This article gleans its information mainly from Henry George
Farmer's book, A History of Music in Scotland. What I have
tried to do it concentrate on the role of the performing class in Scotland
during the period between the sixth and the sixteenth centuries, and give
Farmer's information on this topic in an abridged format. This article
is taken largely from my notes, and is intended only as an introduction
to the subject. Anyone interested is encouraged to read Farmer's
text in its entirety. All information and quotes come from Farmer,
unless noted otherwise.
[The Celtic Period] [The Anglo-Norman
Period (1124-1424)] [The Golden Age (1424-1560)]
PART I: The Celtic Period
The Musicians
It was in the year 503 AD that an Irish tribe
called the Scots came across the Irish sea to establish the kingdom of
Dalriada in what is now Argyle, Scotland. They came from a land that
was well known in this time for "music and poetry, as well as learning
in general, cultivated by a highly skilled professional class." This
professional class was called the ollamh, which meant a "learned
man," or originally, "seer." If the ollamh specialized in
history and genealogy, he was called a seannachaidh (SHAY-na-kay).
If he specialized in poetry, song, and literature, he was a file.
A file would compose verse as well as music, and perform his compositions,
usually to the accompaniment of a cruit (rote) or clairseach
(harp).
This ollamh class occupied a high position
in both pagan and Christian times. The retinue of the Irish kings
included a musician, historian, and poet as late as 1014 AD. Sometimes
all of these functions were assigned to one man, other times several would
share the tasks. The ollamh class demanded a regular stipend
and land grants, "a practice which continued for centuries in Scotland."
Of course, the ollamh was a highly skilled
and trained professional class, and any music produced by them would be
"art" music for the upper class. In addition to this learned and
cultured class performer, there was also a poet-musician of a more popular
class. This was the bard. He would perform for the common
man. His relation to the file was much like a modern pop singer's
relation to the Doctor of Music. The Irish Book of Rights
says, "It is not the right of a bard, but the right of a file,
to know each king and his right." And the Brehon Laws (iv,
361) state, "A bard is one without lawful learning but his own intellect."
There was also a performer in these classical
times called a druth. He was more of a generic entertainer,
and his calling was very infamous, even in pagan times. He was known
as a "purveyor of song and dance," and a "great disseminator of news."
The druth had his place in society, as frowned upon as he may be.
All of this information on class ranks and titles
applies directly to Ireland of the period, and only speculatively to Scotland.
Very little information on Scottish performers exists from this era, but
we can draw certain parallels, assuming that the early emigrants to Scotland
took, "at least, a modicum of the Irish art and craft of music with them.
This could not have been otherwise because the ollamh, whether a file
or a seannachaidh, was indispensable to the social polity."
It is also reasonable to assume that bards and druths would
be a part of this emigration as well, for so often it is the lower classes
who leave their country in search for another. And these common men
would have brought along their own musical and poetic traditions.
Kenneth MacAlpine, King of Scots (844-59) presumably
passed a law which stated, according to Bellenden's version of Boece (died
c. 1536), "All vagabonds, fools, bards, obscene wits, and idle persons
shall be burnt on the cheek and scourged through the town." Another
Scottish king, Macbeth (1044-57) later decreed, "Fools, minstrels, bards,
and all such idle people, unless they be especially licensed by the king,
shall be compelled to seek some craft to earn their living. If they
refuse, they shall be drawn like horses in the plough and harrow."
Upon first glance, it would appear that the Scottish nobility were not
overly fond of the performing arts, but these decrees were more to keep
check on unlicensed performers who were more likely to spread unfavourable
news about various political powers than performers who had their wages
paid by said powers. Indeed, performers of the professional type
were licensed and hired by the nobility on a regular basis.
The Instruments
The three main groups of art and ceremonial instruments
of the Irish and the Scots were the cruit, timpan, and the clairseach.
These metal stringed instruments were to be found in the hands of skilled
musicians of high standing. Cruit is the Scottish word for
a rote, and such an instrument is depicted on the thirteenth century St.
Martin's Cross on the Isle of Iona. The timpan or tiompan
is an unidentified stringed instrument which seemed to have 3 to 8 strings,
and was played either with a bow, a plectrum, or the fingers. The clairseach
was a triangular harp. "The harp is the true ancient instrument of
Scotland as well as Ireland." The name clairseach (clarsech
in Scotland) tells us that the "body was made of wood upon which birds
. . . once chirped when it was a tree branch." The Anglo-Saxon word
for a harp was glee-beam, which meant "music wood."
