Mairi's Wedding

Origins

J. R. Bannerman, who composed the original song, was born in South Uist but left aged seven for Glasgow where he later joined the General Post Office (GPO) as a telegraph boy and rose to become general superintendent. He was brought up in the Glasgow Gaelic community where most social activities were conducted in Gaelic and he developed a lifelong interest in the songs and literature of that culture. His son, John MacDonald Bannerman became a well known Gaelic broadcaster and singer, but better known as a rugby international (37 caps for Scotland; Oxford Blue) and Liberal politician, ultimately being ennobled as John Bannerman, Baron Bannerman of Kildonan.

Winning the Mòd gold medal was (and is) regarded as the highest singing award in Scottish Gaeldom, and Mairi's Wedding was composed to recognise this achievement. A track of Mary C. MacNiven singing her winning song at the 1934 Mòd is still available and the Mod has founded a memorial salver competition to honour her name. Her wedding did not in fact take place until some six years later when she married Captain John Campbell of Glendale, Skye. She continued to sing at Gaelic concerts and céilidhs for most of her life, and died aged 91 at her native Portnahaven, Islay in 1997.

The song "Mairi's Wedding" was first performed for her at the Highlanders' Institute, then in Glasgow's Elmbank Street, and, at that time, a focal point of cultural and social activity for the Highlands and Islands community in the city. It was probably through this performance that Sir Hugh Stevenson Roberton came to know the song.

Roberton was conductor of the Glasgow Orpheus Choir, which had by the early 1930s acquired international recognition under his leadership. His knighthood in 1931, promoted by his friend Ramsay MacDonald, whose radical politics he shared, established him as the leading British choirmaster and a towering figure within the Glasgow musical world. Although the choir had a vast repertoire, Roberton had inherited a particular fondness for folk music from his mother, and in addition to writing choral arrangements of traditional songs, he composed his own.

Roberton had collaborated with John R. Bannerman on other songs destined to become internationally successful. For the song "Joy of my Heart" Roberton wrote the English words and asked Bannerman to produce a Gaelic version; the tune for the "Uist Tramping Song" was written by Bannerman with the English words by Roberton. John M. Bannerman claimed that his father had written the tune for the song "Westering Home" yet this was not acknowledged in Roberton's published scores. In a London court case in 1960 Sir Hugh's executors failed to prove that he had written the tune and costs were awarded to Miss (now Dame) Vera Lynn who had recorded "Travellin' Home" to the same tune, a recording which made 20th place in the music charts.

Roberton wrote the English words for "Mairi's Wedding", which, as can be seen by the lyrics below in both languages, bore little resemblance to Bannerman's original and make no reference to the original inspiration for the song, the winning of a Mòd gold medal. He published this in 1936, giving the song the alternative title of "The Lewis Bridal Song". Roberton presented an original signed copy of his score to Mary C. MacNiven and it became one of her most prized possessions. When the song was published in Roberton's "Songs of the Isles" by J Curwen & Sons Ltd (1951), the Gaelic words did not appear and Bannerman was not acknowledged, the tune being "noted from Dr. Peter A. MacLeod."

Lyrics

Bannerman's Gaelic version, with a literal translation into English by Anne Lorne Gillies, is:

Sir Hugh Roberton's lyrics begin with the chorus:

Recorded versions

Mairi's Wedding has been recorded by a wide variety of musicians.

Use in Film