Annotation:That's How I Spent the Winter
X:1 T:That’s How I Spent the Winter T:Sud mar chuir mi'n geamhradh tharum L:1/8 M:C S:MacDonald – Skye Collection Z:AK/Fiddler’s Companion K:D f>A A>A (A>F) A>A|f>a A>f e>d B<d|f>A A>A B>AF>A|a>ef>d e>d B<d:| f<a {a}b>a a<g e>d|d<d e<e g>ef>e|g<a b>a a<f e>d|(g>e)(f>d) B>A B<d| a>a {a}b>f a>ef>d|e>fg>e a>gf>e|b>fa>e {e}f>def|g>f/e/ a>d B>A B<a||
THAT'S HOW I SPENT THE WINTER (Sud Mar Chuir Mi'n Geamhradh Tharum). Scottish, Strathspey. Scotland, Isle of Skye. D major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB. "From Patrick MacDonald's Collection" (Skye). McDonald published his A Collection of Highland Vocal Airs Never hitherto published To which are added a few of the most lively Country Dances or Reels of the North Highlands & Western Isles. Also some Specimens of Bagpipe Music (1784), containing the tunes to Gaelic songs. McDonald was a minister of Kilmore in Argyleshire.
Jack Campin found the following evocative passage of a morn at the manor during a Highland winter in the memoirs of Elizabeth Grant of Rothiemurchus. She grew up in a manor in the Highlands in the early 19th century, and here she writes about the year 1812, when at age fifteen she and her sister arose under the direction of her governess:
In winter we rose half an hour later, without candle, or fire, or warm water. Our clothes were all laid on a chair overnight in readiness for being taken up in proper order. My Mother would not give us candles, and Miss Elphick insisted we should get up. We were not allowed hot water, and really in the highland winters, when the breath froze on the sheets, and the water in the jugs became cakes of ice, washing was a cruel necessity, the fingers were pinched enough. As we could play our scales well in the dark, the two pianofortes and the harp began the day's work. How very near crying the one whose turn set her at the harp I will not speak of; the strings cut the poor cold fingers so that the blisters often bled. Martyr the second put her poor blue hands on the keys of the grand-pianoforte in the drawing room, for in those two rooms the fires were never lighted till near nine o'clock - the grates were of bright steel, the household was not early and so we had to bear our hard fate.
