Strathspey Performance

Here’s a link to a paper I presented at NAFCo 2018 in Aberdeen on how strathspeys were played in the late 18th century Lowlands. The basic conclusions are:

1. Per Dr Will Lamb’s series of papers, strathspeys were reels played in a Highland style.
2. Eventually Lowlanders realised that it was nice to play reels as reels or as strathspeys.
3. Eventually the strathspey emerged as a distinct form.
4. The dance strathspey was played in 4/4 (not in the modern Northeastern or RSCDS-influenced 2/2) and quite quickly. Definitely faster than the ~120 crotchets per minute done today. I think they could go as quickly as 196 bpm.
5. The ‘slow strathspey’ emerged as a distinct form not used for dancing and played at any number of tempi.
6. The strathspey-reel medley (switching from both strathspeys to reels and reels to strathspeys) enjoyed some popularity. It can always ratchet up the excitment since going from a strathspey to a reel increases the notes per minute (the surface rate) whereas going from a reel to a strathspey increases the beats per minute (see #4). I think this is a lost art in the modern tradition and I hope to bring it back.

For more details, just see the paper! Apologies for inconsistent formatting as I wasn’t yet using a proper citation manager.