Box and Fiddle
Year 21 No 02
October 1997
Price 70p
16 Page Magazine
7 month subscription £8.00
Editor – Charlie Todd, 63 Station Road, Thankerton, Biggar, ML12 6NZ
B&F Treasurer – Mrs Margaret Smith, Smeaton Farm Cottage, Dalkeith, Midlothian, EH22 2NL
The main features in the above issue were as follows (this is not a comprehensive detail of all it contained. The Club reports, in particular, are too time consuming at this stage to retype).
Editorial
Well, here we are with my first issue of the Box and Fiddle. My first duty as incoming Editor must be to thank Ron Ramsay for all the effort he has put into keeping the paper going over the last three years. It is entirely thanks to Ron, Margaret Smith and before that Doug Adamson that we have a paper at all, as together they turned what was a very grim position into a healthy state today. At the time of taking over the editorship Ron was looking forward to a lot of free time with his impending retirement from the uniformed branch of Tayside Police. Fate intervened however with the offer of a job on the civilian staff of the force. Throughout the last three years he has therefore held down both jobs without missing a deadline and we are all due him a sincere vote of thanks.
To move on then, printing will now be in the very capable hands of A&J Typesetting and Printing of Lanark. The ‘A’ therein refers to Andrew Coutts, Pipe Major of Grade 2 Baron Of Lee Pipe Band (formerly called Carluke Caledonia) so I hope we will have a sympathetic ear when the pressure is on. It was Andrew who suggested that the existing format of the paper was ‘gie auld fashioned’. I explained to him that most of the readership were also ‘gie auld fashioned’ (you can rely on me to stick up for you) but we agreed it was a step in the right direction, so here you have it.
Inevitably however as with any changeover there will be problems, so I would ask you to bear with me. I will be on holiday for a week in October and two weeks in November so that could be difficult. Remember that both Margaret and myself do this voluntarily and we are looking for an Assistant Editor for just such eventualities (so as they say on the National Lottery ‘It Could Be You’). Please ensure that copy submitted is as clear as possible. Typesetting the input is what takes time and therefore costs money so the clearer things are, the better. Incidentally, so far both myself and the Printer are very impressed with the clarity of most of the input so keep it up.
In his article ‘Behind the Scenes’ in the last issue Ron highlighted the major difficulty in publishing a newspaper. Namely it must be produced in multiples of 4 pages. As things stand at the moment I have no reserve of photographs or articles, particularly good lead articles on personalities or events in our music scene for the front page of each issue. So please, get your photograph albums and pens out and your thinking caps on.
Continuing on this topic my thanks are due to Keith Chandler from South Leigh in Oxfordshire for permission to use his article on the Wyper Brothers and to Rod Stradling from Stroud, Editor of ‘Musical Traditions’ a magazine which appears on the ‘Internet’ and in which this article first appeared.
Any photographs loaned to me will be copied and returned.
I look forward to comments on your new ‘Box and Fiddle’.
Charlie Todd
Melodeon Maestros
The Story of Peter and Daniel Wyper
By Keith Chandler
The melodeon, or accordion as it was often interchangeably known, is a deceptively simple instrument with one or more row of button keys, operating on a push-pull bellows action. Invented during the 1820s, it was later produced en masse on the Continent - Germany in particular - and imported in vast quantities into the British Isles, where it sold cheaply from around mid-century onwards. By around 1910 one manufacturer in Scotland alone claimed to possess 300,000 testimonials to their product.1
Melodeons were used to provide entertainment, both as accompaniment to dance and song, throughout the whole of these islands. But it is in an urban context that its chief legacy has reached us, via the commercial recordings of a group of talented men who were, broadly speaking, the second generation of players. The invention of permanent sound recording was coincident with this group of musicians, and the early histories of both are inextricably intertwined. This piece, then, highlights the lives and careers of two such - a pair of brothers from the Lanarkshire area of lowland Scotland - and delineates their role in the early history of recording traditional dance music.
The earliest commercially-issued sound recording medium was the wax cylinder. With a typical running time of two to four minutes, this artefact measured about three to four inches, with the sound content etched into a continuous spiral groove along its length. The recording mechanism involved the revolution of the cylinder at a fixed speed, while a stylus, attached to a laterally moving arm, transmitted the vibrations through the horn diaphragm and into the groove as it was being cut.2
The early fortunes of the recording industry are still greatly under researched, and much of the relevant documentation has failed to survive: through carelessness, lack of interest, or destruction during the two wars. It therefore remains debatable which melodeon player first committed items from the common stock traditional dance tune repertory of these islands to cylinder. One candidate is John J Kimmel, who, via two excellent vinyl reissue albums, is certainly the best known of the pioneers.3 His first session for the American Zon-o-phone label took place in New York in either 1904 or 1905.4 Born in Brooklyn in 1866 of German immigrant parents, by the turn of the century he had evolved a style of playing which was melodically fluid, dynamic, thoroughly exciting, and apparently entirely personal. Although the melodeon was common enough among Germans in both the old world and the new (and fed influentially into other American traditions, such as the norteno or Tex-Mex style of the American south west), Kimmel largely eschewed this ethnic heritage - in his recordings at least - and played an essentially Irish repertory, augmented by numbers of Scottish items, ragtime pieces and popular marches.
John J Kimmel recorded for established commercial companies; any quest for the first melodeon player to record needs to take account of the possibility of an entrepreneur who possessed the technology required for recording cylinders in a down-home fashion. And, indeed, one such did exist.
Peter Wyper was baptised in Dalziel, Lanarkshire, on 28 March 1861, the third child of Peter and Charlotte Wyper (née MacKenzie). One of his younger brothers was Daniel MacKenzie Wyper, baptised on 23 October 1872 in Cambusnethan, although the family were actually living at the time in Wishaw. Both men became, in turn, 'Scottish Champion Melodeon Player', both had an extensive recording career, and both were hugely influential on other melodeon players across a wide area of Scotland, and beyond.
Their father was born in Craigend in 1832, and worked as a coal miner, the chief occupation in Lanarkshire throughout the nineteenth century. Although he had migrated around the area, by the date of the 1881 census the family was living in Hamilton. At that date both Peter the elder and Peter the son, then aged 20, continued to work in the pits. A decade later, and still in Hamilton, the father had retired, but both Peter and Daniel were now earning their living in the same manner. Peter had married, moved out of the parental home in Holyrood Street to live at 6 Burnsidelaw, and started a family of his own. The birthplace of his wife Jeanie (née Evans) was given in the census enumeration book as 'Ireland': perhaps a significant factor in terms of tune repertory, discussed briefly below.
Surviving members of both men's families are uncertain under what circumstances either brother came to take up the melodeon, nor if their father had been a player. Logically, Daniel may well have been influenced by his older brother. According to a family tradition, both brothers played a 'command performance for Queen Victoria'. Although specific details are lacking - it may have taken place in London or Balmoral - it certainly occurred prior to Victoria's death in 1901.
Both men used their skill at music to acquire a degree of social elevation which took them out of the hard, physically-debilitating context of the coal face. Peter left first, and at some undefined point during the 1890s became a sewing machine salesman.5 By 1902, at least, he had embarked upon a successful career as a retailer of music-related goods, and around this date opened a shop on Cadzow Street in Hamilton, selling musical instruments, accessories, and sheet music. He added to his stock over the years, and in January 1909 an advertisement in one local paper announced:
Wyper's Music Warehouse
The best place to buy your seasonable gifts
Largest and best selection of talking machines and records in Lanarkshire
Wyper's International Melodeons are the best money can buy
Violins, concertinas, mandolins, and other musical instruments in great variety
Latest songs, books and music
Pantomime songs - 'Oh Antonio,' 'Hang Out the Front Door Key,' 'Afraid to Come Home in the Dark,' 'Auld Reekie,' 'Flip Flap,' and fifty others
Pianos, organs and gramophones on hire.6
The stock evidently represented a considerable financial investment and was an enormous step indeed from the early years spent in the coal mines.
Peter's brother Daniel also worked in the mines, but was able to remove himself from physical labour at the coal face by becoming a member of the pit band, in which he played cornet. Then, as now, there was a robust pit band tradition, with considerable competition between them, and bandsmen were favoured employees. For Daniel Wyper, as perhaps for others, it meant working above ground. He also eventually left the mines, worked for his brother repairing melodeons and gramophones, made money from recordings, and opened and closed a succession of shops - including several selling secondhand goods, and a fish and chip shop. He also made ice cream, which he sold not only in the chip shop, but which several of his children hawked around the local cinemas. He adapted existing 19-keyed melodeons, adding two extra buttons to give an increased chromatic range, and these apparently sold very well indeed. And, of course, he made money from bookings at local music halls (sometimes on the same bill as one of his neighbours, Harry Lauder), dances (for which he sometimes played in company with a hammer dulcimer player named Jimmy Greenhorn), and from competing with other melodeon players.7
Peter Wyper's music dealership also gave him access to the necessary equipment for recording cylinders, and, like the Irish-American uilleann piper Patsy Touhey around the same date, he set to producing commercial items under his own label imprint.8
It was a basic home-grown product, a one-off artefact produced for commercial distribution by Peter Wyper sitting in front of the recording horn of a cylinder cutting machine. The title and catalogue number was handwritten in ink on a specially-printed sticker, which was then pasted onto the lid of each box. Following the fashion already established by the major record companies, each cylinder commenced with an announcement of tune title, and name of both performer and manufacturer. Lady Mary Ramsey, for instance, was 'Wyper's "Empress" Records' release number 12. It began with a voice - undoubtedly Wyper's - intoning "Lady Mary Ramsey. Played by Peter Wyper. Empress Records".9
None of the surviving cylinders or their boxes reveal any specific dates, but there is further evidence that Peter Wyper's recordings of the melodeon were indeed the first. In the August 1903 issue of the trade journal Talking Machine News, published in London, the editor noted that Wyper had sent him 'a record of accordeon playing, which not only proves him to be an expert record maker, but shows him to be quite a master of this instrument.'10 He quotes also from the accompanying letter:
" . . . I have sold a considerable number of these records locally, but as I have to play and make each record separately, I should take it as a favour if you could enlighten me as to how to take one record from another. It is so monotonous playing the same tune time after time."11
The secret of an affordable mass duplication process was not revealed at that date, but Wyper remained unperturbed. Expanding his entrepreneurial net, the following May he advertised in the same journal a competition for the best records 'made by amateurs,' with prizes of £2, £1 and 10s. A month later he sent the editor two further cylinders, one featuring melodeon, the other a bagpipe solo.12 The identity of the bagpipe player is not known, but there is no reason why it should not have been Wyper himself. In the same June 1904 issue an advertisement appeared for:
Wyper's Renowned Empress Records for Phonographs
Largest and best selections of Accordion & Bagpipe Records in the market.
