Edward Bunting (1773–1843) was eighteen years old when he was engaged by the organizers of the Belfast Harp Festival in 1792 to write down the old tunes they expected would be performed. Ten harpers came to the festival, and Bunting wrote down the music he heard, thus beginning a life-long passion of collection Irish music.
Bunting published three books of this music, arranged and adapted for the piano–forte. He also included some historical information on the harps, on the playing techniques, on the tuning systems he observed in use, and brief biographies of the harpers who performed the tunes he collected.
The volume on this page is the second collection, published in 1809. His publication Ancient Music of Ireland (1840) is available here on WireStrungHarp.com. His earlier publication A General Collection of the Ancient Music of Ireland, published in 1796, is also available here on WireStrungHarp.com.
Please follow this Catalogue link to return to the author index on the Library page.