Simon Thoumire Make Good Art

Three reels by the late great fiddler Hector MacAndrew. Burnside of Forglen is a small farm near Turiff, Aberdeenshire and belonged to Mr and Mrs George Morrison. Sandy Edmonstone who performed with Hector's dad lived in this cottage in Carradale and Bob Munro was fiddle enthusiast from Thurso.

This is my fiddle concerto based on Alexander Troup's tune Cluny Castle. I wrote it for our Strathspey and Surreal Society project and it was performed by Patsy Reid at Celtic Connections 2017. Patsy Reid is an amazing fiddler and demonstrate's her virtuosity and skill in this piece.

My version of The Bluebell Polka (written by Frank Stanley) and J. F. Dickies Reel (written by J. Murdoch Henderson) and performed by the Strathspey and Surreal Society on Saturday 4th February 2017 at Celtic Connections.

Here's a special track recorded in memory of musician Alasdair Slessor who sadly passed away last week at the young age of 29. These tunes were written in Tollcross Primary School for our Wednesday Feis Class. This was part of our tune writing phase probably on the way to pizza Hut. In the class room was a Blue Radiator that we admired and also a Peters Projection map with really loooong countries that we used to chat about. I'm sure Alasdair came up with the first phrase of Peters Projection! Oh these were the days :-)

Three reels from the pen of Robert Macintosh. What an amazing composer. His tunes are very varied, challenging and beautiful! Lady's Baird's New Reel / Honbl. Mr Fraiser (of Lovat's) Reel / Miss Farquharson (of Invercauld's)Reel

A couple of delights and a fancie! Here are 3 jigs from the same book as last weeks tunes - The Malcolm McDonald Collection (performed with my son Charlie). Mrs Muir's tune was written by Mr Sharp of Hoddom. I think this might be Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe of Hoddom Castle (Dumfries and Galloway) born May 1781. He wrote songs that were featured in Sir Walter Scott's 'Minstrelsy of the Scottish Borders' A relative of his, Miss Sharpe was 'a patron and friend of Niel Gow and contributed a few pieces to one or more of his collections'. (From Baptie). Miss Graham's Delight / Mrs Muir McKenzies Fancie / Mrs Muir Mackenzie's Delight

Two strathspeys from the Malcolm McDonald Collection (first published in 1788) and one from Twitter! The Twitter tune (The Falls of Divach) was actually written by J. Scott Skinner's daughter - Jeanie (aged 12) so always worth a play! Miss Drummond Megginsh's Strathspey was written by John Bowie who was originally from Perth and 'a famous teacher of the violin, and a composer of dance tunes'. He published a set of reels, etc in 1786 which this one might have featured in. I must find the book! This info about Bowie came from David Baptie's late 19th century opus.

I found this little tune at the back of J. Scott Skinner's The Logie Collection. It's a pretty wee tune but on playing it I recognised Paul McCartney's interest in the Scots fiddle tradition. There is no other way that The Beatles would recorded a similar type tune on their White Album without hearing this first. Well done Paul! I've also tried to emulate McCartney's singing on this track as well.

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Here are two reels from the pen of 18th century fiddler and composer Robert Mackintosh (c 1745-1807). Known as "Red Rob", he was born in Tulliemet, Perthshire and has long been recognised as one of our foremost composers of Scottish dance music. There are 4 collections of his music containing 350 tunes. You can play them all in the amazing Highland Music Trust book 'The Mackintosh Collections' http://www.heallan.com/mackintosh.html When I was learning these tunes I was amazed at the dexterity needed to play them especially Miss Jessy Dalrymple's Reel. I think I might be playing them at a more modern reel speed (!) but all the same they're difficult! Concerto Caledonia made a lovely album of Macintosh music in 2013 entitled Robert Mackintosh - Airs, Minuets, Gavotts and Reels which is well worth a listen. http://www.concal.org/albums/9-albums/7-robert-mackintosh-airs-minuets-gavotts-reels

This I have learnt two William Marshall minuets from volumes 1 and 2 of his collections. The first minuet is called Mr Hoy - Gordon Castle and the second is Chapel Keithack. Mr Hoy (born 1747) is mentioned in Dr Currie's memoir of poet Robert Burns where he says that "Mr James Hoy was librarian to his Grace The Duke of Gordon at Gordon Castle. He was in many respects a singular and original character... with goodness in heart, and simplicity of manners."