One shilling, threepence each.
Trade supplied.13
Fifteen bagpipe selections were then listed, along with details of his own brand 'Renowned International Melodeons', claiming them to be the 'best value in the world'.14
Something of the scope and extent of the available musical repertory was revealed in a further advertisement, published two months later:
PETER WYPER
The Champion Accordion Player's Phono-graph Records
All masters. Loud, clear, and distinct Scotch music.
Solos, Strathspeys, Reels, Hornpipes, Jigs, Marches, &c. Retail price, 1/3 each. Special prices to the trade per doz. Sample sent post free for 1/3.
Lists sent on application: Address:-
PETER WYPER,
RECORD MANUFACTURER,
Cadzow St., HAMILTON,
Scotland, N.B.15
The Wypers, in common with the majority of Scottish-born melodeon players to record, were quite obviously musical sight readers, and, like Kimmel, exhibited a somewhat cosmopolitan musical outlook, often featuring specifically Irish tunes in their repertory.16 Popular and influential tune books such as Kerr's Merry Melodies were already publishing Irish tunes by the date of the first recordings, while up to a third of the population of lowland Scotland at the turn of the century were Irish immigrants who worked on the land or in the pits, and some of these may also have acted as transmitters of such material.
Daniel Wyper was just as prolifically recorded as his older brother. He too sat in front of the cylinder horn and played his melodeon. The format was identical, only on these could be heard, for example, "Jenny's Bawbee. Played by D Wyper. Empress Records."
The solution to duplicating each performance came for the Wypers not in pressing multiple copies from an original master - which was the technique used by the large commercial companies - but by playing into more than one recording machine at the same time.17 One of Daniel's daughters claims that the brothers made 'a lot of money' from these cylinders, and remembers being told by her father of how they were recorded on the first floor of a warehouse located opposite the music shop in Cadzow Street.18 Another daughter recalls being told about Daniel recording at least some of these cylinders at home, his wife brushing away the shavings from the newly-cut groove during production.19
Although Peter Wyper's shop in Hamilton was clearly one retail outlet, his 'trade supplied' offer was evidently successful. A number of the surviving boxes bear a sticker which reads 'Sold by H Robertson, Dunfermline,' a town a considerable distance away, and evidently home to a dealer to whom Wyper supplied merchandise.
Production of cylinders by the Wyper brothers continued, but other than certain of Kimmel's American Edison recordings, even as late as mid-1906 nothing played on melodeon was available on releases by the major companies.20 A letter from William Brown of Corstophine, to the west of Edinburgh, drew public attention to this oversight:
" ... By-the-way how is it that no Company has entered the field with Melodeon Solos? Of concertina solos we have many by the prince of players - Alexander of that name - but not one gold moulded [a cylinder production technique] melodeon record. Let some Co. have the enterprise to make some melodeon records, the very fact that so many thousands of these instruments are sold proves how popular the records would be - Scottish tunes, marches, reels, and strathspeys; English country dances and Irish jigs. They would sell like "hot cakes" and provide a welcome antidote to the rubbishy coon and other comic (?) songs inflicted on a long-suffering public."21
Rectification of the situation must, in fact, already have been under way, for in October of that year the first advertisements appeared for a cylinder from the General Phonograph Company of London: issue number 119 on their 'White Records' label. Significantly, perhaps, this initial release was titled Irish Jig, an 'Accordeon Solo' by A.J. Scott, with 'Piano-forte Accompaniment.'22
Recording activity expanded rapidly, and scarcely a bi-weekly issue of Talking Machine News passed without details of further releases. For the remainder of 1906 A J Scott appears to have cornered the whole field, recording for both General Phonograph and the Russell Hunting Company, the latter issued as 'Sterling' cylinders and subsequently as a Pathé flat disc.23 All selections continued to be drawn from the Irish tune stock: jigs, reels, hornpipes. Although Scott remains a biographical mystery, examination of his extensive recorded repertory and playing style leaves no doubt that he was, in fact, Scottish.
Peter Wyper made the transition from local to national product via a pair of cylinders made for Edison Records, probably recorded also during 1906. These featured tunes which he must have played into his own cylinder horn hundreds of times: Stirling Castle and De'il Among the Tailors.24
Local fame, extensive recording experience and judicious self-publicity brought him to the attention of Columbia Records, already by that date one of the largest companies in the field, and early in 1907 Wyper travelled to London for the first of many sessions. Cylinders were declining in popularity, and from that date on the medium - for the Wypers at any rate - was the flat disc.
During the succeeding eight years Peter was in the Columbia studios on a number of occasions - often in tandem with his brother Daniel. Between them - either solo or as duets - they recorded just about 130 individual tracks.
From the first, international fame was assured for both men by the release of some of these masters on Columbia's domestic American series. By January 1909, a reviewer in Talking Machine News commented of one such issue:
A Columbia list would be incomplete without some Wyper accordion records. Here we have two: The Stranger and Starlit Dell Marches - D 240 - duets by the Brothers Wyper in which, if possible, even more than their usual good skill is displayed.25
Eight years later an American Columbia catalogue proclaimed them, along with Guido and Pietro Diero and John J Kimmel, 'the five greatest accordion players in the world.'26
Beyond the United States there were issues on subsidiary Columbia labels in both Canada and Australia. Flowers of Edinburgh was released on Columbia C 734 for the Mexican market as Flores del Edinburgo; while Busby Polka on Columbia E 1378 was aimed at Scandinavian record buyers. Fame was sometimes elusive, though: Circassian Circle on Standard 26225 appeared simply as 'Accordeon Solo', while the label of E 1378 merely stated 'Harmonika Solo', the Scandinavian word for accordeon.
In Britain, titles from the first session appeared initially on the single-sided Columbia Graphophone label, pressed in America for British issue. They were later re-pressed on the standard price Rena label (and subsequently, as the label formats changed, reissued on Columbia-Rena and then Columbia). Prior to the First World War a massive importation of cheap German-produced discs forced all the major companies to initiate a budget label, generally selling at around 1s. 6d. (7p). In September 1915, a date which coincides almost exactly with Peter Wyper's final recording session, 24 of the brothers' couplings were reissued on Columbia's new cheap Regal label.27 The frequency with which some of these still turn up in second-hand shops - in England, in Scotland, and in Ireland - indicate their popularity.
In 1920 the Hamilton Advertiser carried the following obituary:
Music-lovers, and melodeon players in particular, will learn with regret of the death of Mr Peter Wyper, music dealer, Hamilton, who was known throughout the country as an accomplished accordion player. Mr Wyper's records on the gramophone are to be found in thousands of homes, and he was a much respected member of the music trade. For a period he was champion melodeon player of Scotland, and his numerous public performances with this instrument were marked by chords and variations which gave great pleasure. Quiet, kindly, and retired, he made many friends in Hamilton and elsewhere. His funeral took place to [sic] Hamilton Cemetary on Wednesday. Mr Wyper, who died at Strathaven, was in his 58th year.28
The following August a circular for Regal Records was still proclaiming him 'Scotland's greatest accordion player.' 29 However, this may not accurately reflect reality. Daniel's side of the family maintain that many of the records issued under Peter's name were actually played by his brother. Peter, it is claimed, possessed both the retail outlet and the business acumen, but Daniel was the more talented player.
One of Daniel's daughters claims that the brothers invariably split the considerable royalties derived from the Columbia recordings equally. It was, she says, a source of annoyance to her mother that although Daniel had recorded the greater portion of the released material, Peter received half the money.30 Although difficult at this remove in time to get at the truth, there is sufficient evidence, albeit circumstantial, to at least cast some doubt.
Firstly, the recording companies themselves confused the issue by sometimes releasing the same track as by one, sometimes as by the other. One example is the tune-set titled Tight Little Island, from a mid-1912 session. On early pressings of Regal G 6991 Peter is credited, on later pressings it is Daniel. Another is Royal Belfast Hornpipe: by Peter on the British releases on both Columbia and Regal; by Daniel on the American Columbia and Diamond labels. Most confusing of all was the late Regal issue of Blaze Away, issued as by Peter Wyper, but actually featuring an anonymous piano-accordion player which is neither.
