Jane Campbell: An Early Look at a Tune [Drum Score]

July 20, 2015 on 8:21 pm by Michael Grey | In Music, Photographs, Pipe Bands, Stories | Comments Off on Jane Campbell: An Early Look at a Tune [Drum Score]

You may know I’ve been working a little these days to help make the January 30, 2016, “Live in Ireland 87” concert happen. In doing that I’ve found myself going through my (many) boxes of scores, letters and other assorted ephemera. I can say with hand on heart that, over the years, I really have saved a lot of paper.

Here’s a copy of the drum score composed by J Reid Maxwell for a strathspey I made, the two-parted tune, “Jane Campbell”.

I found this score – composed, as noted by JRM, December 27, 1987. Reid notes that it took him “2 minutes to compose” and, so, he thought it a good sign of a good tune. I’ll leave that to you to decide regarding both the drum and pipe score but will say that our band of that time made some hay with a medley that included this tune – and agree, that doesn’t necessarily mean all the selection’s tunes were good.

Just a little history of a tune and, I guess, a little of the people that played it. A moment in time.

Jane Campbell is my sister, by the way, still with the same monogram but now a Clark (pictured here with my Mum, Joan).

I wonder, this second, at the appropriateness of changing a tune name as required? Does it make sense to change “Jane Campbell” to “Jane Clark”?

Probably not.

Just a few random old school notes for a Monday evening.

M.