Rad Trads
(Performers at the Trad Music Awards: Perth, Scotland)
Last night I was lucky enough to be arm candy at what could arguably be the Scottish Traditional music equivalent of the Oscars or the Brit Awards; ‘The Trads’. My good friend, Joy was nominated for Gaelic Singer of the Year and I went along as her plus-one to offer moral support, banter and general company. We were driven to Perth for the ceremony with another nominee, Rachel, and the three of us went there as a trio. I felt very privileged to be there, amongst so many BBC film cameras, musicians, writers, composers, singers and some Scottish music legends. More than privileged, I felt a little fraudulent. This was compounded by almost every person I met asking me, “so are you a musician, yourself?” However, nobody seemed too disappointed with my lack of melodic talent and me sheepishly admitting that I wasn’t even technically Scottish. Regardless, I had some stunningly bizarre conversations with a host of people I didn’t know.
A particular highlight was bumping into a couple of people in the hotel foyer this morning; one man who had infamously fallen asleep for an entire hour during the ceremony, (as well as in the toilets) despite being sat at a table receiving most media coverage. With him, Michelle McManus. She won the TV show, Pop Idol in 2003 and comes from the same area of Glasgow as my Gran still lives – she’s something of a local girl made good, and she still appears to be making regular television appearances on the Gaelic channel, BBC Alba. She was very amusing – she took it in her stride as Joy and I almost knocked her over in the toilets with some over zealous racing.
Entertainment was provided in between the numerous awards, not least by Joy on my right, whose hilarious commentary made me shake and then weep with laughter. We were treated to several popular Scottish acts; dancers, singers, musicians and then a swathe of local celebrities presenting the awards. There were a few surprises in store for me; the Peatbog Faeries were all men (I assumed they were ladies), it’s totally alright to sing along to everything and it is possible to break dance to bagpipes. Speaking of which, I took a couple of videos to give you a taster of what the ceremony was like. The opening set by Move kicked the Trads off with a bang. Apologies for camera shake and people getting in the way. However, the sound on the videos is pretty representative of what I could hear. And this is the sound of the audience joining in with the choruses of a song in Scots – you just can’t hold them back from toe tapping, whooping and singing along. Except, if like me, you don’t know the words, or really know what they’re saying at all.
I’ll put up a second post soon to take you further into my Trad experience…
– Today Rosie is writing this in a car, drinking tonic cola and recovering her sleep between Perth and Glasgow, Scotland –