My project for this week was to make a set of music written by female composers in the 18/19th century. As you can imagine society and fiddle playing was quite male dominated and there is not too much music written by lady composers around. I did manage to find out about Lucy Johnston of Hilton who was included in Niel Gow's and the Scottish Musical Museum collections. Also Miss Magdelina Stirling has a collection c1812. The strathspey Lady Lucy Ramsay in the set was written by 'A Female Amateur'! Miss L. Johnston's Complements to Niel Gow (Lucy Johnston of Hilton), Lady Lucy Ramsay (A Female Amateur), Lord Torphican's Strathspey, Perthshire Hunt (both Miss Magdelina Stirling)

Here are 2 jigs and a reel. The two jigs - The Duke of York's Camp / Mrs Roy of Nenthorn's Favourite are sourced in Hardie's 'A Fiddler's Book of Scottish Jigs' and 'The Reel of Tyrie' came from the Highland Music Trust's 'Highland Collections'. I recently purchased a copy of David Baptie's Musical Scotland, Past and Present: Being A Dictionary of Scottish Musicians From About 1400 Till The Present Time. Present time is 1894!!! Using the book I found out that John Clark who wrote The Duke of York's Camp was born circa 1740 and published a collection called Flores Musicae in 1773. Robert Mackintosh wrote Mrs Roy of Nenthorn's Favourite. He was also known as 'Red Rob' and was born in circa 1745. He published four collections of music - the first in 1792. The Reel of Tyrie was written by dancing master, violinist and composer William Christie. He was born in 1778 and he published a collection of seventy-one pieces - sixty eight which were his own!!

This beautiful tune was written by fiddler Alexander Troup from Ballater, Aberdeenshire. Troup was a contemporary of J Scott Skinner (he played in a band with Skinner's brother). He judged violin competitions at Grantown-upon-Spey with Charles Grant (student of Marshall) in 1880s and was David Baptie's source for a lot of info about fiddlers in the book Musical Scotland, Past and Present: Being a Dictionary of Scottish Musicians, from about 1400 Till the Present Time (1894). Thanks for all this precious information Ronnie Gibson (@scat4230), Dr Karen McAuley (@karenmca) and Stuart Eydmann (@EydmannHeritage). Cluny Castle, situated in the tranquil undulating farmland of Aberdeenshire known as Gordon Country, is hidden from view by over two hundred acres of landscaped policies. Dating back to 14th century it continues to be a much loved home of the Gordons of Cluny. Between 1820 and 1870 a smaller castle was transformed into the magnificent crenellated mansion that exists today. The name “Cluny” originates

Here are three strathspeys from the pen of legendary fiddler Angus Fitchet (1910-1998). The tune are Miss Jessie Moreen, Allan Gibb, Strong Tea (for Norrie Whitelaw). I learnt them from the National Association of Accordion and Fiddle Clubs publication 'The Music of Angus Fitchet Volume 2). If you would like to read more about Angus follow the link below. https://projects.handsupfortrad.scot/hall-of-fame/angus-fitchet-1910-1998/

This is three reels from the fabulous Scottish tune book - The Athole Collection. Its compiler, James Stewart Robertson of Edradynate, Perthshire, was a founding member of The Edinburgh Highland Reel and Strathspey Society and its president from 1881. He published his collection of 870 strathspeys, reels, jigs, hornpipes and country dances in 1884. The collection was reprinted in 1961, but for many years was out of print, and although scholars and players were aware of the book, it was difficult to obtain direct access to it. It was later reprinted in 1996 by Inverness's Balnain House and reprinted again by Highland Music Trust where you can still buy it here! http://www.heallan.com/athole.html The reels are: The Yetts of Muckart, John Angus and Mrs Duncan.

I'm back for more weekly music and I think I'm going to stick to Scottish traditional tunes for a while. These two tunes from Book 3 of the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society. They are St Patrick's Day (Gow) and The Rock And The Wee Pickle Tow. It says in the book that they were both originally sourced from Allan's Ballroom Guide from 1905. You can read about that here! http://copac.jisc.ac.uk/search?title=Allan%27s+Ballroom+Guide#.V7sdojb2HVE.twitter I'm very lucky to be joined by my son Charlie on bodhran for this set.

Here's simple wee tune. That's it really.

On Friday night me, Rua MacMillan and Mark Maguire were very lucky to be invited down the Lapraik Poetry Festival in Muirkirk. We had a great night of poetry, song and music in the village. This is a strathspey and two jigs we performed on the night. Read about our visit here https://projects.handsupfortrad.scot/handsupfortrad/lapraik-festival-muirkirk/

I set myself a goal of recording / writing something new every week and sometimes Thursday arrives and I have no new ideas. I still make myself sit down and work something out and this is it!! I got out my marimba and came up with a little tune. I then (hopefully) complement it with another little tune on the concertina backed by my mellotron.