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NEFA
1994.075.01-3 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Family background
S: [Announcement.]
She has not sung as well since her pneumonia. Born Mid Culsh. Sings
a bit of Butter Platies. Family background. The laird o Brucklay
was very good to MT when she was young, encouraging her music. She
learned to drive in his car, a Rolls-Royce. Brothers were musical
and the laird bought instruments for them. Brucklay House was beautiful.
There were a lot of stories about him, most of them not true. He
liked MT because she was cheeky, but not impudent. Alexander Dingwall-Fordyce.
The roof was taken off after the war. Father's name was Alexander
Fowlie. [3] Mother's side of the family, Barr, came from Auchmingle.
MT had seven siblings; she is the last.
NEFA
1994.075.04-05 Transcription
P: Myra
Thow
T: Hogmanay and Christmas
S: Hogmanay
was for the grown ups. Recites Hogmanay rhyme: Rise up guid wife
an shak yer feathers... You got cheese, oatcakes, clootie dumpling.
Brother would play bagpipes up the road. You would see people drunk
who you would never see in a pub any other time. You had a stocking
for Christmas with the same things every year. Christmas was just
a religious occasion, really. Some folk celebrated the old New Year.
The Buchan Association still hold the old New Year. There were tricks
on Halloween: letting cattle out, horses let out, other nasty things,
e.g. tying a dead rat to a door. Turf on the chimney.
NEFA
1994.075.06 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Peat cutting and work on the farm
S: MT's house had a big open fire. Peat was cut by hired
help and the farm servants would go and fetch it and stack it in
the yard. Building the stack was a skill. There was a lot to do
around a farm. Clockin hens took some work, too. Mixed farming.
Sometimes the crops were ruined, fallen and rotten. People thought,
the taller the crop, the better the farmer, but height made them
more vulnerable to wind and wet. Father had four hired men, in addition
to MT's brother. There was a twelve year old boy, very homesick,
who got rather badly used. The men stayed in the chaamer, not a
bothy, with box beds, caaf beds (sometimes with a mouse inside).
They jump on the new caaf beds.
NEFA
1994.075.07-09 Transcription
P: Myra
Thow
T: Chaamer food
and meal an ales
S: Porridge and brose in the chaamers, just like in the
house. The milk was allowed to sit, so the cream would rise. There
was a big bowl of brose and then they took spoonsful in order. The
loon was not so keen on the brose. The lads went in and out in their
order of rank. There were oatcakes and, on weekends, broth. Plenty
of cheese. Meat twice a week. Beef brose: oatmeal, salt, pepper,
beef broth. MT taught Sunday school. There were meal an ales every
year. Mother made meal an ale: meal, treacle, stout, left to sit
overnight. Add more porter ale and a little glass of whisky. Mother
made porter ale with hops. They would have dances at them.
NEFA
1994.075.10 Transcription
P: Myra
Thow
T: Dances and Sunday school performances
S: The
older folks would do waltzes and two-steps, and such like.
NEFA
1994.075.11 Transcription
P: Myra
Thow
T: Chaamer lads singing in the kitchen
S: They
used to sing in the kitchen all the time and visit other farms for
music too. There was always music, e.g. when polishing harness (describes).
Most everything turned to music. The work was very hard, though.
NEFA
1994.075.12 Transcription
P: Myra
Thow
T: What would the lads sing?
S: Lads
would sing all the cornkisters in the books today.
NEFA
1994.075.13 Transcription
P: Myra
Thow
T: Shrove
Tuesday practices and rhymes
S: Shrove Tuesday was more of a religious event than an
everyday one. Brose an sauty bannock day.
NEFA
1994.075.14a Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Farm work and laundry
S: Reads
extracts of songs from her own talks about farm work, with extracts
of song to illustrate them. [Phone rings.]
NEFA
1994.075.14b Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Brose an sauty bannocks
S: Brose
made with beef stock. Sauty bannocks were big and had no sugar.
[See 13, above.]
NEFA
1994.075.15 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Beginnings of singing
S: Began
singing at five years old. She had voice lessons seventy years ago
with Nellie donaldson, Aberdeen. The Laird o Brucklay had her sing
at a lot of things. She sang all over the North of Scotland.
NEFA
1994.075.16 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Television Bothy Nichts on Grampian
S: MT
and husband ran the Mill Inn at Maryculter for twenty years. Approached
by Grampian television for Bothy Nichts. She became a judge of the
Bothy Nichts. Talks about other performers who used to be on the
programme. Various farmers took part. MT was the only trained voice,
but she tried not to show it. Talks about various songs she sang.
She still sings out and about and was guest singer with the Aberdeen
Strathspey and Reel for sixteen years.
NEFA
1994.075.17 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Types
of song she used to sing
S: Used to sing the Rowan Tree, Lochnagar and the like. [Ignore
next track.]
NEFA
1994.075.19-20 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Dae ye mind on lang, lang Syne
FL: Dae ye mind on lang, lang syne
S: [False start, then restart at track 20, :41.]
NEFA
1994.075.21 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: Parents singing
S: Both
parents sang, very well. The Lass o Ballochmyle was one of his songs
(sings a line of it). Talks about siblings.
NEFA
1994.075.22 Transcription
P: Myra Thow
T: I Maun Gang tae the Garret
FL: Ma mither his three butter platies
S: Call/response song with TM doing response.
NEFA
1994.075.23 Transcription
P: Myra
Thow
T: Television Bothy Nichts on Grampian
S: MT
took part until they stopped them, but preferred judging as she
did not have to learn so many songs every week.
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