Wednesday 26 November 2003

Time for a bit of catching up. David G arrived on Friday and we played through a few baroque bits and pieces that we haven't played before, interrupted at one point by the CBSO on the phone asking me to play for a project with Emmanuelle Haïm - so that's why she wanted my phone number (I'm not free to do it, unfortunately). Then I packed David off to chez McGillivray for the evening. Alison was up in Glasgow for the day teaching at the RSAMD, so she joined us on the Saturday trip to Edinburgh for the Scots Fiddle Festival. We arrived there in time to catch a bit of Paul Anderson's solo set, before going to David Johnson's talk about, well, I'm not sure what it was really about, but it was pretty interesting stuff, and he was selling copies of his essential "Music and Society in Lowland Scotland in the 18th century" book. By lunchtime Lisa Milne had bought me a beer and the day was going well. A friend of David's had given us the use of a big flat with a piano at the top of Leith Walk, so with our carry-out lunch from Valvona's, we were living.

David gave a masterclass in the afternoon, which included his fascinating demonstration of some of the possible degrees between silence and tone on the violin, then there was just time for a bit of further relaxation before heading off for our spot in the Open Stage night. I met Paul in the bar and we sneaked off to practise (well, for me to try to remember the chords to some of the tunes we'd played at the Edinburgh Festival in the summer). I introduced him to David, and within half an hour the two of them were on stage together playing Niel Gow's Lament on the Death of his Second Wife - and very good it was too. There was just time for two short sets and then we ran for the last train to Glasgow.

Sunday was our rehearsal day and then we were off to the Isle of Skye and Portree on Monday morning. It's a 5 hour drive, and about 3 miles south of our destination we were just congratulating ourselves on not being late despite the horizontal rain, when a queue of traffic appeared from nowhere at a narrow bridge, and once we'd stopped, a white pest control van ploughed right into the back of our car. Not ideal. As you can see, there was no way we could open the boot, so I had no idea whether my  harpsichord had survived, or if the keyboard was now a mess of splinters. After a tense 90 minutes or so, during which Mickey and co. at Portree Coachworks applied various bits of heavy machinery with great expertise, they opened it up and I gingerly looked in - it seemed OK.

Harriet and Rob Forrest, our hosts in Portree appeared, to make soothing noises and apply hot tea and a picnic while we unpacked everything into the church, and I worked up the courage to take the cover off the harpsichord. By some miracle, it had survived without a scratch: the only damage was some distortion of the front part of the stand.  Here you can see Rob applying gentle persuasion with a mallet and some PVA to get it back into shape - there are advantages to staying with a keen sailor when on tour (he's a great cook too).

So there was no time left for rehearsal, but we had a fun concert in the unexpectedly cosy surroundings of St Columba's Church. Afterwards, as we sat down at Harriet and Rob's to a sumptuous meal in good company, we put the radio on just in time to hear Fiona T playing Spring Any Day Now on Late Junction, which was a satisfying way to end a rather bizarre day.

We started the next morning (after I'd looked out of my bedroom window at the view on the left) with an expanse of plastic sheeting and some gaffa tape, trying to make what was left of the back end of the car waterproof.  Then it was time to hit the road for the long drive back to Glasgow and last night's gig. At least this time we had our keyboard tech Roy O'Neil on hand with a large van for the harpsichord and the digital piano. By the time it was 8pm, I'd decided I didn't really feel like playing Bach or Geminiani (too many notes) so we ditched them in favour of a load of fiddle tunes instead.  Dumbing down? Certainly not.