Allan Barty: Barty's Bow (1980)

Allan Barty: Barty's Bow (Kettle Records KOP4, 1980)

A celebrated Dundee mandolinist and fiddler, Allan Barty was in some ways a Scottish Dave Swarbrick, but he didn't reach the same level of success. Barty was a prominent member of the Dundee folk scene. Allan's first group was Barty's Bow, formed in Dundee in 1966, after which played in a number of Tayside groups, such as The Inn Folk, and appeared on television and radio, and toured with acts such as Tommy Makem & Liam Clancy. In 1971 he was considered as a replacement fiddler in The JSD Band after Chuck Fleming left. He recorded this single solo LP:, and was rumoured to have moved to Germany and presented a folk radio programme. He had appeared on more than forty records by the late seventies.

This, as far as I know is his only solo recording, and it's a beauty. It's all instrumental, with fiddle just winning out over mandolin, although many tracks are double-tracked with both. He is helped out on the album by Archie Fisher, Brian Miller and Robin Morton, and it was produced by Artie Tresize.

01 Pet of the Pipers/Dan the Cobbler/The Maid On the Green

02 Hen's March Tae the Middens/The Four Poster Bed

03 Sleepy Bairns

04 Flowers of Edinburgh/Bottom of the Punch Bowl/Petronella

05 The Showman's Fancy/Humours of California/The Galway Hornpipe

06 The Balkan Hills/Campbell's Farewell to Redcastle/Barren Rocks of Aden

07 The March Hare

08 Madame Bonaparte

09 College Hornpipe/Victoria Hornpipe/The Kinks Hornpipe

10 The Blackthorn Stick/Humours of Glenart/The Drunken Parson

11 Marfield Greys

12 Liberton Polka/Mason's Apron

Unavailable

Other albums featuring Allan Barty:

Various Artists: A Better Class of Folk (1975)
Lowland Folk: Newport Braes (1985)