked the Irish Sea – not far from a bird sanctuary. Later that day I arrived on Anglesey. My hostess at the B&B spoke of the Irishmen who’d come there. She noted they were "hard workers and like Welshmen drank". I visited the ruins of an Irish community and remembered I’d once believed I was part Welsh, but had learned from family documents that my Hughes origins are clearly confined to what is now Northern Ireland.
Nevertheless, commentary about the meaning of the lyrics to Inis Mona and the lyrics themselves set me to wondering. Perhaps my gene pool includes Irish who traveled across the sea to Inis Mona to be trained as druids. Druidic musings aside, what I ponder most is my inability to write until now about any of my experiences in Wales. A combination of awe and lingering sorrow kept me silent until my search for an ancient hurdy gurdy tune led me to write my first words on the subject.
Sandra Hughes
8-4-10
