James Scott Skinner

James Scott Skinner’s career is really the story of the development of the Scottish fiddler from untutored dance musician to concert performer. During his lifetime Scottish fiddle music also became primarily listening music, and this has persisted to the present day. Skinner is best remembered for his own compositions – tunes such as ‘Cradle Song’, ‘The Bonny Lass o’ Bon Accord’ and ‘The Laird o’ Drumblair’. 

Skinner was the first Scots fiddler to try to regularise bowings, but he said the tune in the book is merely a skeleton’ and that grace notes and other expressive devices should be added by each player in his or her own way (A Guide to Bowing, c 1900). Some of his pieces are technically very demanding, e.g. ‘The President’ and ‘The Mathematician’, and only playable by fiddlers with some degree of classical training. He also added variations to tunes; some, like those for ‘The Bonny Lass o’ Bon Accord’, have become as popular as the tune itself. Sentimental favourites like ‘Cradle Song’ and ‘Floo’er o’ the Quern’ were originally written as songs but are now played as slow airs.

James Scott Skinner was the first Scottish fiddler to be recorded on disc, and his playing had a great influence on fiddlers during the first half of the twentieth century. He was among the first musical ‘personalities’ to be created by the mass media.

Regional Tags: Aberdeen & Aberdeenshire