Dear Geri,

Co. Galway and Co. Donegal apparently have the greatest numbers of professedly
fluent Irish speakers in the Irish Gaeltacht so this will be what you're most
likely to encounter even in the States.

Munster Irish has something of an elevated place in literary history though. In
certain respects, it relates to the other forms of Gaelic as would Spanish to
French. It has kept more of the synthetic verbal forms than other forms of
Gaelic which tend more to split the person off from the verb. This is like
having Spanish penso, pensas, pensa instead of French je pense, tu penses, il
pense.

It also has structural differences in word stress compared to other forms of
Gaelic: elsewhere the first syllable of a word is stressed but in Munster, the
stress can be moved onto other syllables. This has important implications when
it comes to relating words to musical rhythm. This would like having Spanish
word stress (any of the last three syllables) instead of French word stress
(generally on the last syllable); compare libro/livre, comprendes/comprends,
memoria/memoire stressing the same syllables but música/musique,
próximo/prochaine, magnífico/magnifique stressing different syllables.

Learners of any form of Gaelic are going to encounter different ways of talking
wherever they are. The media, whether the web, newspapers, radio or television,
will inevitably bring you into contact with different dialects of Gaelic, either
in written or in spoken form. The important thing is to start off with one
dialect and to graft knowledge about other dialects onto your own core language.

Pairings of monolingual Anglophones and bilingual native Irish speakers on Live
Mocha of course offer nothing to Irish speakers so that's out. Rosetta Stone
would cost far too much unless you can agree to share the cost and the use with
a group of trustworthy, like-minded individuals. Byki is free but it is only a
learning tool for memorising by drilling phrases (spoken in Connaught Irish)
with flashcards (althought it does have the impressive option to press the
tortoise and slow down the speech of the native speakers so you can really
listen to them). It will not explicitly teach you either the connection between
spelling and pronunciation or grammar.

BBC Northern Ireland's Radio Ulster has a short beginners course which displays
the language points online. These are short aural lessons in Ulster Irish and
don't offer the exercise that the Byki cards would but they are downloadable for
free.

Most people will need a full course, either by buying a book and tapes or by
doing an online course. Gaeltalk does a reasonably priced online beginner's
course which will teach you Munster Irish and offer you Skype sessions online
with native speakers. Have a look at the following webpages.

http://www.gaeltalk.net/shop/
http://www.learn4good.com/distance_learn/ireland_online_irish_courses2.htm

Congratulations on the progress so far!

Beannachdan,



Alasdair

--- In clairseach@..., "bayharper" <bayharper@...> wrote:
>
> First, I wanted to share the news that I have placed the deposit on my Student
Trinity Harp. I am really excited. The Triplett wire harp has all of its
strings now and is beginning to hold its pitch. Actually, it is sounding pretty
good. I just have to add some satellite speakers to my laptop for the Skype
lessons with Ann and make arrangements with her to get started.
>
> Second, I have joined a forum called "Learning Irish". I asked for opinions
on software and a program called "Transparent Language" BYKI was recommended.
My concern is that the reason I want to learn Irish is to use it as an aide in
learning the ancient music. Is there any special dialect I should be looking
for? Or will a program like BYKI be sufficient for these needs? I appreciate
any opinions.
>
> Thanks,
> Geri
>