Highlands history in song

The Rise and Fall o' Charlie
Alan Reid and Rob van Sante


You might perhaps know the Skye Boat Song, which is sometimes used as a lullabye, or perhaps you've heard the rousing and wtty song by Robert Burns, Charlie Is My Darlin’. There’s more to the story of Prince Charles Edward Stuart than that, though, in both song and history.

It’s a history intimately connected with Scotland, as the Rising of 1745, when Bonnie Prince Charlie, as he was known, hoped to lead a revolution to bring the British Crown back to the house of Stuart, began and in many ways ended in the Scottish Highlands. Alan Reid of the Battlefield Band and his frequent duo partner Rob van Sante have gathered songs, written songs, and gathered friends together to play and sing them to tell the story of the prince, from rising to remembrance. It makes for a cohesive whole and good listening, whether you know anything about Charles Stuart, Johnny Cope, Preston Pans, or Culloden or not. If yuo're not up on this part of history, the liner notes will fill you in a bit on the trajectory of the story, and the provenance of the music, as well.

A few of the songs, mostly those in Scottish Gaelic, are from Charlie’s time, and there are two Robert Burns songs, from not that long after. Several of the pieces come from the nineteenth century, a time when Charlie's life and quest were often quite romanticized, and Alan Reid has written four of the fourteen pieces included here. The collection opens with Sound of the Pibroch, marking the highland pipes which called the clans from glen to glen to join in the rising, and ends with Will Ye No’ Come Back Again, a song which today is still sung often at the end of gatherings to wish friends a speedy return. Between there are songs in Gaelic, songs welcoming the prince, songs celebrating victories in battle, songs questioning the future of the prince and his cause, and songs looking back and, as Reid puts it in the liner notes “beginning the long process of romanticizing the life and creating the myth” of Bonnie Prince Charlie. It’s a thoughtful collection balanced both musically, and you might say, philosophically. Reid and van Sante are joined by several gifted Scottish musicians, including rising Gaelic singer Maeve MacKinnon, cellist and singer Wendy Weatherby, fiddler Alistair White, Susan Miller on whistle and flute, Mike Katz on the pipes and Ian Fairbairn on fiddle.


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Island & Sea & Gaelic song: Maggie MacInnes

Maggie MacInnes
A Fagail Mhiughalaigh (Leaving Mingulay)

Family, faith, fishing, and the sea: those four things were the strongest ties which kept people who lived on the remote Scottish island of Mingulay going. They are what form the ideas around which Gaelic singer and clarsach player Maggie MacInnes bases the music she’s chosen for this album, as well.

There is family connection for MacInnes, too. Mingulay is uninhabited today, but her great grand parents lived there, and the musician has long been drawn to thinking about how people in such a remote community -- Mingulay is twelve miles off the coast of the island of Barra, in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides, and the Outer Hebrides themselves are separated by forty miles of water from the northwestern coast of mainland Scotland -- sustained themselves.

When MacInnes was invited to prepare music for a
television documentary about Mingulay and its people, she began gathering her ideas into music. Music from that film is on this recording, some of it rearranged, added to, and remixed, and there is new music as well. The album comprises traditional music, including a hymn which was a favorite of Macinnes’ great grandmother. There is a song from a seventeenth century female bard from the island, as well as a song of fairy legend, several waulking songs from the island’s women’s work, songs of history and of life on the sea, and the instrumental title track, which is composed by MacInnes. In the singing, playing, and song selection, it is a graceful and thoughtful project, illuminating lives and landscapes in ways that connect them with lives today.

Michael McGoldrick on flute, Christine Hanson on cello, Brian McAlpine on keyboards, and and renown Gaelic singer Flora MacNeil on backing vocals are among those who support MacInnes on the project.

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Julie Fowlis:Uam

Uam means from me in Scottish Gaelic. That is what you hear on this recording, a very distinct point of view. Julie Fowlis is a Scot who grew up in North Uist in the Outer Hebrides. She’s also an artist, musician, and thinker completely of the twenty first century.

The music she offers here is rooted and grounded in the old songs she learnt from tradition bearers while she was growing up. It is also rooted and grounded in that tradition spoken with taste and affection in a contemporary voice. Thig am bata (The boat will come) is a fast paced song with a strong but challenging beat, which she invited bodhran player Martin O’Neill to explore with her. On an old milking song, she’s joined by fellow Hebridean Mary Smith of Lewis for the singing and Phil Cunningham provides piano and accordion backing. That aforementioned song about the boat coming is a sort of murder ballad from the Hebrides. Fowlis pairs it with a like story which made its way from Ireland into American folk tradition where it is known and Wind and Rain. Fowlis and top notch Scottish singer Eddi Reader trade verses in Scottish Gaelic and English in a way which really illuminates the story of the song.

