Scottish Fiddle Collections

[sunnybear]

What are your favorite Scottish Fiddle Collections. I am looking for a good one to ask for for Christmas, one printed on nice paper that the ink hasn;t run (wherre you can actually read the music that's not too small..)

[Steve_W]

The book I go to the most is the reprint of the Skye Collection. Print is on the small side but clear, and it has some wonderful tunes (mainly reels & strathspeys, with a few jigs, hornpipes, etc). The Gow Collection, compiled and edited by Carlin, has a lot of tunes but there's not much documentation; I've found it to be a useful source to have, though. I also like Jerry Holland's 2nd collection a lot, but it's not pure Scottish (it contains a lot of Cape Breton tunes) if that matters to you.

On the scots-l mail list we had a discussion of favorite tunebooks a few weeks ago and there was very little agreement between the contributors (most people sent in a list of their top 10!). The Skye collection was mentioned a couple times, as well as Kerr's Merry Melodies; apart from that there was almost no duplication! I realized that there's a ton of collections out there that I've never encountered! -Steve

[tarawa1943]

The Athole Collection

Simon Fraser Collection

The Scottish Violinist (J.Scott Skinner)

Alexandr Walker

[Neil Gow]

Sunnybear - I have a lot of Scottish fiddle music, and my favourite is The Fiddle Music of Scotland, collected by James Hunter - Mel Bay MB95070. This book is particularly strong on beautiful slow airs and the best known strathspeys, many of them North East Scotland 18th Century tunes. The jig and reel sections are OK but smaller, and it just doesn't bother with bagpipe tunes. If you want to play West Coast Scottish bagpipe music on the fiddle (and it's great fun), the series of Highland Fiddle books published by Harpstring House - Tigh Na Teugh (sp?) are just great. Start with No 1 and work your way through.