Secondly, Peter (11 years older than his brother, remember), on his own evidence claimed to have already retired from public performance by 1909, which suggests that he may have been less in practice than his brother.31 That said, one informant claimed that at a melodeon championship held in 1911 Peter Wyper ranked second, beaten only by another of the great recorded stylists, James Brown from Edinburgh.32
Finally, careful listening to the recordings certainly reveal two distinct playing styles, one of which (whoever it may be) is a little more technically accomplished than the other.
Following Peter's death, Daniel Wyper had further sessions for Columbia in 1921, which were released solely on the cheap Regal label (although by this date their price had risen to 2s. 6d.). At the same date, many other titles from their back catalogue were also re-pressed on that label.
Daniel made one final session, in 1926, for the Crystalate Company, issued on Imperial in both their domestic British series and in a short-lived Scottish S 100 series, and also on various five- and seven-inch labels such as Victory and Mimosa in Britain, and on Aerona and Victory Junior in Australia. These small-sized discs appeared under such pseudonyms as 'Mr. Peter Orr' and 'John Roberts.'33 His playing on these titles was as crisp, clean and rhythmic as it had been on the Empress cylinders recorded two decades earlier.
A number of other melodeon players, mainly championship winners such as James Brown, Jack Williams and George 'Pamby' Dick, followed in the Wypers' footsteps, but none were so prolifically recorded. The instrument enjoyed a hey-day of popularity which lasted on disc for a quarter of a century, before being deposed by the more complex three, four and five-row button accordions, and, later still, the piano accordion.
Notes Further historical and contextual details on the Wypers and many other Scottish melodeon players, may be found in the sleevenote booklet which accompanies the CD reissue of Melodeon Greats on the Topic label (TSCD601), which also features 25 tracks from the original discs. The whole subject will be expanded extensively in a forthcoming book, which will also contain comprehensive discographical details and numerous further photographs.
Letters to the Editor
While physically we have returned to Canada, our thoughts are still in Scotland with the wonderful people that made our recent tour so memorable.
Success of a tour can be measured in many ways but most important are the friendships forged along the way. This tour was no exception and I would like to take this opportunity to publicly thank all those who made it possible.
To Robbie Shepherd, Andy Ross and Billy Anderson for much appreciated advertising on their respective radio stations.
To my good friend Jack Cooper for his continued support and, of course, the use of his drums.
To Mo Rutherford for providing us with music stands.
To Ivor Johnson, of Soundhire in Blairgowrie, who provided us with exceptional sound equipment.
To Keith Taylor, of Sensible Music in Bathgate, for providing us with an excellent 88 keyboard.
To Jim Johnstone for a tremendous last evening in Scotland at the ‘King James’.
To all the musicians, too many to mention, who made us feel so welcome.
To the people who attended our concerts and dances.
To those brave individuals, the organizers : Edmund MacKenzie, Eddie Harding, Margaret Wilson, Jessie Stuart, William Crawford, Ethel Carlyle and Anne Sharp.
Last, but not least, to the individual who, from a casual conversation in Montrose last year, made this tour a reality….Ron Ramsay.
On behalf of Bobby Brown and the Scottish Accent, Thank You Ron” Thank You Scotland!
Fred Collins
Take the Floor – Saturdays at 6.30pm with Robbie Shepherd
4th Oct 97 – Ian Thomson SDB + Feature on Angus Fitchet (Part 2)
11th Oct 97 – Sandy Nixon SDB
18th Oct 97 – Ian Cruickshanks SDB
25th Oct 97 – Craig McCallum SDB + Isla St Clair + Carmen Higgins (OB recorded 13th Oct in the Beech Ballroom, Aberdeen)
CLUB DIARY
Aberdeen (Dee Motel) – 28th Oct 97 – Simon Howie SDB
Alnwick (White Swan Hotel) – members only 8th Oct 97 - tba
Annan (St Andrew’s Social Club) - 19th Oct 97 – Cameronian SDB
Arbroath (Viewfield Hotel) - 5th Oct 97 – Paul Anderson
Armadale (Masonic Hall) – 2nd Oct 97 – Dick Black Band
Ayr (Gartferry Hotel) – 5th Oct 97 – Andrew Gordon Trio
Balloch (St. Kessog’s Hall) – 19th Oct 97 – Gordon Pattullo
Banchory (Burnett Arms Hotel) – 27th Oct 97 – Neil McEachern SDB
Banff & District (Banff Springs Hotel) – 22nd Oct 97 – Wayne Robertson Duo
Beith & District (Hotel de Croft, Dalry) – 20th Oct 97 – Lawrie School of Music
Belford (Community Club) – 30th Oct 97 – James Coutts Trio
Biggar (Municipal Hall) – 12th Oct 97 – Morag Robertson & Friends
Blairgowrie (Moorfield Hotel) - 14th Oct 97 – Simon Howie & Duncan Black
Bromley (Trinity United Reform Church) - 14th Oct 97 - tba
Button Key (Windygates Institute) – 9th Oct 97 – Ian Powrie
Campbeltown (Royal or Argyll Hotel) - 17th Oct 97 - Archie John McVicar
Campsie (Glazert House Hotel) - 7th Oct 97 – Alan Gardiner SDB
Carlisle (Border Regiment Club, Carlisle Castle) - 2nd Oct 97 – Tom Porteous Trio
Castle Douglas (Ernespie House Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Tom MacKay Band
Coalburn (Miners’ Welfare) - 16th Oct 97 – Donnie MacGregor & Friends
Crieff & District (Arduthie Hotel) 2nd Oct 97 – Fraser McGlynn
Dalriada (Argyll Arms Hotel, Lochgilphead) 21st Oct 97 – Ian Thomson SDB
Dingwall (National Hotel) – 1st Oct 97 – Susan McIntosh Trio
Dunblane (Westlands Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Judith Linton Trio
Dunfermline (Headwell Bowling Club) – 14th Oct 97 – Duncan Black
Dunoon & Cowal (McColl’s Hotel) 10th Oct 97 - tba
East Kilbride (Sweepers, Cambuslang) – 30th Oct 97 – Ian Anderson SDB
Ellon (Ladbroke Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Nicol McLAren SDB
Fintry (Fintry Sports Centre) – 27th Oct 97 – David Cunningham Jnr SDB
Forfar (Plough Inn) - 26th Oct 97 – tba
Forres (Brig Motel) – 8th Oct 97 – Steven Carcary Duo
Fort William (Alexandra Hotel) –
Galashiels (Abbotsford Arms Hotel) – 2nd Oct 97 – Ray Carse
Galston (Barr Castle Social Club) – 13th Oct 97 – Seamus O’Sullivan
Glendale (Black Bull Hotel – Wooler) – 16th Oct 97 – Donald Ridley
Glenfarg (Lomond Hotel) - 1st Oct 97 – Hamish Smith
Glenrothes (Victoria Hall, Coaltown of Balgownie) - 28th Oct 97 – tba
Gretna (Halcrow Stadium) - 15th Oct 97 – Fintan Stanley
Highland (Drumossie Hotel) – 20th Oct 97 – Deirdre Adamson
Inveraray (Loch Fyne Hotel) - 7th Oct 97 – Scott Gordon Trio
Islay (White Hart Hotel) -
Isle of Skye -
Islesteps (Waterhole, Lochfoot) – 7th Oct 97 – John Renton SDB
Kelso (Ednam House Hotel) – 29th Oct 97 – Robert Whitehead & the Danelaw
Kinlochshiel (Islander Function Room) -
Kintore (Torryburn Hotel) – 1st Oct 97 – Forfar Club
Lanark (Masonic Hall) - 23rd Oct 97 – Alan Gardiner Trio
Langholm (Crown Hotel) –
Lesmahagow (Masonic Hall) – 9th Oct 97 – Gordon Pattullo
Lewis & Harris (Stornoway Legion) - 6th Oct 97 - tba
Livingston (Deans Community Centre) 21st Oct 97 – Fintan Stanley
Lockerbie (Queen’s Hotel) - 28th Oct 97 – Deirdre Adamson
Mauchline (Sorn Village Hall) 21st Oct 97 – Fintry Style
Montrose (Park Hotel) – 1st Oct 97 – Davie Stewart & Rab Smillie
Muirhead (Belmont Arms, Meigle) - 15th Oct 97 – no meeting
Newtongrange (Dean Tavern) – 27th Oct 97 – David Sturgeon SDB
North East (Royal British Legion, Keith) – 7th Oct 97 – Ian Powrie & Paul Clancy
Oban (McTavish’s Kitchen) – 2nd Oct 97 – John Renton SDB
Orkney (Ayre Hotel, Kirkwall) –
Peebles (Green Tree Hotel) – 30th Oct 97 – Alan Gardiner SDB
Perth (Salutation Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Davie Stewart & Rab Smillie
Premier NI (Camlin Function Rooms) - 7th Oct 97 - tba
Reading Fiddlers (Piggot School) -
Renfrew (Masonic Hall, Broadloan) – 14th Oct 97 – Fraser McGlynn Duo
Rothbury (Queen’s Head) - 2nd Oct 97 – James Coutts SDB
Selkirk (Cricket Club) - 9th Oct 97 - Nicol McLaren SDB
Shetland (venue?) - 2nd Oct 97 – Ian Muir Trio
Stirling (Terraces Hotel) - 12th Oct 97 – Michael Garvin SDB
Sutherland (Rogart Hall) - 4th Oct 97 - tba
Thornhill (Dumfries-shire) - 8th Oct 97 – Marian Anderson Trio
Thurso (Pentland Hotel) – 6th Oct 97 – Hebbie Gray
Turriff (Royal Oak Hotel) – 2nd Oct 97 – Paul anderson
Tynedale (Hexham Ex Service Club) – 7th Oct 97 – Bruce Lindsay Trio
Wick (McKay’s Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Duncan Chisholm & Ivan Drever
Yarrow (Gordon Arms) - 15th Oct 97 – Mary Young SDB
THERE WERE CLUB REPORTS FROM :-
1. Armadale
2. Arbroath
3. Banchory
4. Biggar
5. Campsie
6. Dingwall
7. Dunfermline
8. Forres
9. Glendale
10. Inveraray
11. Islesteps
12. Kintore
13. Lesmahagow
14. Montrose
15. Muirhead
16. North East
17. Thornhill
18. Thurso
19. Turriff
20. Yarrow
CLUB DIRECTORY AS AT SEPT 1997
(Clubs didn’t necessarily notify the Assoc when they closed so the following may not be entirely correct. Only the clubs submitting the reports or in the Club Diary above were definitely open.)
