A Pair O Nicky Tams!

Russell Taylor sang one of my favourite bothy ballads when I went to visit him at his house in Ellon in June. He's performing a selection of Scots songs at the AROHA Traditional Concert Party on November 17th, (details at http://www.arohascotland.org/) which is sure to be great!

The song is Nicky Tams. Perhaps you've heard many different versions, the first I ever heard was the Alexander Brothers long ago when I first got my own tape recorder. Jim Malcolm, now singer with the Old Blind Dogs, also performs it - http://www.jimmalcolm.com/html/main_cly6.htm His words are reasonably accurate if you scroll down his page and look!

Rampant Scotland has a great glossary if you need further interpretation - http://www.rampantscotland.com/poetry/blpoems_tams.htm - and they give this succinct description of this most useful piece of a farmhand's attire: Nicky Tams is the name given to the string used by farm workers to tie their trousers below the knees, partly to hitch them up out of the mud.

Oddly enough, though a 'traditional' song, Nicky Tams does have a known author - George Morris, better kent as The Buchan Cheil and the son of a farrier, George married into the Kemp family and moved to Meldrum (making him an adopted son of Formartine!). His brother-in-law Willie Kemp was also a famous musician and hotelier. By 1930, the great Scots record label Beltona got George to record his compositions, giving Nicky Tams, and a few other great bothy ballads to the world - including, Aikey Brae - recalling the story of the Horse Fair; A New Lum Hat, and the The Buchan Bobby. He died in 1958. Beltona has been revived by Sleepytown Records in Ellon, and its back catalogue available for sale online.

You can hear Russell's rendition on the Podcast page - see sidebar for link