The Three Rolls / Cheers / Chords

Both the British and Americans in the 1812-era opened and closed The Troop, The Retreat, The Tattoo, and The General with The Three Rolls or Cheers.

There is sufficient evidence to show the Americans were playing the Three Rolls prior to the major duty calls during the American Revolution. But, unfortunately, little evidence exists that confirms the British play the Three Cheers during this time.

Evidence for Three Cheers in British Sources

Rev War-era music books do not seem to include mention of The Three Rolls or The Three Cheers. However, there is a hint at the end of the Tattoo. Sam Potter’s manuals issued in 1817 further expand on this.

Potter demonstrates the use of these rolls and cheers and later manuals, specifically Tamplini (1850), continue this tradition.

The fact that Potter’s use of The Three Chords and Rolls is nearly identical to the American usage suggests that they are both coming from the same tradition. This tradition probably originates in the pre-American Revolutionary War era.

For that reason, this study will examine the British and American 1812-era use of The Three Rolls / Cheers / Chords in order to attempt to re-construct an appropriate British Revolutionary War-era version of The Three Cheers.

To emphasis, the version of The Three Cheers presented cannot be absolutely assumed to be a correct or definite version used by British musicians. It merely presents a possibility based on available music.

Do you have any additional resources that show the Three Cheers, evidence of Chords, or the Accompaniment to the Drags in period sources? Contact me or comment below.

Ending the Duty Call

To begin, we actually want to discuss how the Cheers ends duty calls. This will help us to better see the overlap between the American Cheers and the British Chords.

In the 1812-era, the Americans ended these duties with a reprise of a portion of the beating. The Troop and The Tattoo ended with the Doublings once through; The Retreat once through the beating; and The General once through the entire beating.

According to Potter, the British, instead, ended The Three Rolls with a Drag & a Stroke. And for The Tattoo, they ended with two Drag & a Strokes. We can’t know whether the British used Potter’s version or the American version during the Revolutionary War.

But based on the similarity between Potter’s beatings and those listed in The Young Drummer’s Assistant, it’s fairly logical to assume that drummers originally used Potter’s Drag & a Stroke. The Americans may have corrupted this at some point during the American Revolution or the interim years.

Rumrille provides some support for this. His Reveille ends with three drags following The Three Cheers, perhaps reflecting on this older British tradition.

Want to know more about whether the British ended The Troop with the Rolls and The Doublings of The Troop? Take a look at my discussion of interpreting Young Drummers Assistant’s version of the Troop.

Accompaniment to the Drags

Potter’s fife manual includes a short tune called “Accompaniment to the Drags at the Close of the Taptoo,” implying that these two bars are added onto the end of The Three Chords (Cheers). 

We have some evidence that these two bars (or at least the first) were used earlier in the 18th century. In some English tutors, such as Rutherfoord, Longman & Broderip, and Thompson, the final bar in the English Tattoo is cut off from the rest of the tune. This measure shows the same rhythm and notes as the opening of Potter’s accompaniment. The connection suggests that fifers played this to close The Tattoo.

This can’t confirm that it was played after The Three Cheers. Certainly though it implies a tradition of using this measure to close the duty call.

Performing the Cheers

This information helps use to start unfolding the closing of these duty calls, or the end of The Three Cheers, but the next concern is to uncover the cheers themselves.

All early mentions of The Three Cheers in American texts are essentially the same three notes (D-E-G) over the span of three measures (or 12 beats) in the Key of C.

The British Chords

Potter’s manuals includes a set of three chords, which he calls the “Accompaniment to the three Rolls” (17). They are written as whole notes without any further embellishments or rhythm. While Potter’s notes aren’t the same as the Americans’, they are written in the Key of D. When transposed down, they nearly match the Americans, showing instead D-E-F.

Potter only includes chords to precede The Troop (which is in the Key of D). However, his manual and Tamplini’s (1850) both suggest that the fife’s role as a practical military instrument has been long extinct. Instead, the fife should now emphasis musicality. Thus, the British fifer seems to be increasingly ornamental and developing greater musical intricacy. Tamplini explains:

“The attention earnestly called to the Chords, especially for the Troop and the Retreats, the Tunes of which being optionally chosen may be in different Keys. It being obvious that each different Key must necessarily be prepared by different Chords, it would be a gross mistake to play the same chords indiscriminately previous to every tune.”

Tamplini (25)

In short, since these duty calls allow for variation in the fife melody, they will also fluctuate in key. The fifers should be able to make those adaptations with ease.