1. Aberdeen A&F Club (1975 – present)
2. Alnwick A&F Club (Sept 1976 – present)
3. Annan A&F Club (joined Assoc in 1996 but started?
4. Arbroath A&F Club (1991? – present)
5. Armadale A&F Club (Oct 1978? or 80) originally called Bathgate Club (for 2 months) Closed
6. Ayr A&F Club (Nov 1983 – per Nov 83 edition) Closed
7. Balloch A&F Club (Sept 1972 – per January 1978 issue – present)
8. Banchory A&F Club (1978 – present)
9. Banff & District A&F Club (Oct 1973 – present)
10. Beith & District A&F Club (Sept 1972 – per first edition – present)
11. Belford A&F Club (joined Sept 1982)
12. Biggar A&F Club (Oct 1974 – present)
13. Blairgowrie A&F Club (
14. Bromley A&F Club
15. Button Key A&F Club (
16. Campbeltown A&F Club (
17. Campsie A&F Club (
18. Carlisle A&F Club (joined Sept 1993 -
19. Castle Douglas A&F Club (c Sept 1980 – present)
20. Coalburn A&F Club (
21. Crieff A&F Club (cSept 1981)
22. Dalriada A&F Club (Feb 1981)
23. Dingwall & District A&F Club (May 1979 – per first report)
24. Dunblane & District A&F Club (1971 – present)
25. Dunfermline & District A&F Club (1974 – per first edition)
26. Dunoon & Cowal A&F Club (
27. East Kilbride A&F Club (Sept 1980)
28. Ellon A&F Club (
29. Etterick & Yarrow (Jan 1989 -
30. Fintry A&F Club (Dec 1972 – reformed Jan 1980 – present)
31. Forfar A&F Club (
32. Forres A&F Club (Jan 1978)
33. Fort William A&F Club (21st Oct 1980 – per Dec 1980 B&F)
34. Galashiels A&F Club (joined Sept 1982 - present)
35. Galston A&F Club (Oct 1969 – per first edition – closed March 2006)
36. Glendale Accordion Club (Jan 1973)
37. Glenfarg A&F Club (formed 1988 joined Assoc Mar 95 -
38. Glenrothes A&F Club (Mar 93?
39. Gretna A&F Club (1991) Known as North Cumbria A&F Club previously (originally called Gretna when started in June 1966 but later had to move to venues in the North of England and changed name. No breaks in the continuity of the Club)
40. Highland A&F Club (Inverness) (Nov 1973 – present)
41. Inveraray A&F Club (Oct 1991 - present)
42. Islay A&F Club (23 Apr 93 -
43. Islesteps A&F Club (Jan 1981 – present – n.b. evolved from the original Dumfries Club)
44. Isle of Skye A&F Club (
45. Kelso A&F Club (May 1976 – present)
46. Kintore A&F Club (
47. Lanark A&F Club (joined Sept 96 – present)
48. Langholm A&F Club (Oct 1967 - present)
49. Lesmahagow A&F Club (Nov 1979 – closed May 2005)
50. Lewis & Harris A&F Club (Aug 1994 -
51. Livingston A&F Club (Sept 1973 – present)
52. Lockerbie A&F Club (Nov 1973 - present)
53. Mauchline A&F Club (first mention 1986? - present)
54. Montrose A&F Club (joined Sept 1982 - present)
55. Muirhead A&F Club (Dec 1994 -
56. Newtongrange A&F Club (joined Sept 1977 - present)
57. North East A&F Club aka Keith A&FC (Sept 1971 - present)
58. Oban A&F Club (Nov 1975 - present)
59. Orkney A&F Club (Mar 1978 - present)
60. Peebles A&F Club (26 Nov 1981 - present)
61. Perth & District A&F Club (Aug 1970 - present)
62. Premier A&F Club NI (April 1980)
63. Renfrew A&F Club (
64. Rothbury Accordion Club (7th Feb 1974) orig called Coquetdale
65. Reading Scottish Fiddlers (cMarch 1997
66. Selkirk A&F Club (
67. Shetland A&F Club (Sept 1978 - present)
68. Stirling A&F Club (Oct 1991 - )
69. Sutherland A&F Club (
70. Thornhill A&F Club (joined Oct 1983 – see Nov 83 edition – closed April 2014)
71. Thurso A&F Club (Oct 1981 - present)
72. Turriff A&F Club (March 1982 - present)
73. Tynedale A&F Club (Nov 1980 - present)
74. Vancouver
75. Wick A&F Club (Oct 1975 - present)
Not on official list at the start of the season (closed, did not renew membership or omitted in error?)
76. Acharacle & District A&F Club (cMay 1988)
77. Bonchester Accordion Club (Closed?)
78. Bridge of Allan (Walmer) A&F Club (Walmer Hotel, Bridge of Allan) (c March 1982)
79. Brigmill A&F Club (Oct 1990) Closed
80. Buchan A&F Club
81. Callander A&F Club (
82. Campbeltown & District A&F Club (c Dec 1980)
83. Cleland (cNov 1981 – March 1985) originally called Drumpellier A&F Club (for 2 months)
84. Club Accord
85. Coquetdale A&F Club (Feb 1974 or c1976/77 – 1981/2? – became Rothbury?)
86. Coupar Angus A&F Club (cSept 1978 - ?)
87. Cumnock A&F Club (October 1976 - forced to close cDec 1982 - see Jan 83 Editorial)
88. Denny & Dunipace A&F Club (Feb 1981)
89. Derwentside A&F Club
90. Dornoch A&F Club (first mention in directory 1986)
91. Dumfries Accordion Club (Oughtons) (April 1965 at the Hole in the Wa’)
92. Dunbar Cement Works A&F Club (Closed?)
93. Dundee & District A&F Club (1970? – 1995?)
94. Edinburgh A&F Club (Apr 1981) prev called Chrissie Leatham A&F Club (Oct 1980)
95. Falkirk A&F Club (Sept 1978 - )
96. Gorebridge (cNov 1981) originally called Arniston A&F Club (for 2 months)
97. Greenhead Accordion Club (on the A69 between Brampton and Haltwistle)
98. Kirriemuir A&F Club (cSept 1981)
99. M.A.F.I.A. (1966 – 1993?)
100. Monklands A&F Club (Nov 1978 – closed cApril 1983)
101. Morecambe A&F Club (joined Sept 1982)
102. Mull A&F Club
103. Newcastleton Accordion Club
104. New Cumnock A&F Club (cMarch 1979)
105. Newton St Boswells Accordion Club (17th Oct 1972 see Apr 1984 obituary for Angus Park)
106. Ormiston Miners’ Welfare Society A&F Club (closed April 1992 – per Sept Editorial)
107. Renfrew A&F Club (original club 1974/5 lapsed after a few years then again in 1984)
108. Straiton Accordion Club (c1968 – closed March 1979)
109. Stranraer & District Accordion Club (1974 – per first edition)
110. Torthorwald A&F Club (near Dumfries)
111. Tranent A&F Club
112. Walmer (Bridge of Allan) A&F Club
113. Wellbank A&F Club
Advertising rates increased
Full Page - £113 from Sept 96
Half Page - £57
Quarter Page - £29
B&F Treasurer – Mrs Margaret Smith, Smeaton Farm Cottage, Dalkeith, Midlothian, EH22 2NL
The main features in the above issue were as follows (this is not a comprehensive detail of all it contained. The Club reports, in particular, are too time consuming at this stage to retype).
Editorial
Well, here we are with my first issue of the Box and Fiddle. My first duty as incoming Editor must be to thank Ron Ramsay for all the effort he has put into keeping the paper going over the last three years. It is entirely thanks to Ron, Margaret Smith and before that Doug Adamson that we have a paper at all, as together they turned what was a very grim position into a healthy state today. At the time of taking over the editorship Ron was looking forward to a lot of free time with his impending retirement from the uniformed branch of Tayside Police. Fate intervened however with the offer of a job on the civilian staff of the force. Throughout the last three years he has therefore held down both jobs without missing a deadline and we are all due him a sincere vote of thanks.
