Calgary Polka (Gaudet Polka) – Fiddle Tune a Day – Day 122

The first time I heard Calgary Polka was on Mark O’Connor’s album Soppin’ the Gravy, which I TOTALLY wore out when I was a teen. And, I started working on it when I heard Hanneke Cassel playing it in the warm up room (cafeteria) one of the first times I wen to Weiser.

I remember how overwhelming that room was, hearing 20 or more people all running through their rounds simultaneously. It was complete sensory overload. It also brings to my mind how all of these people who I met as a teen during that one week at Weiser are still close friends in my mind. I may have only seen them once in the last 10 years, but if they call me up, it is as if we just hung out a few days ago.

Calgary Polka according to Fiddler’s Companion

CALGARY POLKA. AKA and see “Gaudet Polka.” American (?), Canadian {?}; Polka. F Sharp Minor/A Major. Standard tuning. AA’BCAA’. Calgary, Alberta, was named in 1876 by Colonel MacLeod, after his boyhood home, “a little inlet on the sparsely populated island of Mull, with a few grey cottages and one big house” (Matthews, 1972). The word is Norse in origin and may have meant an enclosure for calves. Source for notated version: Mark O’Connor [Phillips]. Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes), vol. 2, 1995; pg. 337.