Comparison of British Chords to American Cheers

If we then assume that the pre-American Revolutionary War musicians were playing The Cheers in one key and were the same as the chords presented in Potter and Tamplini, they were likely playing D-E-F over 12 beats. If they were then also tagging onto the end of these Cheers the accompaniment seen in Potter and earlier tutors, the British would then be playing D-E-F-[DEF]G, the final portion to follow the drag on the drum.

Notice that the American Cheers is the Key of C chords, with the final cheer replaced with the beginning of the accompaniment to the drags in G.

The accompaniment is also clearly related to the final measure found in the English Tattoo.

Since the Americans appear to have dropped the drum’s drag & a stroke, and replaced it with an alternate ending, perhaps they condensed the original British Chords plus Accompaniment down to three chords (cheers), producing their universally accepted D-E-G. This seems further confirmed by the ending of the Americans’ Three Cheers, which is very similar to the Accompaniment.

The Three Rolls

In every manual that mentions the cheers, there are always three equal rolls.

Tamplini’s depiction is clearer. He indicates that the rolls are likely 17-stroke rolls, ending on beat three and resting for one beat before the next roll (33).

Tamplini’s description matches the American explanations of The Three Rolls / Cheers.

Robinson (1820) explains that one cheer is played “in the time of four steps” (13) and Hazeltine (1817) confirms this and adds that “the whole three rolls are performed in the time of twelve seconds, or twelve steps” (11).

Robinson and Hazeltine therefore indicate that all three rolls are the same length (unlike mid-century renditions of The Three Cheers). The entire beating must then be 3 measures in common time. Each roll is contained within one measure, which matches the fife chords.

Robinson’s explanation would suggest a roll commencing on beat one and ending on beat four.

Hazeltine adds that “each roll begins as the left foot rises, and ends when the right foot comes down the second time” (11). This would actually imply that the roll begins as an eighth note pick-up and ends on beat four; thus the roll would be performed: “&a | 1e&a | 2e&a | 3e&a | 4”.

The clearest explanation comes from Rumrille (1817) who states that there are “16 Strokes in each Roll” of the Cheers, making him more consistent with the British Potter and Tamplini (16).

Relationship to The Ruffle

Rumrille’s description might match that seen in Rees’ Cyclopedia:

“The Ruffle is a short roll; perhaps of five or six second duration, beat very close and firm, decreasing a little in force just before it concludes, which it does in an abrupt and smart manner, and with a strong flam.”

Rees (entry: ‘Drum’)

This description suggests that the rolls should be tuplet rolls, perhaps ending in a flam (like a 10-stroke roll). (For more on Reese’s description of a roll, see my discussion on the Ruffle.)

The most practical interpretation of this description would be to assume the rolls are 17-stroke rolls. Further proof for the 17-stroke roll interpretation comes from Potter’s Rolls preparatory to the Scotch Reveille (which appear to be the same as the rolls depicted before the Scotch Reveille in YDA).  Potter shows a 17-stroke roll and a rest on beat 4, twice over, before the longer rolls.

This is the common explanation for the longer set of rolls in the American Reveille (sometimes known as the Six Cheers or the Eight Rolls) explained in Rumrille. This is relevant because the Americans refer to these rolls as The Three Cheers and thus imply that the opening and closing rolls for Retreat, Tattoo, etc., are no different from the rolls separating the Reveille tunes. As to the rhythm of the Drag & a Stroke to end the cheers, we can look to Tamplini, who writes out the drags and Tattoo accompaniment in score form.

Want some practice guides that will help develop these long rolls? Check out: Double Stroke Roll Practice Guide and The Three Camps Practice Guide.

Conclusion: The Three Cheers + Drags

To open the four major camp duties, the Signal Strokes lead into the Three Chords and the Three Rolls plus Flam. Embellishments can be added to lead up to the chords, but no tag should be added after completing the final cheer.

Based on Potter’s explanation of the chords and rolls, this appears to be a logical opening and would be appropriate for the Rev War era.

For the other three camp duties, Potter explains that The Troop, The Retreat, and The General receive only one Drag & a Stroke. This shorter ending would match and fit in time to the ending of the English Tattoo provided in the English tutors.

While Potter doesn’t provide an accompaniment to these other camp duties, it may be assumed that fifers would know to shorten The Tattoo accompaniment.

For The Tattoo, Potter explains that it ends with the Three Cheers and Accompaniment and two Drag & a Strokes.

Since this shorter accompaniment was actually included with the English Tattoo, it may also be logical to assume that the Rev War era musicians only played this shorter version and the longer accompaniment to Tattoo was Potter’s invention. 

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Do you have any resources or observations on the use of the Chords, especially by the British fifers and drummers? Contact me or comment below.

To learn more, go to the next section “The Camp Taps: Drummer’s Call and Reveille”.

Or, skip to the conclusion “Summary: Commencing a Beating”.