Other stringed instruments were bardd cadeiriog,
and the cimphan. The first is unidentified, although its name
translates into "throned bard." The second appears in Scotland during
the Anglo-Norman period, but it may be the same as the hurdy-gurdy, called
the sumphion.
As far as wind instruments go, there was a reedpipe
in Ireland called a buinne. One such pipe possessed a hornlike
terminal end, similar to the Phrygian aulos and the modern Scottish stockhorn.
It was later referred to generically as the piob, a word of Anglo-Saxon
origin. Someone who played the pipes was a buinnire.
The recorder was called the cuisle in both Ireland and in Scotland.
The name is also of Anglo-Saxon stock. The word cuisle also
seemed to eventually cover the bagpipe as well in both countries, although
the bagpipe was originally called a tinne in Ireland, at least.
The horn was called the corn (although there were a variety of names
and spellings), and someone who played the horn was called a cornaire.
The trumpet in Scotland was called a stoc, or sturgan.
The Music
There is very little we can accurately say about
Scottish or Irish music at this early point in history. About all
most scholars are willing to say is that they could only have used symphonia.
One feature which we can speak of with some certainty is that one of the
artistic features of both felic and bardic music was "the decoration or
ornamentation of the melodic outline which, as those who are conversant
with Gaelic music will know, has persisted into quite modern times."
PART II: The Anglo-Norman Period (1124-1424 AD)
Prior to this time period, there were four
separate
nations existing in what we now know as Scotland; the Picts, Scots, Bretons,
and Angles. In the year 844 AD, Kenneth MacAlpine, King of Scots,
became King of Picts as well, uniting the two kingdoms. One
hundred and seventy-five years later Malcolm II, King of Scots, became
ruler of the Angles of Bernicia, having defeated them at Carham in 1018.
Scotland's royal family then married into the British of Srathclyde, bringing
the throne of that land to Malcolm II as well. "By all of these events
Scottish rule and Celtic custom were later extended to the Tees in the
east and to the Derwent in the west, and it was by these means that the
land which we now know as Scotland first received its name."
The Court & Nobility
Performing classes in Celtic Scotland went by
such names as file, bard, and druth. But during this
period, we start to see new names for performers in Scotland, and they
came with Anglo-Norman fashions. "The king and nobility had their
musicians who, in spite of such names as minstrel (ministrallus),
mime (mimus), jester (joculator), and player (histro),
all followed the art of music but with these added accomplishments."
Before long the old Gaelic titles were rarely heard in Scotland, especially
in the lowlands. The name of bard did persist, "but because
he retained so much of the old technique, which the new dispensation would
consider uncouth and pagan, his calling fell into disrepute."
Only one of the old Celtic offices continued
to flourish. This was the seannachaidh, or historian and genealogist.
We read of these men involved in the coronations of Malcolm Canmore in
1058 and Alexander III in 1249, dressed in red robes, chanting the king's
lineage.
We can find evidence of court minstrels throughout
this period. These performers were officers in the Royal Household.
They may or may not have been under the authority of a "King's Harper."
From what evidence we have, this officer seems to have been the equivalent
to the English joculator regis, of whom we find mention of in the Doomsday
Book (1085-6). "The King's Harper was . . . a privileged artist
who sang and played in the privy chamber . . . whilst the subordinate minstrels
in ordinary attended to the more domestic needs of the royal household
in matters musical . . . when feasting, sport, and pastimes were afoot."
These "ordinary minstrels" mentioned probably
included trumpeters, horners, and drummers for state and martial display;
pipers playing on shawm, bagpipe, and recorder -- indispensable musicians
for outdoor music in general; rote and harp players, fiddlers, psaltrists,
lutars and others. We can find mention of praise in vernacular 14th
century literature for "harpe, fethill, lute, gitterne, rybybe, horne,
tabour, trompe, and crowd."
It was also during the Anglo-Norman period when
we first see evidence of a new fashion -- that of surnames. As well
as patronymic surnames, and surnames describing an identifying feature,
people also took surnames associated with their occupation. We can
find record of such men as Robert le Harpur of Ayrshire, Rogier le Harpur
of Berwick, and William le Harpur, who had a seal which displayed a harp.
Other musical names were also taken, including a Patrick Trumpator and
one Nichul Bard. There are at least a dozen seals in the Ragman Rolls
which have a buglehorn for a crest.
Given the wide disparity of wealth between England
and Scotland at this period, it is a tribute to this country's love of
music that the court and castle minstrels in Scotland were as imposing
in numbers as those of England.
The People
The information in this section concerns the
people in the Lowlands of Scotland, of whom we have some record.
What, if any, applies to the Highlands is only conjecture.
