Box and Fiddle
Year 17 No 03
November 1993
Andy Stewart (1933 – 1993) – Obituary
by Jimmy Blue
I first met Andy when, with the Ian Powrie Band, I had the pleasure of taking part in some of the first ‘White Heather Clubs’. Andy had many talents – the gift of telling a story through his songs, his musical movements, his amazing memory for words and tunes, and – what I possibly admire most – his ability to write a monologue of many verses and commit it to memory just before a show, and recite it, with actions, word perfect on live TV. His powers of concentration were quite fantastic.
My band became his backing group from 1967 until 1977 and in that time we traveled a great deal – Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, South Africa, the then Southern Rhodesia, and, of course, Canada and America. These tours could be very tiring but Andy worked at keeping a happy cast – and he was always very patient and courteous to people who came to see him. He was a real professional and a great ambassador for Scotland.
Andy was a literary man. He read widely and always had an apt quote for an occasion, but he was particularly a Burns’ man and worked a lot of Robert Burns’ material into his stage performances with great effect.
He loved Scottish music and was always on the lookout for a melody which would be suitable for a lyric. He could pen these with great speed and was certainly a very clever rhymer. His ‘Scottish Soldier’ was a masterpiece then it was endless – ‘Donald Whaur’s Your Troosers’, ‘The Battle’s O’er’, ‘By the Lochside’, ‘Take Me Back’, etc, etc. In fact, his great friend, the late Roddy MacMillan gave him the chorus he had written of ‘Campbeltown Loch’ just prior to leaving for the first tour of New Zealand in 1963. Andy had the song completed very quickly, and it was first performed in a small town called Wanganui. As everyone knows, it became an international hit.
He particularly enjoyed performing at His Majesty’s Theatre in Aberdeen, as he did on countless occasions. (In fact he liked the North East so much that for a number of years he had him home in nearby Banchory). The support he got at HM Aberdeen was really tremendous. Thousands came from all over the North East to see him year after year. He could talk in ‘the Doric’ and he sounded just like one of them. He always, of course, included his ‘ploughmen’ and sang bothy ballads which they loved. His first big year in Aberdeen was 1964, the year of the typhoid epidemic, and this was allegedly started by a bad tin of corned beef. Andy made a lovely story out of it by saying that Aberdeen was the only city in the world that could have had 400 cases of typhoid because it was the only city in the world that could have got 400 slices of corned beef ‘oot o’ the wan tin’.
I was delighted when Andy was honoured by the N.A.A.F.C. for his services to Scottish music. No-one did more to promote Scottish music throughout the world than Andy, he being the first entertainer to take a full Scottish Band with him on his overseas tours. And Andy loved the Accordion and Fiddle movement. When he was able and his health permitted, he and Sheila joined us at the Station Hotel for the Annual Weekend, and his Odes to Honoured Guests were always a highlight of the weekend. I am sure these will be forever treasured.
Scotland has lost its greatest national and international entertainer, and for me, it was a great privilege to have known and worked with him for all those years. Nothing will ever be the same again.
by Jimmy Blue
I first met Andy when, with the Ian Powrie Band, I had the pleasure of taking part in some of the first ‘White Heather Clubs’. Andy had many talents – the gift of telling a story through his songs, his musical movements, his amazing memory for words and tunes, and – what I possibly admire most – his ability to write a monologue of many verses and commit it to memory just before a show, and recite it, with actions, word perfect on live TV. His powers of concentration were quite fantastic.
My band became his backing group from 1967 until 1977 and in that time we traveled a great deal – Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, South Africa, the then Southern Rhodesia, and, of course, Canada and America. These tours could be very tiring but Andy worked at keeping a happy cast – and he was always very patient and courteous to people who came to see him. He was a real professional and a great ambassador for Scotland.
Andy was a literary man. He read widely and always had an apt quote for an occasion, but he was particularly a Burns’ man and worked a lot of Robert Burns’ material into his stage performances with great effect.
He loved Scottish music and was always on the lookout for a melody which would be suitable for a lyric. He could pen these with great speed and was certainly a very clever rhymer. His ‘Scottish Soldier’ was a masterpiece then it was endless – ‘Donald Whaur’s Your Troosers’, ‘The Battle’s O’er’, ‘By the Lochside’, ‘Take Me Back’, etc, etc. In fact, his great friend, the late Roddy MacMillan gave him the chorus he had written of ‘Campbeltown Loch’ just prior to leaving for the first tour of New Zealand in 1963. Andy had the song completed very quickly, and it was first performed in a small town called Wanganui. As everyone knows, it became an international hit.
He particularly enjoyed performing at His Majesty’s Theatre in Aberdeen, as he did on countless occasions. (In fact he liked the North East so much that for a number of years he had him home in nearby Banchory). The support he got at HM Aberdeen was really tremendous. Thousands came from all over the North East to see him year after year. He could talk in ‘the Doric’ and he sounded just like one of them. He always, of course, included his ‘ploughmen’ and sang bothy ballads which they loved. His first big year in Aberdeen was 1964, the year of the typhoid epidemic, and this was allegedly started by a bad tin of corned beef. Andy made a lovely story out of it by saying that Aberdeen was the only city in the world that could have had 400 cases of typhoid because it was the only city in the world that could have got 400 slices of corned beef ‘oot o’ the wan tin’.
I was delighted when Andy was honoured by the N.A.A.F.C. for his services to Scottish music. No-one did more to promote Scottish music throughout the world than Andy, he being the first entertainer to take a full Scottish Band with him on his overseas tours. And Andy loved the Accordion and Fiddle movement. When he was able and his health permitted, he and Sheila joined us at the Station Hotel for the Annual Weekend, and his Odes to Honoured Guests were always a highlight of the weekend. I am sure these will be forever treasured.
Scotland has lost its greatest national and international entertainer, and for me, it was a great privilege to have known and worked with him for all those years. Nothing will ever be the same again.