Paddy on the Turnpike

This reel came from Ireland and is now played in nearly every fiddle tradition in North America and the British Isles, in versions that run from major to minor. Septimus Winner printed it in Philadelphia in 1864. Samuel Bayard traced it to an old Scottish song air, "The Waulkin' o' the Fauld," though he could not find it before the early 18th century. Irish players mostly use G, while in America A is at least as common.

West Virginia fiddler Wilson Douglas said his state had its own "Paddy on the Turnpike," with a hornpipe feel and a drone, different from the one in Kentucky and North Carolina. Missouri fiddler Bob Holt recalled that his grandfather kept travelers who could fiddle up all night playing it.