"By this time men of all classes had taken to
'the road' under the guise of minstrelsy, for the roving life had attracted
quite a crowd who yearned for release from the shackles of inherited usage."
The average person in southern Scotland could expect to hear the traditional
folk music (toil songs, simple songs of the homestead, etc.). Other
than this, the only other music heard with any regularity was that performed
at festival times, prompted by the church, the feast, and the revels.
Much of this music would seem of an exotic nature to the average listener,
because of the wandering minstrel who traveled the land from one end to
the other. It's doubtful, though, that this Anglo-Norman type of
performer penetrated very far into the north.
These minstrels were marked by their gaudy clothes,
flat shoes, shaven faces and cropped hair. These appearances were
not only the mark of their craft, but were an added attraction in and of
themselves. The quaintness and exotic nature of their appearances
doubtless attracted the crowd to the performer as much as the music itself.
These traveling men were usually greeted well by the common man, eager
to hear of goings on outside of his small world of knowledge. "There
is nothing like the widely versed and traveled man in weaning people from
their insular prejudices." The church had other opinions of the majority
of performers, though. Many were accused of religious heresy.
"Many a minstrel paid dearly for his loose tongue."
While "professional" performers were greatly
valued and appreciated by the courts and the powers-that-be, unlicensed,
traveling performers were considered a danger to the church and court,
since they could spread news detrimental to "official" goals. "The
minstrel, unless he was under the protection of court, castle, priory,
or burgh, was denied the law of the land and the rites of the church, and,
if we can accept the decree of Macbeth (d. 1058), was actually subjected
to the branding iron and scourge when the sheriff's hands were laid on
him. It was much the same elsewhere. In Ireland, under the
parliament of Lionel Duke of Clarence (c. 1327), it was made a penal offence
to harbour 'Irish minstrels, rhymers, and newstellers.' A similar
edict was issued in Wales against the minstrel class in 1402." Not
only minstrels, but also their families were denied the rites of the church.
The old word druth, which in Gaelic meant an itinerant minstrel,
now came to mean "lewd" and "harlot."
These suppressive laws may have been brought
about because of the absence of a guild or fraternity of minstrels in Scotland.
Elsewhere, these organizations controlled and disciplined their members.
These guilds existed in England and on the continent, but not in Scotland.
Even after the rise of craft guilds in the 15th century, we still find
no guilds for the performing classes. Instead, minstrels met and
performed at the market place, the village green, the wayside shrine, or
the crossroads. But the greatest occasion for minstrels was the "fair,"
usually held on days of church festivals. "Whilst bartering and selling
were going on at one end of the fair, the minstrels had their corner in
another spot where song, melody and dance were in full swing."
The minstrel class contributed greatly to the
"triumph of English speech and civilization" that took place in Scotland
at this time. After the Norman Conquest in England, the Anglo-Saxon
scop and gleeman were forced to lay low, as the conquerors
did not approve of their defiant songs. Many took refuge in Scotland
and mixed with the Scottish minstrel classes, becoming the voice of popular
discontent.
Also during this period, we have the real beginnings
of folk-song and folk-dance in the recreational sense. "It was no
longer the bardic and church song that obtained, but compositions of a
more varied nature such as have come down to us in ballad literature."
The Instruments
During the 12th century, the Scots had three
"art," or high-class instruments. There were the cithara, timpanum, and
chorus. The cithara was possibly the rote and the harp.
Rote, in Gaelic, is cruit. The chorus was an early
type of bagpipe. It consisted of a simple wind bag, or other wind-chest,
with an inflation pipe and a drone, or chanter. The unknown identity
of the timpanum has been discussed in Part I. It seemed to
be a stringed instrument of some sort.
A few decades later, men returning from the Crusades
brought to Scotland new instruments. These were the rebec, fiddle,
lute, psaltry, and gittern. The rebec was known in Scotland as the rybybe.
The fiddle was called fethill in both Scotland and in England at
this time, and the psaltry was the sawtrye. Europeans had previously
had a rectangular psaltry, and Arabs introduced the trapezoid and truncated
triangle forms of this instrument. Other new instruments from the
east included the trump or trombe (jew's harp), tabour
drum, naker (kettle drum), and timbrel (tabmourine).
"Almost all of these instruments were used by the minstrels whether at
court, castle, burgh, or 'on the road,' those of the wind and percussion
groups being especially favoured in open-air music."
The organ, of course, held sway in church music
in Scotland, as in England. We do find mention of Aeldred (d. 1166),
a missionary to the Picts of Galloway in 1164, complaining of the sound
of organs, cymbals, and musical instruments in church.
Farmer mentions that "it is hardly likely that
[musical instruments in Scotland] differed much from those so well figured
and described in Galpin's Old English Instruments of Music.
