# Great Arrangements of Folk Songs



## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

What are some great arrangements of folk songs? Hoping to hear some rare stuff. Vaughan Williams' Greensleeves Fantasia is probably the most famous.

This one I like more because of the tune, which is my favourite, and makes me cry like a little girl. Can't decide which arrangement I like better.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

This is probably my favourite version of this Japanese folk song. Check out how she manipulates the microtones.


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## Alfacharger (Dec 6, 2013)

Two Vaughan Williams folk song arrangements I like.

Loch Lomond for chorus.






The Running Set for orchestra.


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

Emphatically NOT arrangements, but Bartok? Janáček? The latter shines in his Moravian Folk Poetry in Song pieces.

You might fall in love with this simple but wonderful, hence famous, Welsh lullaby:


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Benjamin Britten officially did about three discs of British and Irish stuff, mostly for voice and piano - all worth checking out, if only to get another angle on a multi-faceted composer. Janáček is essential as he actually took his inspiration directly from field recordings (good call, CnCB).


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Great! Never heard these gems. The Vaughan Williams dance set is lively and uplifting, the Suo Gan (thought it was some oriental name at first) kind of got me choked up a bit.


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

Suo Gan translates as "lullaby", imaginative, eh? It was heavily used, effectively too, in Spielberg's Empire of the Sun.

Janáček's folk songs are stupendous. They are "mere arrangements", but none the worse for that.

Try this one specifically:


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## tortkis (Jul 13, 2013)

I don't know the original songs, but I like Walter Zimmermann's works based on the melodies of Franconian German folk music.

10 Fränkische Tānzer I-IV (version for string quartet with drone quartet)





Mode recently reissued Zimmermann's Lokale Musik, originally released in 1982, which includes the string quartet version of 10 Fränkische Tānzer.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Vaughan Williams - English Folk Suite, for Band, a wind ensemble classic.
Copland - Old American Folk Songs, for voice and orchestra...again classic arrangements if American tunes


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Gustav Holst's Second Suite if F for Military Band





And for something a tad different, Vaughan William's opera 'Sir John in Love' is full of folk song arrangements. He took five of them and arranged them as the cantata "In Windsor Forest"


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Graham Waterhouse - Jig, Air and Reel for strings


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

This cycle (Berio - Folksongs) has to be heard imo:


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

I like this one:






Anyone know what was the connection with Beethoven and Scotland/Scottish folk music? Did he ever spend much time there?


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

This is special. The 3rd movement extraordinary.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Rachmaninoff's Op. 41: Three Russian Songs:


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

flamencosketches said:


> Anyone know what was the connection with Beethoven and Scotland/Scottish folk music? Did he ever spend much time there?


No connection, apart from a rather bulging one with his wallet. He was very well paid for those arrangements (and admittedly he didn't do a bad job of it!!)


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## Alfacharger (Dec 6, 2013)

How about an entire symphony of folk tunes, Roy Harris 4th.


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## Fabulin (Jun 10, 2019)

Hatikvah (arr. John Williams)




Hej Sokoły! (arr. Krzesimir Dębski)


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## CaseyJCostello (Jan 1, 2020)

As far as "Shenandoah" goes, I particularly enjoy Jay Althouse's arrangement of the piece, which he arranged both as a vocal solo as well as for various choral settings, all of which I think are lovely. I have personally sung his vocal solo arrangement with piano accompaniment many times.

Some other vocal folk song arrangements I like are "All Through the Night" arranged by Ruth Elaine Schram and "The Last Rose of Summer" arranged by Greg Gilpin, as well as an orchestral arrangement of "The Last Rose of Summer" by the great Leroy Anderson from his _Irish Suite_:


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## Gallus (Feb 8, 2018)

flamencosketches said:


> Anyone know what was the connection with Beethoven and Scotland/Scottish folk music? Did he ever spend much time there?


I don't think so, only that Scotland was a very 'romanticised' place during Beethoven's lifetime, in large part thanks to the extraordinary success throughout Europe of Sir Walter Scott's Waverley novels. There was a craze for all things Scottish, and a collection of arrangements of Scottish folk songs was something Beethoven imagined could be a nice moneymaker.


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## david johnson (Jun 25, 2007)

Please give a listen to "Lincolnshire Posy" by Percy Grainger. Here is the final movement -


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