This article first appeared over 10 years ago on a website called Tartan Umbrella. Veteran Scots actor John Cairney, who was living in New Zealand at the time, is won over by the passion and thoughtfulness of a live performance by The Proclaimers in Auckland and recognises a new brand of Scottishness being taken around the world. He refers to the Reid twins as young – scary to think they
The rosy cheeked and elegantly coiffed image of Robert Burns as portrayed by Alexander Nasmyth is the one that has come to be universally accepted – but how close is it to reality? Has the old familiar image prevented us from seeing the real man? Using forensic technology, a 3D model was recently created at Dundee University to show Robert Burns ‘as he really was’. Apart from having Burns look
Robert Burns, poet, songwriter and Scottish icon, spent his last seven years in Dumfries in Scotland’s south west. It was his retreat from the Edinburgh literary world that had brought him, only a year before, contemporary fame. It was in Dumfries he wrote his great songs, Auld Lang Syne, My Love is like a Red Red Rose and John Anderson My Jo. It was here he had his children and died
by John Cairney The rain in Crieff stays mainly right in your face and the night I was there, it was particularly on form. It was the elegance of the place that first caught my eye, even in a storm and the gracious, charcoal grey warmth of The Lounge drew me in. There was music in the French voice that greeted me. When I asked, ‘Do you by any chance