The Eel in the Sink is normally played as a single reel, and can be found in different modes and keys – A dorian for example, with a C natural, rather than C sharp. I like it played in A mixolydian, with bright sharp C sharps, and then the nice surprise of the G natural when it turns up at the end of the A part.
I don’t know much about the tune, and can’t remember where I first learned it. In a session in London, probably. The Eel in the Sink is an old tune, I would think, and was recorded by Peter Conlon as far back as the 1920s, though under the title The Irishman’s Blackthorn.
I like to think the tune has an appropriately slippery quality – like eels in the sink!
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