Burnsong International Song Contest
Keeping the legacy of Robert Burns alive through new songwriting talent
Looking back over this busy year, there have been so many happy moments contributing to Homecoming Year. A good number have been attributable to the man whose 250th birthday we celebrate – Robert Burns. Burns is Scotland’s national poet and hero, partly because of his extraordinarily life story, and of course his amazing poems recited across the world on Burns Night (and other nights too!), but the greatest debt we all owe him is his collection of famous songs. Auld Lang Syne could well be the most sung song ever, while My Love Is Like A Red Red Rose brings fond tears to every eye, and who can forget A Man’s A Man For A’ That which was the natural choice to celebrate the devolution of power to our own parliament.
Robert Burns almost single-handedly saved our traditional Scottish songs from oblivion over the last years of his life. He toured the countryside sometimes finding an old fragment and lovingly recreating a ballad from the few bars of music and a barely remembered rhyme. Other times he polished traditional verses in a way that made European composers like Haydn and Beethoven jump to compose tunes for them. And, of course, his limitless genius created everlasting favourites – Ae Fond Kiss, Ca’ The Yowes, The Diel's Awa and many many others that still thrill us two hundred years later in the renditions of beautiful voices and settings and even in impromptu sing alongs and parties.
So, in Homecoming Year, it’s entirely appropriate that one of the keynote events to close the fun and festivities of the year is the showcase concert finale of The Burnsong International Song Contest which will be on St Andrew’s Day in the Scottish parliament building itself in Edinburgh.
The idea behind the Burnsong competition is simple; to celebrate the legacy of Robert Burns and keep it alive by stimulating new songwriting talent. The competition was first held in 2005 to develop and to nurture song writing skills across Scotland and it’s now a biennial fixture in the arts calendar. This year, in keeping with the international dimension of Homecoming, the competition was opened worldwide with the invitation for budding stars to submit their songs – in any genre – through a web platform to be assessed and adjudicated. The common theme – hope and optimism.
The competition’s patron is Midge Ure OBE, who, like Robert Burns shares the view that songs can change the world for the better and his enthusiasm sparkles every time he talks about his involvement. He sees the project as being not just about nurturing raw talent by giving a platform for new songs and new writers, but maybe an even bigger picture: as he said: ‘I’d like to see Burnsong a bit more established. A bit like Nashville was the centre of country music in America, Scotland could be the centre of songwriting for the Western world’. Certainly this year’s winners are an eclectic mix of musical styles and of backgrounds: Scots (including the first Gaelic winner) are joined by two American performers – one from New York and the other from Texas.
It’s as much of a learning experience as a head-to-head competition, that’s one of the key strengths of the programme for the ten winners (eleven actually as one winner is a duo) as they gather together in a rural retreat (called the Song House) for a week’s activities designed and run by key figures in the music world to enhance and develop each singer/writer’s skills. It is this interaction that makes this a unique competition as the participants and their mentors share ideas, tunes and hopes.
The culmination of all this talent, inspiration and perspiration is the closing concert at Holyrood. Hosted by the Presiding Officer, Alex Fergusson MSP and presented by Midge, the evening will showcase these incredibly gifted musicians in front of an audience of parliamentarians and members of the public. What a way to bring down the curtain on this Homecoming Year.
Through the works of Robert Burns, and his selfless efforts to gather and protect our ancient songs, Scotland has a truly great heritage of literally popular songs. How fitting it is that Burnsong actively nurtures new talent today by building on that wonderful legacy and keeping it alive.
Midge Ure summed up Burns’ philosophy memorably when he said recently ‘without songs it would be a pretty dull world’. With Burnsong as a fixture in the calendar, Scotland again shows the world how to banish dullness.
Writer: Clark McGinn, author of ‘The Ultimate Burns Supper Book’ and ‘The Ultimate Guide To Being Scottish’
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