The Laird of Drumblair

James Scott Skinner (1843 to 1927) wrote this strathspey for William McHardy, laird of Drumblair in Aberdeenshire, who had made a fortune in South American engineering and gave Skinner a rent-free cottage. Skinner said the tune came to him whole one night. He jumped out of bed, found no music paper, and wrote it on a piece of soap wrapper.

His wife worried the laird would light his pipe with it, but Skinner sent it anyway. McHardy was so pleased he sent Skinner a check every Christmas for the rest of his life. James Morrison and Tom Carmody recorded it in 1935, and Tommy Peoples played it with the Bothy Band first as a strathspey, then as a reel.