Irish Tune Types: Jig

Hi, friends.

Let’s look at another Irish tune type, the Jig. A jig is a dance tune.

We’ll describe the basic jig in this video, and we’ll walk through one in the next.

I’ll continue sharing examples for us to use in practice, but if you want to can search for some jigs yourself from the Session website.

When we understand the nature of a tune’s style, then we’ll have a better idea of how to play it.

A jig is in 6/8 time. This means there are 6 beats in the tune’s smallest segment, a measure, and that an eighth note gets one beat. This time signature is counted in two groups of three, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. In saying that you can tell right away that beats one and four are emphasized, so the count really feels like, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Many end up counting 6/8 time as one beat for each group of three, 1, 2. Think about the jig as a collection of these groups of three notes.

The time signature in itself doesn’t tell us enough about the rhythm, but it gives us some direction.

Jigs are lively, full of life, and intended to be danced with delight. For us this means we need to be satisfied with learning to be fun at a slower pace until our fingers are able to dance around. Remember, our fingers won’t dance around until we go through the work of taking it slowly.

Select the video to the right to access the lesson.