Jamie Allan - his surname always takes an A not E so descendants inform me - was put in Durham Gaol in 1803 for stealing a horse to get home from a session. His sentence of transportation was commuted to life imprisonment on account of his age (74). Allegedly one of the first acts of the Prince Regent - who had heard him play - was to issue a pardon for him, but this only reached Durham after his death in 1810.

His tune has a far less distinguished history. It was "collected" by the Scottish band leader Ian Powrie in the 1950s, was in D and was, as someone has already pointed out "The Reel of Tullochgorum" (not to be confused with other tunes called Tullochgorum).

Whether Ian Powrie actually wrote it is unknown, but it's eminently possible.

It must have come over the border with the Scottish dance bands that frequently played in Northumberland and was borrowed, probably by Jack Armstrong and his Barnstormers, who *probably* were responsible for re-christening it.

Since then it's achieved universal British status - via both Peter Kennedy's tunebooks, and the NPS First tunebook - published 1970.

A list of what Jimmy Allan is likely to have played in his long and varied career as a player of several types of pipes is an entirely different selection of mixed Border, Northumbrian and Scottish tunes.


Paws, who is currently into unexploded myth detonation.