Seattle Press on Line - Shetland Music

Sandy Bradley's Potluck

Shetland Music

Jul 27, 2000 -- Music holds magical things, mostly untranslatable, but occasionally one gets an aware glimpse of what the subconscious is reacting to. I wrote a solo guitar piece and played it for my sister. After I finished, she said, "It sounds like the person is marching along through times which aren't so good, but with confidence that everything will be fine eventually." She hit the nail on the head. That attitude produced the tune, and the tune could always take me to that frame of mind. The content was based on the grammatical phrasing of American English, so I knew which clues tipped her off. I was so impressed with her clear translation of the music that I decided to give her a more difficult challenge using music of the Shetland Islands.

Tom Anderson, renowned Shetland fiddler, had been visiting, and I'd been enjoying playing music with him. Though I'm not really fluent on the piano, I sat on the bench and struggled through one of Tom's airs, halting and making lots of mistakes. When I completed my faulty presentation, my sister said she saw a rocking chair in front of a fireplace.

The tune was The Resting Chair, and Tom had written it upon visiting his grandfather's homestead and seeing the chair in front of the fireplace. English isn't Tom's native language, so clearly my sister wasn't depending on language cadences for the translation. She saw a picture, and so did Tom when he wrote the tune. He wrote visual music, each key a different color and each note part of a linear presentation of the scene he is portraying. I'm convinced that his rods and cones fire when he hears music, and the image of the resting chair endured despite my poor execution and our different mother tongues. That is powerful writing! I jumped at the opportunity to spend three weeks in the winter with him in the Shetlands. I spent many hours hearing his stories of visual music, and about the color of each key signature. He has since passed away, but the images in his tunes remain.

Reader Comments

Discuss this article in the forums!


Sheena Morrison	Apr 29, 2003	Sandwick, Shetland Islands	IT
Tom Anderson was my great uncle who, unfortunately, I never met. It is very gratifying to hear such lovely words spoken about such a marvellous man. Thank you.


Gary Peterson	Jun 27, 2003	Shetland	musician
I can still remember our nights in the Hayfield, Sandy, hope you are doing well, and maybe get in touch,we are still playing, you can see us at www.hombru.co.uk best wishes Gary.