Well, we’re all having to find new ways to keep ourselves busy and feed the birds so I have ventured into the world of Patreon. I’m quite enjoying it and getting into a good steady workflow, meaning my Patrons have lots of interesting, mostly fiddle teaching based content to keep them occupied and most importantly, learning.

To whet the appetite I’m posting a free workshop here, where I teach a fantastic traditional reel, Mary Gray. As always, it’s more than just learning the tune and I go into lots of bowing, ornamentation and general technique advice. I hope you enjoy it and please have a look to see if it might help you with your own fiddling adventure!

Go to Patreon

I’m honoured to have been nominated again for Instrumentalist of the Year, as part of the MG ALBA Scots Trad Music Awards 2018.

It’s always a really fun event and there’s every chance I’ll be making an appearance in my Emerald City costume, after my performance as violinist for Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s Wizard of Oz production, just up the road.

If you’d like to find out more and to place a vote for any of the categories, please visit the MG ALBA Scots Trad Music Awards website.

Yes it is finally here, you can now listen to and buy A Glint O’ Scottish Fiddle on all platforms.

You can order it from my shop.

Alternatively it’s available from my distributor, Proper Music.

Or Amazon and other third party websites.

If streaming is your thing, the album is on my Soundcloud page as well as Apple Music & Spotify.

The first review of A Glint o’ Scottish fiddle is in and it’s a lovely one!

Thanks to the great people at Bright Young Folk.

A Glint o’ Scottish Fiddle is the third studio album from accomplished Scottish fiddle player, and Breabach founder, Patsy Reid. It’s a composition of both deft fiddle and more meandering, introspective pieces, all of estimable quality.

Accompanied by Alistair Iain Paterson on the piano, Reid weaves her way through a collection of Scottish fiddle tunes, both contemporary and traditional.

The album opens with a set of five traditional tunes, beginning with the gentle Strathearn. It’s a nice introduction to the subtle emotiveness of Reid’s playing, beginning as meandering and wistful and then evolving into something warmer, though still with that wistful edge.

The addition of Paterson’s piano is often a very welcome one. It is a relatively soft touch, never replacing Reid as the driving force. An uncontroversial choice but probably the better one, since any time spent focused on Paterson’s playing (lovely as it is) would detract from the real star of the show, Reid.

Paterson does add some welcome rhythm and depth however. The pairing and interplay between the two throughout the album sets A Glint o’ Scottish Fiddle apart from other trad fiddle albums. The ninth set particularly, comprised of Niel Gow’s Wife, Miss Whiteford, Mrs Graham of Balgowan, and Miss Grant, features a veritable dance between the fiddle and piano parts.

The short of it is – Reid is really a very good fiddle player, as if there was any doubt, and is also a dab hand at collating complementary tunes into evocative sets. There’s perhaps room for the emotional peaks to be higher and the troughs to be lower, but there’s something to be said for subtlety and it is nevertheless a fine release.

James Motteram

http://brightyoungfolk.com/records/a-glint-o-scottish-fiddle-patsy-reid