Shepheard, Spiers & Watson
Peter Shepheard, Tom Spiers & Arthur Watson have been active performers, collectors and organisers since the 1960s and are enthusiasts for the Scottish folk tradition. They bring together a wealth of song in a repertoire gleaned predominantly from many traditional singers they have known including well known artistes such as Jimmy McBeath, old Davie Stewart, Jeannie Robertson and Lizzie Higgins.
Listen to
Shepheard, Spiers & Watson
- Bleacher Lassie o Kelvinhaugh [3.57Mb]
- Bonnie Ship The Diamond [3.05Mb]
- Jock Hawk's Adventures [2.99Mb]
- The Fair o Balnafinnan [3.22Mb]
- The Last o The Clydesdales [2.47Mb]
Simple, powerful and effective fiddle, whistle and melodeon underscore three big voices as they revel in a colourful, broad sweep of Scots song. Tom and Arthur were members of the well-respected Aberdeen-based group The Gaugers for 30 years along with founder member, the late Peter Hall, who was a noted folk song collector and folklorist. Tom now lives in Auchtermuchty in Fife and Arthur lives across the silvery Tay in Dundee while Pete Shepheard has lived many years in Fife.
The three have been sharing their enthusiasm for and deep love of Scottish traditional music and song. The natural extension of this was to play the music together and this they have been doing since about the millenium.
Shepheard, Spiers & Watson have been guests at the Whitby Festival several times appearing in concerts and presenting workshops on Ballads, Maritime Songs, Bawdy Songs etc.. In 2005, Pete presented workshops on song and song collecting from the Smith and Brazil traveller families of Gloucestershire. The trio have also performed at various events Scotland (festivals: Stonehaven, Celtic Connections, Auchtermuchty etc; clubs: Montrose, Aberdeen, Kilmarnock, Girvan etc) and over the border at the Royal Oak (Lewes), Musical Traditions (London) amongst numerous others. They have also been running the Fife Traditional Singing Weekend at Collessie since 2002.
Pete Shepheard is an acknowledged authority on folk song. A founder member of the Traditional Music and Song Association of Scotland (TMSA) in the mid 1960's, his enthusiasm as a singer and collector resulted in the creation of Springthyme Records in the 1970's specialising in the release of recordings of Scottish traditional song and music. www.springthyme.co.uk
Pete's contacts with the Scottish travellers, the Stewarts of Blair, and Jeannie Robertson's family in Aberdeen, led to exploration of traveller tradition in Ireland and England as well as Scotland. He has presented lectures and workshops based on his song collecting, on ballad repertoire in the living tradition, traditional singing style, song repertoire among the Romany gypsies in Gloucestershire and among the Scottish travelling and farming communities in Fife, Tayside and Aberdeenshire. Pete is a fine singer and melodeon player with a song repertoire that includes songs he has collected in England, Ireland and Scotland but, living as he does in the ancient 'kingdom' of Fife, many of his songs are from local Fife and Perthshire tradition.
Arthur Watson too has been steeped in the music of North-east Scotland from an early age. He joined The Gaugers folk group in 1974 with Peter Hall and Tom Spiers, recording their first album for Topic in 1976. Arthur too is a fine singer and whistle player with his own distinctive style and a particular enthusiasm for the older ballads.
Arthur is an artist and is now a senior lecturer at the University of Dundee. In the 1970's he set up what became the internationally respected Peacock Print Makers in the folklorically infamous Peacock Close just off Aberdeen's Castlegate. His enthusiasm for folk song and printing technology comes together in his appreciation of Peter Buchan of Peterhead whose early work in both fields came together in his 1828 Ancient Ballads and Songs of the North of Scotland where such ballads as, 'The Twa Magicians' (Child 44), and, 'Willie's Lyke Wake' (Child 25), appeared in their first and definitive versions.
Shepheard, Spiers & Watson's first CD - "They Smiled As We Cam In" (2005: Springthyme SPRCD 1042) - has been warmly received while receiving excellent reviews:
"Refreshingly real and nourishingly organic" - Scotland on Sunday
"Storytelling in music at the highest level" - Living Tradition
"Go and buy a copy!" - Musical Traditions
"Sobere maar mooie begeleiding, trekt nooit de aandacht weg van de zang" - Folk Roddels
"Stirringly fresh - Why aren't there more records like this?!" - Net Rhythms
For more information visit Shepheard, Spiers & Watson's Website
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