brian rutherford
music and stuff
Caberfeidh at the Corbie Ha
Well, its been a busy few months. I’m getting pretty steady traffic from my youtube videos which are under ‘folk fingerpicking’. I have to admit that I am pleased that so many people have checked them out and that they find them useful. I have stopped doing my guitar classes for a while but I did learn quite a lot about teaching guitar and one of the lessons that I learnt was to keep each teaching point as succint and simple as possible. I’ve tried to apply this lesson to the the fingerpicking videos. If you check them out at:
The band has been re-named as ‘Caberfeidh’ and here we are in an earlier incarnation:
March 2008
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Freshwater
Well, its been a busy few months since my last posting. I have finally gotten my new bouzouki, hence the lack of posts. I will be recording some new stuff soon which I hope to post. Sorry. I hate these kinds of posts where people go on about their lack of doing anything but I have been busy, honest. I’ll be doing a video blitz where I will post all the various videos in the guitar lessons section. If you’re one of my students then , hold on. Finally I went to see ‘30 days of night’ tonight. I thought it was really, really good. Very scary.
November 2007
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The Fairy Dance
As I said in the ‘About Me’ pages I’ve been learning to play the bouzouki. In case you think your about to listen to ‘Zorba the Greek’ I should qualify this and state that its the ‘Celtic Bouzouki’. Its become very popular in Irish music. I first came across it , like many people, through the playing of Any Irvine from the band ‘Planxty’. I’m really enjoying learning to play it as I just love the way it rings out. It has a wonderfully full sparkling sound. Anyway thats the build up. I hope the results are worth it. This was recorded on Garage Band, the free mac recording software. I’m still not entirely convinced that Macs’ will one day rule the world but they have managed to pull the rabbit out the hat on so many things and ‘Garage band’ is a really good bit of software design.
September 2007
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Craigieburn Wood
We’re coming around again to that time of year when the annual Milngavie Gathering occurs. This is a charity night in aid of the Beatson Institute in Glasgow. I’ve played there for the last few years and this is a recording from last year of a burns poem that myself and my twin brother set to music and arranged. Alistair is on main vocal and I am singing the Harmony. Putting aside the odd flaky note this is actually pretty good. At least I’m proud of it.
August 2007
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Don’t Leave Love Out
This is the third song from the ‘Recovery Room’ sessions that I recorded with Kathleen Higgins. I’m not sure of this song works or not. Its one of the first I ever wrote so to me its a bit dated plus my voice has changed since then. Since no-one has ever heard it before I suppose that doesn’t matter.
July 2007
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How Long?
This is another old recording from the ‘Recovery Room’ session. Its not a particularly profound song but I like the way it turned out. It helps that Kathleen was such a fantastic singer
June 2007
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Fade Away
This is a song written by my brother but I’m going to post it anyway as I am singing and playing guitar on it. Plus I really like it. We did this for the Glasgow girls soundtrack - basically a movie that was never made. We did a lot of songs for this soundtrack and this is by far the best thing.
June 2007
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Hard Times
This is the second of my promised posts from the old days when I had an acoustic duo with Kathleen Higgins. This song is another that I am quite proud of. It sounds like an old traditional song (I probably stole the melody subconciously from somewhere) but it was written round about 1992. The story it tells is very old and has been done a million times but like all the best stories its the way you tell it that matters.
May 2007
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The Golden Ring
Last but not least is the third of three sets that Donald Mackenzie recorded for our wee band ‘Noise and Smoky Breath’. This takes its name from the first tune which is called ‘ The Golden Ring’.
May 2007
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Breton Scots
This is the next in the folk sessions that Donald Mackenzie recorded with Donald on small pipes and me on acoustic guitar. The main tune ‘Breton Scots’ was written by his father and has a ‘breton’ sound to it.
May 2007
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Lady Mackenzie
I played with my old band ‘Jump City’ last year at the same charity concert as ‘Craigieburn Wood’ was recorded.(see the post below). Milngavie pipe band also played there and I met the pipe major Donald Mackenzie who is an amazing piper (www.mackenziebagpiping.com). Anyway , we’ve been putting some tunes together with the small pipes and the guitar and are going under the name ‘Noise and Smoky Breath’ for the moment. This is the first of three sets of tunes I am going to post and this set is named after a tune that he wrote for his mother which is the last one in the set.
May 2007
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Glory Days
Its funny but I always thought this song, out of all the songs that I’d written, would make me rich. It hasn’t happened yet and I’ve grown to have ambivalent feelings about the song itself. This has Kathleen Higgins singing on it. We had an acoustic duo together which was a bit hit and miss but like the band songs I am only going to post the good stuff and this is the first track from an e.p we recorded.
May 2007
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Strange
I was imagining a walk from the west end of Glasgow into town and down Sauchiehall Street when I wrote this song. My wife tells me that the character in the song is how I imagine myself but the the reality is that I’m much more ordinary. Still, I liked the end result as I did spend a bit of time writing the lyrics and it grooves along fairly well. This song is about as funky as the band got. It also has the distinguishing factor that I’m singing through a megaphone.
May 2007
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The End of Summer
This is kind of a story song. It rattles along quite nicely. Watch out for the ‘We’re all going on a summer holiday’ guitar line at the end. No-one seems to have ever noticed it so I thought I better point it out.
May 2007
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Between Today and Tomorrow
When I lived in Paisley I had a small batchelor pad right at the top of the student flats in Lady Lane. I was lucky to get the only one person University owned flat in the whole block which cost an amazing £80 a month to rent. Really cheap. Anyway, one night I had a disturbing dream. One of those where you are trapped and can’t get out and not long after that I wrote this song. Its kind of about death or about that state in dreaming where you are suspended between the world of the living and some other place. We did this as part of the Glasgow Girls soundtrack and it has Eileen Hunter singing the lead.
May 2007
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The Dark Isle
The dark isle is a wonderful old scots tune that seems to capture perfectly the haunting distances you sometimes feel when looking out over the sea to Skye. I liked it so much that I put together a wee piece with the guitar. Its nothing fancy but I like it.
May 2007
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The Late Lamented Foxglove
I’ve been a fan of guitarists like John Renbourne and Bert Janch for many years now. Bizarrely a local entrepeneur has been putting on folk gigs in my wee town of Milngavie and we’ve had just about all of the guitar gods of the 60s including John Renbourne. Here is my take on that 60’s sound with a short guitar piece named after the band. I put this together after the band had split hence its name.
May 2007
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So Long Tomorrow
Way back when , in the dim and distant days when I was a hungry musician I formed a band called Foxglove. It had me on guitar, Al (my twin) on Bass and Gordon Hastie on Drums. We’d both known Gordon for years, in fact I was the one who got him into drumming when I invited him down to the pipe band - but I digress. So we were the proverbial ‘three piece’. Let me tell you, trying to sound good with only guitar, bass and drums is a bit of an art. The guitar has to be rhythm and lead which is a tricky balance to get right. We did manage to hit gold occasionally and this is one of those moments.
May 2007
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