A Chiad Cheum (The First Step) is a lovely tune Fowlis and her husband, bouzouki player Eamon Doorley, composed for the wedding of a cousin. It allows the talents of Fowlis and Doorley’s frequent musical compatriots fiddler Duncan Chisholm, guitarist Tony Byrne, and bass player Ewan Vernal to come especially clear, and the two of them join in on whistle and bouzouki, respectively, as well. When Fowlis and Doorley played a festival in another Celtic area, Brittany in France, there they were asked to do a Breton song. Translated from Breton into Scottish Gaelic, the one they chose fits well in place in this collection. The title in comes over to English as I was born in the midst of the sea, an idea anyone from the western isles could easily appreciate.

There are sad songs and lively songs, ballads and working songs, songs which spring directly from the Hebrides and songs with touches of other traditions. Whether you understand Scottish Gaelic or not (there are English translations in the liner notes if you do not), you hear the sea, the land, the lives and loves of people in the songs, the wind and the weather. You hear Scotland, through the music of a gifted and original musician who is choosing to apply her gifts in service of traditional music and language.

Side note: should you have the chance to see Fowlis and her musical friends play live, take it. It is an engaging experience not to be missed. . Another side note: apologies to Gaelic speakers: this keyboard does not handle fadas well.



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Hanneke Cassel: For Reasons Unseen

For Reasons Unseen

Hanneke Cassel talks about the world through her fiddle. As she’s grounded in Scottish style fiddle playing (she the former US champion in the style, among other things) that world often includes Scotland seen in various ways, from traditional tunes to her own new ones. There are some of each on this recording

Cassel is also a world traveler with her fiddle. In the past she’s written about the Red Sox and and rural Tennessee, as well as Ireland and pop movie heroes, all without saying a word, mind you. Here she offers, among other things, tunes for a friend’s wedding, a sister’s birthday, a lullaby, a tune called the The Goat Whisperer, and a tune and song learned on her travels in China. A mixed bag, sounds like, but what it actually sounds like is a lively story and an unfolding conversation where you’re eager to hear the next way things will turn.

If you’ve heard Cassel play in person, or listened to one of her earlier albums, you’ll know she offers a sure touch, vibrant energy, strong faith, and a sense of humor through her music, and if you’ve yet to make her acquaintance, this album is a fine place to begin. She’s just been on a trip to Kenya, where she shared tunes and songs with the people at One Home, Many Hopes. Tunes to come from that, as well, no doubt.

Meantime, every track on this recording is well worth more than one listen. Especially take note of Blackberry Festival Footrace, The Crane Estate, The Dusky Meadow set, and For Reasons Unseen/Rong Hua. Musicians sitting in with Cassel include Natalie Haas, Christopher Lewis, Alasdair Fraser, and Brittany Haas.

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Jim Malcolm and Robert Burns

Acquaintance



Jim Malcolm is one of Scotland’s most inventive writers in the realm of traditional folk. He’s the writer behind Lochinside, among other folk classics, and was named Scots Traditional Male Vocalist of the Year several years back.

On the American side of the waters, he's especially well known for his work with top Scots folk band The Old Blind Dogs. He’s been back on the solo road now for some years, and offers a very fine set from another Scottish poet, Robert Burns. It’s always a danger, on both sides of the Atlantic, that Burns may be dismissed as over familiar or over sentimental. Eddi Reader and Emily Smith, among others, have proved that contemporary folk artists are able to move beyond those obstacles, and Malcolm, with his own distinct interpretations, does too.

Opening with Rantin’ Rovin’ Robin, Malcolm sets a conversational tone which well serves Burns funny stuff such as Deil’s Away wi the Exciseman (good riddance to the tax collector, if you need a bit of brush on your Scots), the narrative and gentle humor of The Ploughman, and the fine love songs such as Ae Fond Kiss and Auld Lang Syne. Understatement serves Malcolm well, and allows him room to move into the stories and the sentiment. His wife Susie, herself a fine singer in her own right, joins for that Ploughman song and the dry humor of the The Shepherd’s Wife. Fourteen cuts in all, and each one is a keeper.


This year, Scotland is celebrating a year of song. Look for more on the singers and songs of Scotland ahead here along the music road. Thanks for traveling with us.

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Scotland: A Year of Song

Two and half centuries ago, the battle of Culloden in the Scottish highlands marked what seemed to be the end of the highland way of life. As bleak as things seemed at the time, though, the people and the ways of life, the clans, the stories, and the language stayed alive. At times around the edges and at the fringes, at times across the ocean. They stayed alive.

So did the music. This year Scotland is marking A Year of Song, in English, Scots, and Scottish Gaelic. You’ve met many musicians from Scotland along the music road, and there’s more to come on the music of Scotland as the year unfolds. Here is a look back at several singers with ties to the Western Isles. The links will take you to deeper information about these artists and their music.


