Tom Anderson & Aly Bain / The Silver Bow: the Fiddle Music of Shetland

I dust off the Silver Bow a few times each year. It’s an album that should be in every fiddle player’s collection, if not every music lover’s collection. 

The selections, deftly rendered by Tom Anderson and Aly Bain, are a mixture of traditional tunes from Shetland and Scotland. These two locales may be united politically, but Shetland has a cultural identity that is quite distinct from all things Scottish. I think it was Aly who once remarked that in Shetland you may support Scotland in the World Cup but you don't wear tartan or play the bagpipes. It is this way because those dramatic rocky spits at the top of the world were settled by the Norse and long ruled by Norway. Much Scandinavian culture – including a distinct dialect, family heritage, music, and customs – was preserved there. So the record does have a few strathspeys and reels from Scotland, but most of the music on Silver Bow is endemic to Shetland. If you travel there, these are the melodies you are likely to hear.

Listening to the Silver Bow is like watching history play out through dances, wars, holidays, labor, weddings and funerals. I think it is some of the most evocative and uplifting instrumental music ever recorded.

It is practical music, music with a purpose. Some of the tunes were played for dancing and like “Da Cross Reel,” once had special dance figures that accompanied them. “Da Day Dawn,” a haunting Norse melody that seems to walk all by itself, is now used as an interlude to usher dancers onto the floor for a sword dance but was once played annually by a single fiddler who walked from house to house greeting the New Year for each family. Other tunes like “Da Mill” and “Da Rooth” were used as accompaniment for manual tasks like milling and spinning. This shared, social character of the music is again displayed in “Soldier’s Joy,” a melody which is well known in the United States as a bluegrass standard but has roots on the other side of the Atlantic. Here, multiple fiddlers share the spotlight. At each turn, one plays the melody while two or more back him up with a rough, improvised bass accompaniment on the lower strings. I admit, under normal circumstances, I am not a huge fan of this tune. After playing guitar in a bluegrass band, I’ve become weary of a few common tunes, “Soldier’s Joy” being one of them. But the Shetland treatment brings out the melody’s best qualities and underscores its role as a celebratory melody of shared joy and community bonding. Other tunes reflect the history of the region. During the Napoleonic Wars, the British Navy impressed 120 seamen from Fetlar alone, and only 20 are said to have returned home alive. The event made such an impact on the people of Shetland that it was preserved in the tune "Jack is Yet Alive."

Of course, considering something like the history or utility of a piece is a secondary concern. It is impossible not to be swept up by the sheer musicality, and I find it difficult to listen without tapping a foot, a finger, or wanting to reach for an instrument. And more than a few times, I've found the hair standing up on the back of my arms and neck. Spooky, yes, but there's a reason this music still gets played.

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