To move on then, printing will now be in the very capable hands of A&J Typesetting and Printing of Lanark. The ‘A’ therein refers to Andrew Coutts, Pipe Major of Grade 2 Baron Of Lee Pipe Band (formerly called Carluke Caledonia) so I hope we will have a sympathetic ear when the pressure is on. It was Andrew who suggested that the existing format of the paper was ‘gie auld fashioned’. I explained to him that most of the readership were also ‘gie auld fashioned’ (you can rely on me to stick up for you) but we agreed it was a step in the right direction, so here you have it.
Inevitably however as with any changeover there will be problems, so I would ask you to bear with me. I will be on holiday for a week in October and two weeks in November so that could be difficult. Remember that both Margaret and myself do this voluntarily and we are looking for an Assistant Editor for just such eventualities (so as they say on the National Lottery ‘It Could Be You’). Please ensure that copy submitted is as clear as possible. Typesetting the input is what takes time and therefore costs money so the clearer things are, the better. Incidentally, so far both myself and the Printer are very impressed with the clarity of most of the input so keep it up.
In his article ‘Behind the Scenes’ in the last issue Ron highlighted the major difficulty in publishing a newspaper. Namely it must be produced in multiples of 4 pages. As things stand at the moment I have no reserve of photographs or articles, particularly good lead articles on personalities or events in our music scene for the front page of each issue. So please, get your photograph albums and pens out and your thinking caps on.
Continuing on this topic my thanks are due to Keith Chandler from South Leigh in Oxfordshire for permission to use his article on the Wyper Brothers and to Rod Stradling from Stroud, Editor of ‘Musical Traditions’ a magazine which appears on the ‘Internet’ and in which this article first appeared.
Any photographs loaned to me will be copied and returned.
I look forward to comments on your new ‘Box and Fiddle’.
Charlie Todd
Melodeon Maestros
The Story of Peter and Daniel Wyper
By Keith Chandler
The melodeon, or accordion as it was often interchangeably known, is a deceptively simple instrument with one or more row of button keys, operating on a push-pull bellows action. Invented during the 1820s, it was later produced en masse on the Continent - Germany in particular - and imported in vast quantities into the British Isles, where it sold cheaply from around mid-century onwards. By around 1910 one manufacturer in Scotland alone claimed to possess 300,000 testimonials to their product.1
Melodeons were used to provide entertainment, both as accompaniment to dance and song, throughout the whole of these islands. But it is in an urban context that its chief legacy has reached us, via the commercial recordings of a group of talented men who were, broadly speaking, the second generation of players. The invention of permanent sound recording was coincident with this group of musicians, and the early histories of both are inextricably intertwined. This piece, then, highlights the lives and careers of two such - a pair of brothers from the Lanarkshire area of lowland Scotland - and delineates their role in the early history of recording traditional dance music.
The earliest commercially-issued sound recording medium was the wax cylinder. With a typical running time of two to four minutes, this artefact measured about three to four inches, with the sound content etched into a continuous spiral groove along its length. The recording mechanism involved the revolution of the cylinder at a fixed speed, while a stylus, attached to a laterally moving arm, transmitted the vibrations through the horn diaphragm and into the groove as it was being cut.2
The early fortunes of the recording industry are still greatly under researched, and much of the relevant documentation has failed to survive: through carelessness, lack of interest, or destruction during the two wars. It therefore remains debatable which melodeon player first committed items from the common stock traditional dance tune repertory of these islands to cylinder. One candidate is John J Kimmel, who, via two excellent vinyl reissue albums, is certainly the best known of the pioneers.3 His first session for the American Zon-o-phone label took place in New York in either 1904 or 1905.4 Born in Brooklyn in 1866 of German immigrant parents, by the turn of the century he had evolved a style of playing which was melodically fluid, dynamic, thoroughly exciting, and apparently entirely personal. Although the melodeon was common enough among Germans in both the old world and the new (and fed influentially into other American traditions, such as the norteno or Tex-Mex style of the American south west), Kimmel largely eschewed this ethnic heritage - in his recordings at least - and played an essentially Irish repertory, augmented by numbers of Scottish items, ragtime pieces and popular marches.
John J Kimmel recorded for established commercial companies; any quest for the first melodeon player to record needs to take account of the possibility of an entrepreneur who possessed the technology required for recording cylinders in a down-home fashion. And, indeed, one such did exist.
Peter Wyper was baptised in Dalziel, Lanarkshire, on 28 March 1861, the third child of Peter and Charlotte Wyper (née MacKenzie). One of his younger brothers was Daniel MacKenzie Wyper, baptised on 23 October 1872 in Cambusnethan, although the family were actually living at the time in Wishaw. Both men became, in turn, 'Scottish Champion Melodeon Player', both had an extensive recording career, and both were hugely influential on other melodeon players across a wide area of Scotland, and beyond.
Their father was born in Craigend in 1832, and worked as a coal miner, the chief occupation in Lanarkshire throughout the nineteenth century. Although he had migrated around the area, by the date of the 1881 census the family was living in Hamilton. At that date both Peter the elder and Peter the son, then aged 20, continued to work in the pits. A decade later, and still in Hamilton, the father had retired, but both Peter and Daniel were now earning their living in the same manner. Peter had married, moved out of the parental home in Holyrood Street to live at 6 Burnsidelaw, and started a family of his own. The birthplace of his wife Jeanie (née Evans) was given in the census enumeration book as 'Ireland': perhaps a significant factor in terms of tune repertory, discussed briefly below.
Surviving members of both men's families are uncertain under what circumstances either brother came to take up the melodeon, nor if their father had been a player. Logically, Daniel may well have been influenced by his older brother. According to a family tradition, both brothers played a 'command performance for Queen Victoria'. Although specific details are lacking - it may have taken place in London or Balmoral - it certainly occurred prior to Victoria's death in 1901.
Both men used their skill at music to acquire a degree of social elevation which took them out of the hard, physically-debilitating context of the coal face. Peter left first, and at some undefined point during the 1890s became a sewing machine salesman.5 By 1902, at least, he had embarked upon a successful career as a retailer of music-related goods, and around this date opened a shop on Cadzow Street in Hamilton, selling musical instruments, accessories, and sheet music. He added to his stock over the years, and in January 1909 an advertisement in one local paper announced:
Wyper's Music Warehouse
The best place to buy your seasonable gifts
Largest and best selection of talking machines and records in Lanarkshire
Wyper's International Melodeons are the best money can buy
Violins, concertinas, mandolins, and other musical instruments in great variety
Latest songs, books and music
Pantomime songs - 'Oh Antonio,' 'Hang Out the Front Door Key,' 'Afraid to Come Home in the Dark,' 'Auld Reekie,' 'Flip Flap,' and fifty others
Pianos, organs and gramophones on hire.6
The stock evidently represented a considerable financial investment and was an enormous step indeed from the early years spent in the coal mines.
Peter's brother Daniel also worked in the mines, but was able to remove himself from physical labour at the coal face by becoming a member of the pit band, in which he played cornet. Then, as now, there was a robust pit band tradition, with considerable competition between them, and bandsmen were favoured employees. For Daniel Wyper, as perhaps for others, it meant working above ground. He also eventually left the mines, worked for his brother repairing melodeons and gramophones, made money from recordings, and opened and closed a succession of shops - including several selling secondhand goods, and a fish and chip shop. He also made ice cream, which he sold not only in the chip shop, but which several of his children hawked around the local cinemas. He adapted existing 19-keyed melodeons, adding two extra buttons to give an increased chromatic range, and these apparently sold very well indeed. And, of course, he made money from bookings at local music halls (sometimes on the same bill as one of his neighbours, Harry Lauder), dances (for which he sometimes played in company with a hammer dulcimer player named Jimmy Greenhorn), and from competing with other melodeon players.7
Peter Wyper's music dealership also gave him access to the necessary equipment for recording cylinders, and, like the Irish-American uilleann piper Patsy Touhey around the same date, he set to producing commercial items under his own label imprint.8
It was a basic home-grown product, a one-off artefact produced for commercial distribution by Peter Wyper sitting in front of the recording horn of a cylinder cutting machine. The title and catalogue number was handwritten in ink on a specially-printed sticker, which was then pasted onto the lid of each box. Following the fashion already established by the major record companies, each cylinder commenced with an announcement of tune title, and name of both performer and manufacturer. Lady Mary Ramsey, for instance, was 'Wyper's "Empress" Records' release number 12. It began with a voice - undoubtedly Wyper's - intoning "Lady Mary Ramsey. Played by Peter Wyper. Empress Records".9
None of the surviving cylinders or their boxes reveal any specific dates, but there is further evidence that Peter Wyper's recordings of the melodeon were indeed the first. In the August 1903 issue of the trade journal Talking Machine News, published in London, the editor noted that Wyper had sent him 'a record of accordeon playing, which not only proves him to be an expert record maker, but shows him to be quite a master of this instrument.'10 He quotes also from the accompanying letter:
" . . . I have sold a considerable number of these records locally, but as I have to play and make each record separately, I should take it as a favour if you could enlighten me as to how to take one record from another. It is so monotonous playing the same tune time after time."11
The secret of an affordable mass duplication process was not revealed at that date, but Wyper remained unperturbed. Expanding his entrepreneurial net, the following May he advertised in the same journal a competition for the best records 'made by amateurs,' with prizes of £2, £1 and 10s. A month later he sent the editor two further cylinders, one featuring melodeon, the other a bagpipe solo.12 The identity of the bagpipe player is not known, but there is no reason why it should not have been Wyper himself. In the same June 1904 issue an advertisement appeared for:
Wyper's Renowned Empress Records for Phonographs
Largest and best selections of Accordion & Bagpipe Records in the market.
