Collection of Scots Songs
Thomson played in the orchestra of the St Cecilia Concerts, enjoying performances of Scots songs by Italian castrati visiting Scotland. This gave him the idea of bringing out a collection of Scots songs with new accompaniments and respectable words. In the summer of 1792 he got Andrew Erskine, younger brother of the composer the Earl of Kellie, to take part in the project, but about fifteen months later Erskine, with gambling debts, ended his life by jumping into the Firth of Forth.
To continue the project Thomson asked Alexander Cunningham for a letter of introduction to Robert Burns and in September 1792 sent it with his letter stating that "For some years past, I have, with a friend or two. employed many leisure hours in collating and collecting the most favourite of our national melodies, for publication.... we are desirous to have the poetry improved wherever it seems unworthy of the music.... Some charming melodies are united to mere nonsense and doggerel, while others are accommodated with rhymes so loose and indelicate as cannot be sung in decent company. To remove this reproach would be an easy task to the author of The Cotter's Saturday Night... We shall esteem your poetical assistance a particular favour, besides paying any reasonable price you shall please to demand for it". Burns was already a contributor to James Johnson's The Scots Musical Museum and agreed to do the work, but indignantly added that "In the honest enthusiasm with which I embark in your undertaking, to talk of money, wages, fee, hire, and etc. could be downright Sodomy of Soul! A proof of each of the Songs that I compose or amend, I shall receive as a favour."
Read more about this topic: George Thomson (musician)
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