Grace Reid – Biography
I was born in Dundee, Scotland. There was always singing and listening to singing. From nursery school (those songs and and the ones I learned later as a Nursery Nurse have been invaluable) through to secondary school. There were choirs and solos for school and parish concerts, the Dundee Schools Festival, the Leng Medal and letting it rip in church (I loved being able to sing latin) and lessons from Miss Winifred Scully. We had a wooden piece of furniture called a radiogram and a pile of all kinds of 78s. Each skipping and ball game had its song and every gathering at our house was a party. Most relatives and friends had their own song or two – music hall, Burns, Mario Lanza. One uncle had an additional talent for whistling! We bairns were expected to entertain visitors in some way, but any hint of “showin’ aff” would have been very quickly quashed!
When I babysat with my pal, we played her sister’s records – Ella Fitzgerald, Andy Williams and I got to like Joan Baez. As soon as I could afford it, I bought an LP of hers. I suspect I enjoyed hearing a contemporary singer who didn’t have the big alto voice commercially popular at that time. And of course there was great excitement when each Beatles record was released, with evenings spent getting the harmonies right. More exciting than seeing them live. Screaming being the thing to do then, I could hardly hear them! The Everly’s harmonies were fun too.
I first experienced performed acoustic music from the mid 60s in Dundee’s early folk venues when a lager and lime would last all night, so I’m not sure why I recall finding Archie Fisher’s appearance at that time, a bit scary. I liked the Lowland Folk Four too and still have their LP ‘Eh’ll Tell the Boaby’ from which I learned some songs.
Occasional forays to Sandy Bells and the Waverley were made when I was a student nurse in Edinburgh. My flatmates had me called up to sing ‘House of the Rising Sun’ there one night, but apart from the fact that I didn’t believe I had much of a folk repertoire, I wouldn’t have dreamt of putting myself forward to sing then.
The Marymass Folk Festival in Irvine where we lived for a short time, was a new and exciting experience.
In the late 70s in Livingston, West Lothian, I joined a local amateur dramatic society that put on pantomimes, plays and musicals, with proceeds going to a charitable committee. This was an enjoyable diversion from being at home with three wee ones, and I played a variety of roles before having baby number four.
We – husband Reg and four children – emigrated to Perth in Western Australia in 1982. Around the late 80s/early 90s I discovered I could sing all those songs I’d learned over the years and interpret them as I liked. I began to sing unaccompanied at pub and club sessions. I was introduced to an Australian clarsach player called Mike Burns as a possible accompanist. He played other instruments too and we performed together at festivals and concerts – requiring a rapid growth in our Scottish and Irish traditional and contemporary repertoire.
I’ve long been intrigued by how the voice of each individual makes a unique sound and how others react to that sound. From loving it and wanting to hear more, through to being repulsed and never wanting to hear that sound again. Fascinating!
In 1995, after singing at a concert, I received a letter from someone who had been in the audience, saying he had enjoyed the songs and my “somewhat unusual voice”. He had a notion to hear me sing psalms in the manner of the old Scots and also suggested writing a song about the character in a book he had photo-copied and enclosed.
Some time later I wrote a ballad about that character then decided to continue writing songs on the ‘Scots in Australia‘ theme. Years passed. I stopped when I had ten songs. Once the decision to record a cd was made, it took over two years to complete, due as always to the vagaries of life – or at least of my life! So I’m sending Changing Hemispheres on its way now, that it might sink or it might swim, like the baby cast out to sea in the old ballad.
