Why I Got Into Scottish fiddling

Hint: Not because my family's Scottish

In a couple of weeks, I’ll be receiving a plaque to commemorate my induction this year into the Scots Trad Music Hall of Fame for services to the Scottish music community. It’s made me think lately about what drew me to Scottish music.

As a kid and through college, I was heavily and happily involved in classical music for a long time, including being concertmaster of orchestras in grade school and high school, and touring with orchestras in high school and college. I enjoyed playing chamber music as well.

My brother-in-law was a bluegrass musician in Pennsylvania, so I used to play with him and my sister and their friends when visiting them, and also learned many bluegrass and old-time tunes, along with New England, Irish and French Canadian tunes when I got involved in playing for contra dances, even directing an open contradance band for a few years. I also played for Hungarian tanzhaz dances for a couple years, learned some klezmer music, swing jazz, and English dance music. But my primary experience and expertise was developed in the arena of Scottish music.

Without detailing my intense involvement in Scottish and Cape Breton music, dance, and culture, I’ll just say a few words about the frequent question I used to get from journalists and others: Is your family Scottish? I suppose this kind of thinking was influenced by the roots movement of the 1970s, though in the case of Scotland, it’s also linked to the romanticism of clans, tartans, and the Highlanders, the same gauzy view that spurred the enormous popularity of Braveheart and Outlander. Many still see Scottish music as an ethnic specialty. Few think this way about Irish, jazz, bluegrass or old-timey music, or about other theoretically ethnic activities, like kung fu!

My entry point into Scottish music was not ethnic romanticism but the music itself. The more I played it, whether for dancing or listening, the more I liked it. Arranging music for a theatrical Scottish dance troupe, and leading workshops for the Boston Scottish Fiddle Club, pushed me to look into the origins of tunes, composers, playing styles, regional styles — the context of the music.

Creating medleys for Burns Night concerts added a focus on the life and works of Scotland’s songwriter and national bard, Robert Burns. I’ve always appreciated Burns and his passion for nature, love, egalitarian values, the traditional music that he researched and preserved through song, and the liberal Scottish values he embodied and that helped make America great in the first place. (See the site I created for the 2017 inauguration of a certain U.S. president and will have to revive soon.)

Distributing the music, writing for Scottish Life magazine, and co-leading music & walking tours in Scotland only enhanced my appreciation of Scottish music, dance, culture and values. (See my Substack columns based on the magazine articles and the photos and stories from our music & walking tours.)

My interest was never linked to nostalgia, even though I always appreciate and respect the attachments many people feel to their heritage. In high school, we were assigned a book by the ultimate romantic fantasist, Sir Walter Scott (Ivanhoe), but it made no discernible impression on me. On the other hand, I learned long-lasting lessons from studying Mark Twain, especially after having to write and rewrite a detailed paper about his Huckleberry Finn. This not only taught me about Twain and history, but also a great deal about the process of writing.

I mention this because Mark Twain loved Robert Burns* (or at least accepted his genius without tearing into it as he had no trouble doing with many other writers) but had no time for the entertaining fantasies of Sir Walter Scott. Twain once wrote an essay called “How Walter Scott Started the American Civil War.” (More details on this in my post about visiting Scott’s home at Abbotsford.) In his essay, Twain wrote, “It was Sir Walter that made every gentleman in the South a Major or a Colonel…” and “made these gentlemen value these bogus decorations… it was he that created rank and caste down there…” (This reminds me of how Colonel Sanders’s title lent an aura of Southern aristocracy to KFC, even though in his 4-month military career he was an enlisted private; his “Kentucky Colonel” award for achievement in business was given him by his friend, the governor of Kentucky, and he called himself Col. Sanders ever after.)

It was also Sir Walter Scott who in 1822 — when he was in charge of efforts to impress and flatter King George IV during the first visit of a king from London to Scotland in 170 years — pretty much single-handedly created the clan tartans, the kilt as we know it, and other popular images of Scottish culture.

As much as I respect and delve into the fascinating stories of the Scottish clans that are part of the heritage of my wife and kids, that’s not the reason I dived into exploring and sharing so much Scottish traditional music (and by the way, also not the reason my wife got so deeply into Highland and other Scottish dance). It was just because the music is so good, varied, enjoyable, and challenging, and its history and context so fascinating… and often misunderstood, which meant there was always something new to learn.

In all my performing, teaching, distributing CDs, producing concerts, and writing columns, there was no particular ambition or plan other than to do the next thing that needed doing. My brother-in-law once tried to teach me that whether you paint a door or write a tune, part of the job is to step back and appreciate what you did. But I was never very good at that! I just moved on to the next thing.

This prestigious award has made me, and apparently others as well, step back and appreciate that I’ve done a few good things for the music. I’m very grateful for the recognition.

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*Mark Twain wrote about his reverence for Robert Burns, primarily because he saved him from humiliation in an argument! A group of multi-national dinner party guests were arguing over the Scottish pronunciation of the word “three” and when Twain chimed in, despite his own ignorance in the matter, and supported the Scotsman in saying that it was pronounced “three” and not “thraw,” everyone piled on against him — until he mentioned Robert Burns:

While the storm was still raging, I made up a Scotch couplet, and then spoke up and said:

“Very well, don’t say any more. I confess defeat. I thought I knew, but I see my mistake. I was deceived by one of your Scotch poets.”

“A Scotch poet! O come! Name him.”

“Robert Burns.”

It is wonderful the power of that name. These men looked doubtful—but paralyzed, all the same. They were quite silent for a moment; then one of them said—with the reverence in his voice which is always present in a Scotchman’s tone when he utters the name.

“Does Robbie Burns say—what does he say?”

“This is what he says:

    'There were nae bairns but only three--
     Ane at the breast, twa at the knee.'

It ended the discussion. There was no man there profane enough, disloyal enough, to say any word against a thing which Robert Burns had settled. I shall always honor that great name for the salvation it brought me in this time of my sore need.

It is my belief that nearly any invented quotation, played with confidence, stands a good chance to deceive. There are people who think that honesty is always the best policy. This is a superstition; there are times when the appearance of it is worth six of it.