Janice Hopper wrote:
>
> Ok, I have a question:
>
> The Scottish Harp Society of America (SHSA) has recently revised its Rules
> of Competition. One of the requirements states:
>
> "Music must be Scottish, or an explanation give as to the tune's
> relationship to the Scottish tradition.... Scottish music must be played to
> receive an SHSA level."
>
> Any opinions on whether I could justify the inclusion of Northumbrian tunes
> into a competition setting?
>
The Border tradition includes both Scottish and Northumbrian tunes, on
both sides of the Border. William Dixon (of Morpeth) 'New Road to
Bowden' (in Scotland) is Northumbrian or Scots - Scots tune,
Northumbrian tradition, Border pipes. Since the clarsach 'tradition' is
a re-invented one and no one knows for sure exactly how the instruments
were played anything earlier than 250 years ago (except for specific
clues like Bremner's reference to the shake on guittar being equal to
anything on the harp, 1758 - etc) you could presumably take any
Northumbrian tune title with a provenance of having been printed in any
Scottish published music or written MS; and any Scottish tune (by name)
which had appeared in any Northumbrian equivalent.
If the tune was pre-1100 AD - especially anything known to be from the
period around 600 to 1000 - you could justify it easily since the
question of whether or not Northumberland was really part of Scotland
was only settled later on.
Personally I think the rule set out above is counter productive, read
Alison Kinnaird and others on the interchange between Scotland and
Ireland, esp in the Gaelic domain where clarsairs survived longest.
Since you can successfully play 'Scottish music' in a totally
inappropriate manner, enough to remove its specificially Scottish
aspect; and you can play non-Scottish music in a Scottish manner; what
do the examiners say about this? Do you have to play the music in a
Scottish manner? Or can you get by with Scottish dots in front of you
and play them just as written, without any of the subtleties of rythm
and phrasing which complete the work?
David
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