This book would therefore be a good reference for medieval Scottish instruments
as well.
The Music
During the first millennium AD, harmony as we
think of it was unknown. Melody was doubled at the octave,
which was known as symphonia. Around the 12th century, organum (the
use of 4ths, 5ths, and 3rds) developed in Britain.
Scotland at this point had the popular song and
toil song. Indeed, popular song handed down almost the only "history"
we have of Scotland from this period. It is better to trust a minstrel's
interpretation of an event than a monk's or annalist's.
"Minstrelsy in the earlier years of this period
was still monodic for the greater part. One can scarcely believe
that even the early court minstrels had any written music before them.
Their repertoire was not wide and its extension was a matter of
contact with other performers with the consequent borrowing viva voce
and by rote of each other's "specialties" . . . One frequently reads of
court minstrels going or being sent abroad to visit 'minstrel schools.'"
The folk music (non-court music) in Scotland
was at this time "artless," as is most folk music. Compared to court
musicians, they were unsophisticated, rude, and inelegant. But one
Thomas of Ersyldoune is known for having said they were still dominant
"for tonge es chefe of mystralsye." The court music was apparently
superior to most as Norman writer Giraldus Cambrensis praised Scottish
music above that even of his own native Wales.
The poetic writers of this era include the aforementioned
Thomas of Ersyldoune, Huchoun, Barbour, Wyntoun, and Blind Harry.
Very little is known of the actual music that
may have been performed during this era. Much is only speculation,
as little, if any, music notation was written and preserved for us.
PART III: The Golden Age (1424-1560 AD)
The beginning of what is called "The Golden Age"
in Scotland's history come with many advances in education, art, and therefore,
music. Universities opened: St. Andrews in 1412, Glasgow in
1451, and Aberdeen in 1492. Printers made their first appearance
in Scotland in 1507. Scotland began to establish its first merchant
and craft guilds. King James I was reputedly a great musician in
his own right, composer of many songs and tunes, and a great patron to
the arts. Despite continuing rivalries with England (due mainly to
Scotland's "Auld Alliance" to France), James I learned music in England,
and adopted these English customs in his own court, and encouraged other
Scottish nobles to do so. Thus begins the great Anglicizing of Scottish
court music.
King James III (1460-1488) patroned many English
musicians in his Scottish courts. His son, King James IV (1488-1513)
married Margaret Tudor, who brought her own English minstrels with her
when she came to Scotland. Many Scottish minstrels, in order to keep
up with the fashions of the day, would attend minstrel schools in the Netherlands,
or Flanders, and brought these influences back to Scotland with them as
well.
In the latter half of the 16th century, the music
of France dominated the "art" music of Europe. Again, due to the
"Auld Alliance" between Scotland and France, many Scots minstrels were
encouraged to follow these French fashions as well, as was being done in
most of Western Europe. Among the court minstrels mentioned on record
in Scotland during this period we have a "French quhissalar" in 1505, a
"French fithelar" in 1508, and other similar records in 1512 and 1513.
Either these were whistlers or fiddlers in the French style, or actual
French musicians being patroned by the Scottish courts.
After 1537, the "howboy" (the French hautbois)
became more fashionable than the Scottish shawm, and the "curtall"
(French courtaud) was also seen with much frequency. Cornets
came into fashion. What were once called "fiddlaris" were
now being called "violaris".
Even though these southern and continental influences
were heavy in most Scottish courts, Irish musicians remained popular in
the Highland courts, and documentary evidence suggests that Irish and Scottish
music remained similar at this time, and were indeed considered the same.
In the Annals of the Four Masters, written in 1451, Margaret, the
wife of O'Conor of Offaly, invited musicians and poets of Ireland and Scotland
to a banquet. The Buke of the Howlate (Book of the Owl),
written in 1450, mentions a "bard owt of Irland" who knew of the "schenachy"
and of the "clarschach." Apparently the old bardic tradition was
still to be found in some areas.
The Book of Lismore (1512-1526) calls
"Cas Corach, the son of Caincinde, . . . the best musician of Erinn or
Alba." These Gaelic names of Ireland and Scotland suggest that this
was a Gaelic musician being mentioned, not an Anglicized or a French court
entertainer. James IV was perhaps the final Scottish monarch to have
spoken Gaelic. We know for a fact that he had Celtic music played
at his courts. The old strain of music still thrived in the Highlands,
and through the influence of monarchs like James IV, remained important
in the Lowland courts of the Scottish kings to a certain extent.
