Scottish Folk Music

Folk and traditional music are an essential part of Scottish culture; bagpipes and kilts do not begin to represent the breadth and nuance of music there. In Scotland music plays a very important role in preserving a heritage that has historically faced cultural oppression. Music is an inclusive and encouraging component of culture in Scotland, where people of all classes and backgrounds listen and perform together, and young people are heartily invited to play and join in ensembles.

Music in Society

Music in Scotland can accompany a wide variety of social occasions, such as weddings, funerals, anniversaries, civic occasions, music festivals, or holidays. For example, a community might welcome an important guest with a bagpipe band or a parade.

Traditional Scottish music often accompanies dance, where a typical ensemble would include an accordion, fiddle, piano, bass, and drums. In the Highlands of northern Scotland, a bagpiper generally accompanies dances along with a solo fiddler. Beginning in the 1980s, a more eclectic ensemble for the youth dance movement featured bagpipes, fiddle, and electronic instruments.

Céilidhs

A céilidh, which means "a visit" in Scottish Gaelic, was traditionally any gathering that took place in the home. People from the neighborhood might drop by informally in the evening for some songs, poetry, and storytelling while seated around the fire. These gatherings were very important to the culture in that they were occasions where folk knowledge was passed along. In addition to music and dance, this might include jokes, customs, beliefs, myths, and information about farming or hunting. Like a formal orchestra performance, etiquette demanded silence whenever music was played. As people moved to the cities, céilidhs came to be social gatherings specifically for music, dance, and song usually held in halls.

Music Characteristics Though there is considerable variety in instrumentation, there is a standard repertoire of tunes and songs that are played throughout Scotland. These pieces are heard on the variety of melodic instruments in Scotland. Scottish tunes are generally passed along aurally, though songs have been written down since the 1700s.

Scottish melodies include many pentatonic scales as well as six and seven-note scales. One interesting characteristic of many tunes is the double tonic, in which a song will state a musical phrase and then play it a whole step lower. Because of the construction of the Scottish Highland bagpipe, this changing melody against the drone note creates a characteristic sound that is often mimicked on other melodic instruments, such as the fiddle. Scottish melodies also often begin in one key and switch to another by the end of the song, such as a transition from a major key to its relative minor.

The "Scottish snap" is the trademark of many Scottish melodies. This is a rhythm figure that features a short note on the beat followed by a longer note, such as a sixteenth note to a dotted eighth note. The snap can be heard in many pipe melodies and marches.

Scottish Songs Scottish songs can be sung in Scottish Gaelic, Scots (an English dialect), or English. There are long ballads of love, heartbreak, long journeys, and strife-as well as songs related to the calendar such as "Auld Lang Syne," which is sung around New Year. Though many traditional tunes are truly folk in that they do not have an acknowledged composer, many others have known composers, even those that may be 200 years old or more. Singers usually perform songs straight with little ornamentation. Singers among the Travellers, a Scottish minority related to the Roma (Gypsies), tend to sing more ornamented melodies, lending power to the tales of the songs.

Instruments The Highland bagpipes are the dominant instrument of Scotland, and because of the former reach of the British Empire, they can be heard all over the world. The Highland bagpipes have four pipes: three drones (two tenors and a bass drone) and a chanter pipe that has nine holes for playing the melody. The pipes are played solo or in a larger pipe band, where tunes are generally in unison and accompanied by drums.

The fiddle is another major instrument in Scotland, and often features with the pipes to accompany dances and play jigs, reels, marches, and strathspeys. The clàrsach is a gut- or metal-stringed harp that was revived at the end of the nineteenth century. Initially, an orchestral, arpeggiated style was used, but research in the 1980s found that melodic playing was more historically accurate. Other instruments used in traditional music include the harmonic, the accordion, and the piano.

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