One shilling, threepence each.
Trade supplied.13
Fifteen bagpipe selections were then listed, along with details of his own brand 'Renowned International Melodeons', claiming them to be the 'best value in the world'.14
Something of the scope and extent of the available musical repertory was revealed in a further advertisement, published two months later:
PETER WYPER
The Champion Accordion Player's Phono-graph Records
All masters. Loud, clear, and distinct Scotch music.
Solos, Strathspeys, Reels, Hornpipes, Jigs, Marches, &c. Retail price, 1/3 each. Special prices to the trade per doz. Sample sent post free for 1/3.
Lists sent on application: Address:-
PETER WYPER,
RECORD MANUFACTURER,
Cadzow St., HAMILTON,
Scotland, N.B.15
The Wypers, in common with the majority of Scottish-born melodeon players to record, were quite obviously musical sight readers, and, like Kimmel, exhibited a somewhat cosmopolitan musical outlook, often featuring specifically Irish tunes in their repertory.16 Popular and influential tune books such as Kerr's Merry Melodies were already publishing Irish tunes by the date of the first recordings, while up to a third of the population of lowland Scotland at the turn of the century were Irish immigrants who worked on the land or in the pits, and some of these may also have acted as transmitters of such material.
Daniel Wyper was just as prolifically recorded as his older brother. He too sat in front of the cylinder horn and played his melodeon. The format was identical, only on these could be heard, for example, "Jenny's Bawbee. Played by D Wyper. Empress Records."
The solution to duplicating each performance came for the Wypers not in pressing multiple copies from an original master - which was the technique used by the large commercial companies - but by playing into more than one recording machine at the same time.17 One of Daniel's daughters claims that the brothers made 'a lot of money' from these cylinders, and remembers being told by her father of how they were recorded on the first floor of a warehouse located opposite the music shop in Cadzow Street.18 Another daughter recalls being told about Daniel recording at least some of these cylinders at home, his wife brushing away the shavings from the newly-cut groove during production.19
Although Peter Wyper's shop in Hamilton was clearly one retail outlet, his 'trade supplied' offer was evidently successful. A number of the surviving boxes bear a sticker which reads 'Sold by H Robertson, Dunfermline,' a town a considerable distance away, and evidently home to a dealer to whom Wyper supplied merchandise.
Production of cylinders by the Wyper brothers continued, but other than certain of Kimmel's American Edison recordings, even as late as mid-1906 nothing played on melodeon was available on releases by the major companies.20 A letter from William Brown of Corstophine, to the west of Edinburgh, drew public attention to this oversight:
" ... By-the-way how is it that no Company has entered the field with Melodeon Solos? Of concertina solos we have many by the prince of players - Alexander of that name - but not one gold moulded [a cylinder production technique] melodeon record. Let some Co. have the enterprise to make some melodeon records, the very fact that so many thousands of these instruments are sold proves how popular the records would be - Scottish tunes, marches, reels, and strathspeys; English country dances and Irish jigs. They would sell like "hot cakes" and provide a welcome antidote to the rubbishy coon and other comic (?) songs inflicted on a long-suffering public."21
Rectification of the situation must, in fact, already have been under way, for in October of that year the first advertisements appeared for a cylinder from the General Phonograph Company of London: issue number 119 on their 'White Records' label. Significantly, perhaps, this initial release was titled Irish Jig, an 'Accordeon Solo' by A.J. Scott, with 'Piano-forte Accompaniment.'22
Recording activity expanded rapidly, and scarcely a bi-weekly issue of Talking Machine News passed without details of further releases. For the remainder of 1906 A J Scott appears to have cornered the whole field, recording for both General Phonograph and the Russell Hunting Company, the latter issued as 'Sterling' cylinders and subsequently as a Pathé flat disc.23 All selections continued to be drawn from the Irish tune stock: jigs, reels, hornpipes. Although Scott remains a biographical mystery, examination of his extensive recorded repertory and playing style leaves no doubt that he was, in fact, Scottish.
Peter Wyper made the transition from local to national product via a pair of cylinders made for Edison Records, probably recorded also during 1906. These featured tunes which he must have played into his own cylinder horn hundreds of times: Stirling Castle and De'il Among the Tailors.24
Local fame, extensive recording experience and judicious self-publicity brought him to the attention of Columbia Records, already by that date one of the largest companies in the field, and early in 1907 Wyper travelled to London for the first of many sessions. Cylinders were declining in popularity, and from that date on the medium - for the Wypers at any rate - was the flat disc.
During the succeeding eight years Peter was in the Columbia studios on a number of occasions - often in tandem with his brother Daniel. Between them - either solo or as duets - they recorded just about 130 individual tracks.
From the first, international fame was assured for both men by the release of some of these masters on Columbia's domestic American series. By January 1909, a reviewer in Talking Machine News commented of one such issue:
A Columbia list would be incomplete without some Wyper accordion records. Here we have two: The Stranger and Starlit Dell Marches - D 240 - duets by the Brothers Wyper in which, if possible, even more than their usual good skill is displayed.25
Eight years later an American Columbia catalogue proclaimed them, along with Guido and Pietro Diero and John J Kimmel, 'the five greatest accordion players in the world.'26
Beyond the United States there were issues on subsidiary Columbia labels in both Canada and Australia. Flowers of Edinburgh was released on Columbia C 734 for the Mexican market as Flores del Edinburgo; while Busby Polka on Columbia E 1378 was aimed at Scandinavian record buyers. Fame was sometimes elusive, though: Circassian Circle on Standard 26225 appeared simply as 'Accordeon Solo', while the label of E 1378 merely stated 'Harmonika Solo', the Scandinavian word for accordeon.
In Britain, titles from the first session appeared initially on the single-sided Columbia Graphophone label, pressed in America for British issue. They were later re-pressed on the standard price Rena label (and subsequently, as the label formats changed, reissued on Columbia-Rena and then Columbia). Prior to the First World War a massive importation of cheap German-produced discs forced all the major companies to initiate a budget label, generally selling at around 1s. 6d. (7p). In September 1915, a date which coincides almost exactly with Peter Wyper's final recording session, 24 of the brothers' couplings were reissued on Columbia's new cheap Regal label.27 The frequency with which some of these still turn up in second-hand shops - in England, in Scotland, and in Ireland - indicate their popularity.
In 1920 the Hamilton Advertiser carried the following obituary:
Music-lovers, and melodeon players in particular, will learn with regret of the death of Mr Peter Wyper, music dealer, Hamilton, who was known throughout the country as an accomplished accordion player. Mr Wyper's records on the gramophone are to be found in thousands of homes, and he was a much respected member of the music trade. For a period he was champion melodeon player of Scotland, and his numerous public performances with this instrument were marked by chords and variations which gave great pleasure. Quiet, kindly, and retired, he made many friends in Hamilton and elsewhere. His funeral took place to [sic] Hamilton Cemetary on Wednesday. Mr Wyper, who died at Strathaven, was in his 58th year.28
The following August a circular for Regal Records was still proclaiming him 'Scotland's greatest accordion player.' 29 However, this may not accurately reflect reality. Daniel's side of the family maintain that many of the records issued under Peter's name were actually played by his brother. Peter, it is claimed, possessed both the retail outlet and the business acumen, but Daniel was the more talented player.
One of Daniel's daughters claims that the brothers invariably split the considerable royalties derived from the Columbia recordings equally. It was, she says, a source of annoyance to her mother that although Daniel had recorded the greater portion of the released material, Peter received half the money.30 Although difficult at this remove in time to get at the truth, there is sufficient evidence, albeit circumstantial, to at least cast some doubt.
Firstly, the recording companies themselves confused the issue by sometimes releasing the same track as by one, sometimes as by the other. One example is the tune-set titled Tight Little Island, from a mid-1912 session. On early pressings of Regal G 6991 Peter is credited, on later pressings it is Daniel. Another is Royal Belfast Hornpipe: by Peter on the British releases on both Columbia and Regal; by Daniel on the American Columbia and Diamond labels. Most confusing of all was the late Regal issue of Blaze Away, issued as by Peter Wyper, but actually featuring an anonymous piano-accordion player which is neither.
Secondly, Peter (11 years older than his brother, remember), on his own evidence claimed to have already retired from public performance by 1909, which suggests that he may have been less in practice than his brother.31 That said, one informant claimed that at a melodeon championship held in 1911 Peter Wyper ranked second, beaten only by another of the great recorded stylists, James Brown from Edinburgh.32
Finally, careful listening to the recordings certainly reveal two distinct playing styles, one of which (whoever it may be) is a little more technically accomplished than the other.
Following Peter's death, Daniel Wyper had further sessions for Columbia in 1921, which were released solely on the cheap Regal label (although by this date their price had risen to 2s. 6d.). At the same date, many other titles from their back catalogue were also re-pressed on that label.
Daniel made one final session, in 1926, for the Crystalate Company, issued on Imperial in both their domestic British series and in a short-lived Scottish S 100 series, and also on various five- and seven-inch labels such as Victory and Mimosa in Britain, and on Aerona and Victory Junior in Australia. These small-sized discs appeared under such pseudonyms as 'Mr. Peter Orr' and 'John Roberts.'33 His playing on these titles was as crisp, clean and rhythmic as it had been on the Empress cylinders recorded two decades earlier.
