The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #174543   Message #4232527
Posted By: GUEST,Lang Johnnie Mor
05-Dec-25 - 05:57 AM
Thread Name: Obit: Adam McNaughtan (1939-2025)
Subject: RE: 2025 Obit: Adam McNaughtan
Very sad news. He did indeed venture "North". I spent a wonderful evening in his company along with Jim and Sylvia Barnes, Tom McConville and others at an Orkney Folk Festival, maybe late 1980s. So many good songs, and he was the very personification of that wonderful dry, droll, even lugubrious West coast of Scotland wit, perhaps best encapsulated in "Oor Hamlet". Anyone who can write lyrics such as "A sword fight wiz arranged fur the interested perties, Wi a bluntit sword for Hamlet, an' a sherp sword fur Laertes" deserves an Ivor Novello award.
I'm in agreement with johnmc above, though. Dick Gaughan's rendition of Adam's "Thomas Muir of Hunterhill" is a masterpiece, and the song I will remember Adam for over all others.
https://youtu.be/jeXew47nCPU?si=i0tdbEiGLHQbSD0F