Rosslyn/Roslyn/Roslin Castle is a tune I love, and it's in the NPS
books. I'd like to find more about the origin.
The story about the mason, from Andy May on his CD insert, is a great
tale, but of course doesn't explain the tune's beginnings - I sort of
assumed from there it was perhaps a lament related to the terrible deed.
But it never seems very Scottish in its shape - all those major 7th
leaps in a minor tune.
We have a CD by the Welsh triple harp player Llio Rhydderch (OT
thought... so was Lliopatra really Welsh, not Egyptian??!) who is very
steeped in her tradition and takes it very studiously.
She writes that there's a tradition that a relation of the famously
Eponymous David of the White Rock, (and he died early mid C19th),
travelled to Rosslyn Castle where he worked as a gardener, and took the
tune with him from Wales. Certainly, once you hear her playing of it,
it's absolutely Welsh. And very much the same feel as the David Of etc
tune.
On t'other hand she doesn't actually say who wrote it or when.
While it's not strictly a Northumbrian Question, it's now in the nsp
repertoire, so does anyone know any more of it, please?
Thanks,
Richard.
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