A number of other melodeon players, mainly championship winners such as James Brown, Jack Williams and George 'Pamby' Dick, followed in the Wypers' footsteps, but none were so prolifically recorded. The instrument enjoyed a hey-day of popularity which lasted on disc for a quarter of a century, before being deposed by the more complex three, four and five-row button accordions, and, later still, the piano accordion.
Notes Further historical and contextual details on the Wypers and many other Scottish melodeon players, may be found in the sleevenote booklet which accompanies the CD reissue of Melodeon Greats on the Topic label (TSCD601), which also features 25 tracks from the original discs. The whole subject will be expanded extensively in a forthcoming book, which will also contain comprehensive discographical details and numerous further photographs.
- Advertisement for Campbell's Melodeons, The Sunday Circle Yearbook, c. 1910. I am grateful to Des Miller for a copy of this source.
- Jerrold Northrop Moore, A Voice in Time: The Gramophone of Fred Gaisberg 1873 - 1951 (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1976).
- Richard Spottswood, Ethnic Music on Records (Urbana & Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1990).
- Multiple interviews and correspondence with Margaret Price (née Wyper), Burnbank, 1991-94 (hereafter Price interviews).
- Hamilton Directory
- Lanarkshire 6 January 1909, 4.
- Price interviews.
- Pat Mitchell & Jackie Small, The Piping of Patsy Touhey (Dublin: Na Píobairí Uilleann, 1986), 9 -10. Musical examples may be heard on the accompanying cassette (NPU 001).
- I am grateful to Len Watts for taped copies of the Empress cylinders in his collection.
- Talking Machine News (hereafter TMN) I, 4 (August 1903), quoted in Jim Walsh, 'Favorite Pioneer Recording Artists - Wizards of Accordion and Concertina (Peter and Daniel Wyper and Alexander Prince)', Hobbies, March 1953, 32.
- Ibid.
- TMN, June 1904, quoted in ibid.
- Ibid.
- Ibid.
- TMN II, no. 11 (March 1905), 460.
- Examples may be heard on the Topic CD, Melodeon Greats (TSCD601).
- Tony Engle and Tony Russell, sleevenotes to Melodeon Greats (Topic album 12T376), 1978.
- Price interviews.
- Interview with Charlotte Hands (née Wyper), Burnbank, April 1994.
- TMN, IV, 45 (1 October 1906), 413.
- TMN, IV, 44 (1September 1 1906), 299.
- TMN, IV, 45 (1 October 1906), 386.
- TMN, IV, 47 (1 November 1906), 482 for Sterling cyinders. Thanks to Len Watts for discographical data on Pathé releases.
- Edison catalogue (date ???)
- TMN, I, 3, n.s. (January 1909), 82.
- I am grateful to Nicholas Carolan for drawing my attention to this source.
- Frank Andrews & Arthur Badrock, Regal (No.???)
- Hamilton Advertiser, 25 September 1920, 4.
- 1921 Regal supplement, the cover of which is featured in Hobbies, op.cit.
- Price interviews.
- Lanarkshire 10 February 1909, 4.
- Interview with John MacDonald, Pitgavney, Elgin, c. 1969, by Frederick Cameron, to whom I am indebted for a cassette copy.
- Thanks to Arthur Badrock for complete discographical details of this 1926 Crystalate session.
Letters to the Editor
While physically we have returned to Canada, our thoughts are still in Scotland with the wonderful people that made our recent tour so memorable.
Success of a tour can be measured in many ways but most important are the friendships forged along the way. This tour was no exception and I would like to take this opportunity to publicly thank all those who made it possible.
To Robbie Shepherd, Andy Ross and Billy Anderson for much appreciated advertising on their respective radio stations.
To my good friend Jack Cooper for his continued support and, of course, the use of his drums.
To Mo Rutherford for providing us with music stands.
To Ivor Johnson, of Soundhire in Blairgowrie, who provided us with exceptional sound equipment.
To Keith Taylor, of Sensible Music in Bathgate, for providing us with an excellent 88 keyboard.
To Jim Johnstone for a tremendous last evening in Scotland at the ‘King James’.
To all the musicians, too many to mention, who made us feel so welcome.
To the people who attended our concerts and dances.
To those brave individuals, the organizers : Edmund MacKenzie, Eddie Harding, Margaret Wilson, Jessie Stuart, William Crawford, Ethel Carlyle and Anne Sharp.
Last, but not least, to the individual who, from a casual conversation in Montrose last year, made this tour a reality….Ron Ramsay.
On behalf of Bobby Brown and the Scottish Accent, Thank You Ron” Thank You Scotland!
Fred Collins
Take the Floor – Saturdays at 6.30pm with Robbie Shepherd
4th Oct 97 – Ian Thomson SDB + Feature on Angus Fitchet (Part 2)
11th Oct 97 – Sandy Nixon SDB
18th Oct 97 – Ian Cruickshanks SDB
25th Oct 97 – Craig McCallum SDB + Isla St Clair + Carmen Higgins (OB recorded 13th Oct in the Beech Ballroom, Aberdeen)
CLUB DIARY
Aberdeen (Dee Motel) – 28th Oct 97 – Simon Howie SDB
Alnwick (White Swan Hotel) – members only 8th Oct 97 - tba
Annan (St Andrew’s Social Club) - 19th Oct 97 – Cameronian SDB
Arbroath (Viewfield Hotel) - 5th Oct 97 – Paul Anderson
Armadale (Masonic Hall) – 2nd Oct 97 – Dick Black Band
Ayr (Gartferry Hotel) – 5th Oct 97 – Andrew Gordon Trio
Balloch (St. Kessog’s Hall) – 19th Oct 97 – Gordon Pattullo
Banchory (Burnett Arms Hotel) – 27th Oct 97 – Neil McEachern SDB
Banff & District (Banff Springs Hotel) – 22nd Oct 97 – Wayne Robertson Duo
Beith & District (Hotel de Croft, Dalry) – 20th Oct 97 – Lawrie School of Music
Belford (Community Club) – 30th Oct 97 – James Coutts Trio
Biggar (Municipal Hall) – 12th Oct 97 – Morag Robertson & Friends
Blairgowrie (Moorfield Hotel) - 14th Oct 97 – Simon Howie & Duncan Black
Bromley (Trinity United Reform Church) - 14th Oct 97 - tba
Button Key (Windygates Institute) – 9th Oct 97 – Ian Powrie
Campbeltown (Royal or Argyll Hotel) - 17th Oct 97 - Archie John McVicar
Campsie (Glazert House Hotel) - 7th Oct 97 – Alan Gardiner SDB
Carlisle (Border Regiment Club, Carlisle Castle) - 2nd Oct 97 – Tom Porteous Trio
Castle Douglas (Ernespie House Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Tom MacKay Band
Coalburn (Miners’ Welfare) - 16th Oct 97 – Donnie MacGregor & Friends
Crieff & District (Arduthie Hotel) 2nd Oct 97 – Fraser McGlynn
Dalriada (Argyll Arms Hotel, Lochgilphead) 21st Oct 97 – Ian Thomson SDB
Dingwall (National Hotel) – 1st Oct 97 – Susan McIntosh Trio
Dunblane (Westlands Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Judith Linton Trio
Dunfermline (Headwell Bowling Club) – 14th Oct 97 – Duncan Black
Dunoon & Cowal (McColl’s Hotel) 10th Oct 97 - tba
East Kilbride (Sweepers, Cambuslang) – 30th Oct 97 – Ian Anderson SDB
Ellon (Ladbroke Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Nicol McLAren SDB
Fintry (Fintry Sports Centre) – 27th Oct 97 – David Cunningham Jnr SDB
Forfar (Plough Inn) - 26th Oct 97 – tba
Forres (Brig Motel) – 8th Oct 97 – Steven Carcary Duo
Fort William (Alexandra Hotel) –
Galashiels (Abbotsford Arms Hotel) – 2nd Oct 97 – Ray Carse
Galston (Barr Castle Social Club) – 13th Oct 97 – Seamus O’Sullivan
Glendale (Black Bull Hotel – Wooler) – 16th Oct 97 – Donald Ridley
Glenfarg (Lomond Hotel) - 1st Oct 97 – Hamish Smith
Glenrothes (Victoria Hall, Coaltown of Balgownie) - 28th Oct 97 – tba
Gretna (Halcrow Stadium) - 15th Oct 97 – Fintan Stanley
Highland (Drumossie Hotel) – 20th Oct 97 – Deirdre Adamson
Inveraray (Loch Fyne Hotel) - 7th Oct 97 – Scott Gordon Trio
Islay (White Hart Hotel) -
Isle of Skye -
Islesteps (Waterhole, Lochfoot) – 7th Oct 97 – John Renton SDB
Kelso (Ednam House Hotel) – 29th Oct 97 – Robert Whitehead & the Danelaw
Kinlochshiel (Islander Function Room) -
Kintore (Torryburn Hotel) – 1st Oct 97 – Forfar Club
Lanark (Masonic Hall) - 23rd Oct 97 – Alan Gardiner Trio
Langholm (Crown Hotel) –
Lesmahagow (Masonic Hall) – 9th Oct 97 – Gordon Pattullo
Lewis & Harris (Stornoway Legion) - 6th Oct 97 - tba
Livingston (Deans Community Centre) 21st Oct 97 – Fintan Stanley
Lockerbie (Queen’s Hotel) - 28th Oct 97 – Deirdre Adamson
Mauchline (Sorn Village Hall) 21st Oct 97 – Fintry Style
Montrose (Park Hotel) – 1st Oct 97 – Davie Stewart & Rab Smillie
Muirhead (Belmont Arms, Meigle) - 15th Oct 97 – no meeting
Newtongrange (Dean Tavern) – 27th Oct 97 – David Sturgeon SDB
North East (Royal British Legion, Keith) – 7th Oct 97 – Ian Powrie & Paul Clancy
Oban (McTavish’s Kitchen) – 2nd Oct 97 – John Renton SDB
Orkney (Ayre Hotel, Kirkwall) –
Peebles (Green Tree Hotel) – 30th Oct 97 – Alan Gardiner SDB
Perth (Salutation Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Davie Stewart & Rab Smillie
Premier NI (Camlin Function Rooms) - 7th Oct 97 - tba
Reading Fiddlers (Piggot School) -
Renfrew (Masonic Hall, Broadloan) – 14th Oct 97 – Fraser McGlynn Duo
Rothbury (Queen’s Head) - 2nd Oct 97 – James Coutts SDB
Selkirk (Cricket Club) - 9th Oct 97 - Nicol McLaren SDB
Shetland (venue?) - 2nd Oct 97 – Ian Muir Trio
Stirling (Terraces Hotel) - 12th Oct 97 – Michael Garvin SDB
Sutherland (Rogart Hall) - 4th Oct 97 - tba
Thornhill (Dumfries-shire) - 8th Oct 97 – Marian Anderson Trio
Thurso (Pentland Hotel) – 6th Oct 97 – Hebbie Gray
Turriff (Royal Oak Hotel) – 2nd Oct 97 – Paul anderson
Tynedale (Hexham Ex Service Club) – 7th Oct 97 – Bruce Lindsay Trio
Wick (McKay’s Hotel) – 21st Oct 97 – Duncan Chisholm & Ivan Drever
Yarrow (Gordon Arms) - 15th Oct 97 – Mary Young SDB
THERE WERE CLUB REPORTS FROM :-
1. Armadale
2. Arbroath
3. Banchory
4. Biggar
5. Campsie
6. Dingwall
7. Dunfermline
8. Forres
9. Glendale
10. Inveraray
11. Islesteps
12. Kintore
13. Lesmahagow
14. Montrose
15. Muirhead
16. North East
17. Thornhill
18. Thurso
19. Turriff
20. Yarrow
CLUB DIRECTORY AS AT SEPT 1997
(Clubs didn’t necessarily notify the Assoc when they closed so the following may not be entirely correct. Only the clubs submitting the reports or in the Club Diary above were definitely open.)