Mary Ann Kennedy and the men of Na Seoid bring traditions from all parts of the highlands together in a work that celebrates a rising generation of men who carry on the tradition of singing in Scottish Gaelic.

Julie Fowlis has taken her singing in Scottish Gaelic around the world, and for her work was named the country’s first ambassador for Gaelic.

Kathleen MacInnes has worked as an actor and in broadcasting, but it is as a singer that the ideas of her native place in the Outer Hebrides come across most passionately.

There is more on Scottish music and Scotland's year of song to come here along the music road. Stay tuned.

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Music Road: Emily Smith: Too Long Away

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our Scottish music store at Amazon

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here is a way to do that, through PayPal. Note that you do not have to have a PayPal account to do this.Thank you.

Emily Smith, Jamie McClennan, and Robert Burns

Adoon Winding Nith

2009 was the 250th anniversary of Robert Burns birth, and the year the year the Scottish government was calling the year of homecoming, inviting people all over the world to celebrate. Jamie and I wanted to do something to contribute, we weren’t quite sure what, “ says Scots Singer of the Year Emily Smith. She and her husband, multi instrumentalist Jamie McClennan, live not far from the eighteenth century Scottish bard’s stomping ground in Dumfries and Galloway in southern Scotland. It’s the area where Smith grew up, learning a number of the poet’s songs along the way.

“My dad said, you could do a concert of all Burns songs, and I thought, yeah, we could get to that. Once we started talking about it, we decided if we were going to learn a whole gig’s worth of material, then we should do a tour -- maybe a tour here in Dumfries and Galloway, where there are little towns and villages that never get to have concerts in them. That might be a sort of quirky way to contribute to the homecoming year, we thought. Then we thought, as long as we’re going to learn all this material, we really should make a recording of it. I wanted it to be a different Burns album, though -- there are so many of them out there coming not only from Scotland, but all over the world.”

The duo has succeeded, offering a lively, upbeat, conversational and very musical take on eleven the bard’s songs, making a direct connection between songs of tradition and the ears and interests of contemporary listeners. “At first, I wanted to have songs that he wrote about this region, or people from this area, and then some other of his songs that folk might not know so well,” Smith says, “ and then there are several on there just because they are ones I’ve always wanted to learn or we just really enjoy playing!”

The title track and first cut on the recording, Adoon Winding Nith, draws listeners in with a driving beat on a traditional tune backing Burns’ words -- Burns often chose traditional melodies to which to set his words, allowing for quite a lot of variation and interpretation in subsequent years. Rather than a song of the beauties of this major river of the southwest, it celebrates the beauties of a young woman of the area. Silver Tassie finds Smith and McClennan in gentle and haunting mood on a song about a man drinking a parting glass and missing his love as he goes off to war. In Soldier Laddie, we meet a woman who is well acquainted with soldiers a vivid portrait by Burns that finds partnership in the musicians’ lively choices. The song itself, part of a cantata Burns wrote called The Jolly Beggars, was suppressed during his lifetime as being socially and politically dangerous. Another political song -- and perhaps an even more dangerous one -- is A Man’s a Man for A’ That, a ringing statement of the brotherhood of all, which the pair give a fine restrained treatment. Then there’s the happy fiddler who finds welcome everywhere with his tunes in Whistle Ower the Lave o It, and the dancing ploughman, who works hard each day and comes home weary, but still delights his wife with his dancing and his bonnie looks, in The Plooman. The other tracks are equally fine. For the most part it’s just Smith on lead vocals, piano, and accordion, with McClennan on backing vocals and fiddle, guitar, and mandolin.

“That was another idea we had for this album,” says Smith. “Jamie and I play with a band, but quite often now we’re working as a duo. Duncan Lyall played bit of bass on the album, but basically it is just the two of us, and that maybe shows people a bit of a different side of Jamie and me.

“We wanted to do something different with the packaging, too,” Smith says, “so we commissioned an artist friend of ours, John Johnstone, to create some paintings of us as though we were hanging out with Burns, maybe having a drink or singing a song. He came up with four fantastic paintings, and the one we chose for the cover is as though we are all sailing down the River Nith.”


If you are new to the work of Robert Burns (and if you are, you’ve still likely sung a song or two of his. -- Auld Lang Syne for example) this is a fine place to start. If you grew up learning about him, Smith and McClennan’s album will add to your understanding of his work, and it’s well worth repeated listening.


side note: Smith and McClennan each have very fine solo albums out as well.
They are heading out for a run of gigs in New Zealand and Australia just now, so if you are reading from there or happen to be in the neighborhood, take the chance to see them live.

another side note: 2010 is Scotland's year of song -- look for more articles ahead along the Music Road featuring fine Scottish voices


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Music Road:: Emily Smith: Too Long Away

Music Road: Eddi Reader sings more of the songs of Robert Burns

tuning up for Burns Night: Jim Malcolm

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