Green Mountain Petronella
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Standard Notation
ABC Notation
Mandolin Tablature
Violin Tablature
traditional
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Transcription: by Darryl D. Bush
"Green Mountain Petronella" is an American reel, polka or country dance. known in<br> New England in G Major (Brody, Miller & Perron/1983, Phillips, Spadaro, Sweet) or<br> F Major (Miller & Perron/1978). The parts are played AAB (Miller & Perron/1978) or<br> AABB (Brody, Miller & Perron/1983, Phillips, Spadaro, Sweet).<br> Canterbury, New Hampshire caller and musician Dudley Laufman has been credited with<br> finding and disseminating this tune. Nick Barber inexplicably identifies the tune as<br> from Newfoundland, however the title refers to the Green Mountains of Vermont.<br> The title came about due to 20th century New England adaptations of the Scottish country<br> dance "Petronella", as first described by New England musician and dance prompter<br> Ralph Page in Northern Junket, Vol. 10 No. 2 (1970). At some point it became customary<br> for the 'inactives' during the dance to join in a figure, where previously they had<br> stood by. Caller Dudley Laufman tongue-in-cheek referred to that variation of the dance<br> as "Citronella", although there were other minor figure variations as well (some of which<br> 'stuck' while others dropped out of fashion among dancers). Page wrote that the tune<br> named "Petronella" was disliked by many of the fiddlers he knew, as was "despised" by the<br> dancers. Substitutions for it for the dance were “The Girl I Left Behind Me" and<br> "Finnegan's Wake”, among others, but the "Green Mountain Petronella" was Page's favored<br> substitution. He said:<br> "The nearer you got to Vermont the surer you were to dancing "Pat'nella" to this tune".<br> It was printed in Barber's Nick Barber's English Choice (2002),<br> Brody's Fiddler's Fakebook (1983),<br> Miller & Perron's 101 Polkas (1978) and<br> New England Fiddler's Repertoire (1983),<br> Ralph Page's Northern Junket, vol. 10, No. 2 (1970),<br> Phillips' Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 1 (1994),<br> Spadaro's 10 Cents a Dance (1980) and<br> Sweet's Fifer's Delight (1964/1981).<br> It was recorded by Nick & Mary Barber with Huw Jones on Lovely Nancy (2002),<br> Rodney and Randy Miller on Castles in the Air and<br> on New England Chestnuts, vol. II (1981).<br>
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