A Gaelic Christmas
Image: Castlebay, Barra’s, 2020 Christmas tree made by islanders who spent the Covid lockdown making squares for this wonderful thing. … Read more
Articles
Broughton House and Border Ballads Part 3: songs and chapbooks
Featured Image: Cover of a 19th Chapbook printed in Newton Stewart, Galloway (author’s own photograph) This is the last of … Read more
Broughton House and Border Ballads Part 2: The Mansfield Manuscript
Featured Image: Kirkcudbright, by Kenny Lam, from Visit Scotland Website In Soundyngs’ last post, I discussed the song collecting activity … Read more
Broughton House and Border Ballads Part 1: The Macmath Manuscript
Featured Image: Broughton House, photograph by Lorna M Campbell, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons Soundyngs went to Galloway this … Read more
Dunkeld Fiddlers and Music Archives
With thanks to Pete Clark and Munro Gauld for filling in some of the gaps. Dunkeld is widely known as … Read more
17th Century Danish Music with Scottish Connections
With thanks to Bodil Partridge, who told me recently about Thomas Kingo, a 17th century Danish composer with family roots … Read more
17th Century Lutes around the North Sea Littoral
Image: from the Thysius Lutebook, 17th century lute tablature (French style) Soundyngs went on a trip to the Netherlands recently … Read more
Militant Music in 1797: All at Sea with Urbani’s Ever-Memorable Battle of Bannockburn
Featured image: The Battle of Camperdown October 1797, by Thomas WhitcombeRoyal Museums Greenwich catalogue CC-BY-NC-SA-3.0 license A new EP release … Read more
James Watt, musical instrument maker, and the “James Watt Organ” dilemma
Soundyngs features in this post research by Dr Nina Baker, independent engineering historian, on the unexpected connections between the great … Read more
Rock, Rap and Modern Scottish Political Identity
In a month when the music for a coronation has been discussed intensively, the BBC broke the news this week … Read more
Muckle Sangs : (Re)Styling Greysteil
One of the many challenges of the word ‘ballad’ is that its range of meanings, even in the Scottish context, … Read more
Summer Festival or Fèis?
Soundyngs posted earlier in the year about Celtic Connections, Scotland’s premier international festival for Celtic music. The summer months are … Read more