1. Aberdeen A&F Club (1975 – present)
2. Alnwick A&F Club (Sept 1976 – present)
3. Annan A&F Club (joined Assoc in 1996 but started?
4. Arbroath A&F Club (1991? – present)
5. Armadale A&F Club (Oct 1978? or 80) originally called Bathgate Club (for 2 months) Closed
6. Ayr A&F Club (Nov 1983 – per Nov 83 edition) Closed
7. Balloch A&F Club (Sept 1972 – per January 1978 issue – present)
8. Banchory A&F Club (1978 – present)
9. Banff & District A&F Club (Oct 1973 – present)
10. Beith & District A&F Club (Sept 1972 – per first edition – present)
11. Belford A&F Club (joined Sept 1982)
12. Biggar A&F Club (Oct 1974 – present)
13. Blairgowrie A&F Club (
14. Bromley A&F Club
15. Button Key A&F Club (
16. Campbeltown A&F Club (
17. Campsie A&F Club (
18. Carlisle A&F Club (joined Sept 1993 -
19. Castle Douglas A&F Club (c Sept 1980 – present)
20. Coalburn A&F Club (
21. Crieff A&F Club (cSept 1981)
22. Dalriada A&F Club (Feb 1981)
23. Dingwall & District A&F Club (May 1979 – per first report)
24. Dunblane & District A&F Club (1971 – present)
25. Dunfermline & District A&F Club (1974 – per first edition)
26. Dunoon & Cowal A&F Club (
27. East Kilbride A&F Club (Sept 1980)
28. Ellon A&F Club (
29. Etterick & Yarrow (Jan 1989 -
30. Fintry A&F Club (Dec 1972 – reformed Jan 1980 – present)
31. Forfar A&F Club (
32. Forres A&F Club (Jan 1978)
33. Fort William A&F Club (21st Oct 1980 – per Dec 1980 B&F)
34. Galashiels A&F Club (joined Sept 1982 - present)
35. Galston A&F Club (Oct 1969 – per first edition – closed March 2006)
36. Glendale Accordion Club (Jan 1973)
37. Glenfarg A&F Club (formed 1988 joined Assoc Mar 95 -
38. Glenrothes A&F Club (Mar 93?
39. Gretna A&F Club (1991) Known as North Cumbria A&F Club previously (originally called Gretna when started in June 1966 but later had to move to venues in the North of England and changed name. No breaks in the continuity of the Club)
40. Highland A&F Club (Inverness) (Nov 1973 – present)
41. Inveraray A&F Club (Oct 1991 - present)
42. Islay A&F Club (23 Apr 93 -
43. Islesteps A&F Club (Jan 1981 – present – n.b. evolved from the original Dumfries Club)
44. Isle of Skye A&F Club (
45. Kelso A&F Club (May 1976 – present)
46. Kintore A&F Club (
47. Lanark A&F Club (joined Sept 96 – present)
48. Langholm A&F Club (Oct 1967 - present)
49. Lesmahagow A&F Club (Nov 1979 – closed May 2005)
50. Lewis & Harris A&F Club (Aug 1994 -
51. Livingston A&F Club (Sept 1973 – present)
52. Lockerbie A&F Club (Nov 1973 - present)
53. Mauchline A&F Club (first mention 1986? - present)
54. Montrose A&F Club (joined Sept 1982 - present)
55. Muirhead A&F Club (Dec 1994 -
56. Newtongrange A&F Club (joined Sept 1977 - present)
57. North East A&F Club aka Keith A&FC (Sept 1971 - present)
58. Oban A&F Club (Nov 1975 - present)
59. Orkney A&F Club (Mar 1978 - present)
60. Peebles A&F Club (26 Nov 1981 - present)
61. Perth & District A&F Club (Aug 1970 - present)
62. Premier A&F Club NI (April 1980)
63. Renfrew A&F Club (
64. Rothbury Accordion Club (7th Feb 1974) orig called Coquetdale
65. Reading Scottish Fiddlers (cMarch 1997
66. Selkirk A&F Club (
67. Shetland A&F Club (Sept 1978 - present)
68. Stirling A&F Club (Oct 1991 - )
69. Sutherland A&F Club (
70. Thornhill A&F Club (joined Oct 1983 – see Nov 83 edition – closed April 2014)
71. Thurso A&F Club (Oct 1981 - present)
72. Turriff A&F Club (March 1982 - present)
73. Tynedale A&F Club (Nov 1980 - present)
74. Vancouver
75. Wick A&F Club (Oct 1975 - present)
Not on official list at the start of the season (closed, did not renew membership or omitted in error?)
76. Acharacle & District A&F Club (cMay 1988)
77. Bonchester Accordion Club (Closed?)
78. Bridge of Allan (Walmer) A&F Club (Walmer Hotel, Bridge of Allan) (c March 1982)
79. Brigmill A&F Club (Oct 1990) Closed
80. Buchan A&F Club
81. Callander A&F Club (
82. Campbeltown & District A&F Club (c Dec 1980)
83. Cleland (cNov 1981 – March 1985) originally called Drumpellier A&F Club (for 2 months)
84. Club Accord
85. Coquetdale A&F Club (Feb 1974 or c1976/77 – 1981/2? – became Rothbury?)
86. Coupar Angus A&F Club (cSept 1978 - ?)
87. Cumnock A&F Club (October 1976 - forced to close cDec 1982 - see Jan 83 Editorial)
88. Denny & Dunipace A&F Club (Feb 1981)
89. Derwentside A&F Club
90. Dornoch A&F Club (first mention in directory 1986)
91. Dumfries Accordion Club (Oughtons) (April 1965 at the Hole in the Wa’)
92. Dunbar Cement Works A&F Club (Closed?)
93. Dundee & District A&F Club (1970? – 1995?)
94. Edinburgh A&F Club (Apr 1981) prev called Chrissie Leatham A&F Club (Oct 1980)
95. Falkirk A&F Club (Sept 1978 - )
96. Gorebridge (cNov 1981) originally called Arniston A&F Club (for 2 months)
97. Greenhead Accordion Club (on the A69 between Brampton and Haltwistle)
98. Kirriemuir A&F Club (cSept 1981)
99. M.A.F.I.A. (1966 – 1993?)
100. Monklands A&F Club (Nov 1978 – closed cApril 1983)
101. Morecambe A&F Club (joined Sept 1982)
102. Mull A&F Club
103. Newcastleton Accordion Club
104. New Cumnock A&F Club (cMarch 1979)
105. Newton St Boswells Accordion Club (17th Oct 1972 see Apr 1984 obituary for Angus Park)
106. Ormiston Miners’ Welfare Society A&F Club (closed April 1992 – per Sept Editorial)
107. Renfrew A&F Club (original club 1974/5 lapsed after a few years then again in 1984)
108. Straiton Accordion Club (c1968 – closed March 1979)
109. Stranraer & District Accordion Club (1974 – per first edition)
110. Torthorwald A&F Club (near Dumfries)
111. Tranent A&F Club
112. Walmer (Bridge of Allan) A&F Club
113. Wellbank A&F Club
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