You can buy sheet music for Ashokan Farewell at any good music store. It's written in D and that key works out very well on standard G tuning Dobro.

I don't write tab, but if you can cipher from written music at all you shouldn't have much trouble figuringing it out. The first note is third string, second fret.

Other than being forever associated with the Ken Burns doc video series, the tune has nothing to do with the Civil War. It was written by fiddler Jay Ungar to convey the sweet sadness of leaving friends after bonding at his summer music workshops in Ashokan, NY, in the Catskills. I heard it played there soon after he wrote it--two fiddles and a cello, as I recall--and there wasn't a dry eye in the house.

When Jay wrote the tune he was listening to a lot of Scottish fiddle music, a tradition rich in beautiful slow airs. To me, it sounds very much like a Scottish air. Playing lots of unisons, drones and pulloffs on your reso will help give it a Scottish flavor.

I don't know of any recordings of this tune by reso artists. Maybe someone will post. You can find it played by Jay himself on the Fiddle Fever album and elsewhere.

Good luck. It's a great tune.

[This message was edited by Bob Stone on 08 October 2003 at 08:38 AM.]

Also, I believe LeRoy Mack has tabbed a version in a book he sells. He recorded the tune on "LeRoy Mack & Friends". Check at http://www.leroymack.com/albums.html

Lloyd Green has recorded this on his great new CD. I think it's one of the best things I've ever heard him play. I love his rendition of the song.

GOD bless each of you!

As far as I remember the tune was originally written for a big contra dance fest called Ashokan.
www.ashokan.org/ashokan/camp.shtml

Bob

[This message was edited by Bob Hoffnar on 12 October 2003 at 10:28 PM.]