James I (1424-37) could play the harp (lyra), psaltry, organ, reedpipe
or shawm (tibia), recorder (fistula), trumpet, bagpipe (choro),
and drum.
James IV was considered an accomplished musician.
The average court instruments of this period were the trumpet, the harp,
the lute, the rebec, and among the woodwinds there were the "schawm" (shawm),
"recordour" (a beaked flute), "quhissel" (whistle), and the
"dron" (bagpipe). Musicians who played any of these woodwinds
were called "pyparis," or pipers.
Vocalists were not employed regularly in the
courts until the late 16th century. They are, however, mentioned
casually before this period. In the court of James IV, in 1489, we
find mention of one "Wilyenm, sangster of Lithgow." King James gave
him a "sang bwke." In 1507, "crukit vicar of Dumfreise" sang for
him, and in 1508 he was entertained by the singing of "wantones and her
twa marrowes." They sang a song called "Gray Steil."
As to not leave the poets out completely, it
must be noted that Blind Harry appeared in the Scottish courts in 1490-91.
Most court minstrels were given rather low salaries,
but they were given frequent gifts. They must have been able to at
least clothe themselves with the latest fashion, for a law in 1471 forbade
the wearing of silk, except for "knichtes, minstrelles, and heraulds,"
as well as the landed gentry. This law refers only to the upper class
minstrels, of course. Popular performers were not included in this
group.
The People
"Gif there be onie that makis them fuiles [jesters],
and ar bairdes [bards], or uthers sik like rinnares about, and gif onie
sik be fundin, that they be put in the king's waird, or in his irons for
their trespasses, als lang as they hauve onie gudes of their awin to liue
upon -- that their eares be nailed to the throne [pillory], or till ane
uther tree, and their eare be cutted off, and banished the cuntrie -- and
gif thereafter they be funden again, that they behanged."
This Act of Parliament was passed in 1449 to
discourage minstrels from spreading political slander among the people.
This Act only mentions fools and bards, however. A "bard" at this
time meant a vagrant minstrel. In fact, "bard" and "minstrel" could
be viewed as the opposites of each other. Those calling themselves
bards were seen to be descendants of the ancient seers, and were believed
to practice necromancy and witchcraft. The term "minstrel" however,
as introduced by the Anglo-Norman culture, was applied now mostly to instrumentalists.
This included even wandering minstrels, who were welcomed everywhere, and
even invited into the courts. James IV (1488-1513), however, did
not seem to discriminate. He patroned both minstrels and bards in
his courts.
By this time, in Scotland, most cities and towns
had what were called "toun minstrellis," but these were usually pipers
and drummers whose chief duties included making public announcements.
Despite the advent of craft guilds during this period, no guilds for minstrels
existed in Scotland. When the printing press was introduced and made
readily available in the early 16th century, the wandering minstrel class
soon began to die out. The minstrel's activities then were reduced
to mainly instrumental work.
Between the late 14th century and the Reformation,
"Sang Schools" were erected in Aberdeen, St. Andrews, Glasgow, Brechin,
Edinburgh, Elgin, Restalrig, etc.. These were controlled by the church
and the towns, and taught music as well as reading, writing, arithmetic,
reading in the vernacular, and manners. These schools demanded a
high tuition, however, and only the upper-middle classes and higher could
afford to go.
The Instruments
Two instruments that were very popular at this
time were the Highland clarsech and the Lowland harp. Essentially
these two names describe like instruments, but there were several differences
between them. The clarsech used wire strings, had a soundboard covered
with leather, and was plucked with fingernails that were allowed to grow
long. The harp, on the other hand, used gut strings and had a mellowed
sound.
Other instruments to be found mentioned in the
period were the rote, psaltry (triangular), dulcimer (hammered), manichord
(a mechanical dulcimer with a keyboard), the clavichord, and the organ.
Farmer writes that "instruments of the lute, guitar, and citole groups
were quite fashionable." The bowed instruments to be found included
the "crowd, rebec, fiddle, and viol." This last was adopted into
the courts during the reign of James V. The common woodwinds, as
mentioned before, were the recorder (a beaked flute), the quhissel (a Swiss
fife), and the shawm. There were a variety of bagpipes being played,
some with a bladder and a reed, some including a chanter and drone, and
some with two drones. A "piper" at this time referred to a player
of the shawm as well as the bagpipes.
Martial instruments commonly used were bugles,
trumps, trumpets, clarions, horns, and cornets. For percussion the
tabor drum was common, as well as the tympane or kettledrum, bells,
cymbals, ribupe or rivupe, and the Jew's Harp, which is also
called a trump.
As a final note, let it be known that the rulers
and the gentry of this period were all expected to be musically proficient.
