Henry Whyte (1852-1914), a native of the island of Easdale, off Argyll in the West of Scotland, was an active member of An Comunn Gàidhealach, the foremost organization for furthering the Gaelic language in Scotland. As a journalist he wrote prolifically on the history and culture of the Highlands. He campaigned for the Crofters Act, passed in 1886, which he translated into Gaelic; and under the pen-name Fionn, he published collections of Gaelic song.
Fionn originally published The Celtic Lyre in four parts between 1883 and 1895. This edition, supported by subscription, is ring-bound, and reproduces the greater part of the author’s obituary as it appeared in The Celtic Review in 1914; it also presents a new eleven-page scholarly preface by the music editor, an ethnomusicologist. Certain changes have been made so that the work may be used “as a possible template for performance.” Hence, “[t]he tunes have been updated in making their rhythms reflect the Gaelic language without regard to English; the rhythms now approximate the way that people actually sang them and still sing them in Gaelic society today.” In addition the orthography was changed to correspond to “the Gaelic spelling notation conventions of Nova Scotia.”
The book is aimed at musically literate members of the local community, which has a strong Gaelic heritage, and should facilitate the promotion of Gaelic song in Nova Scotia.
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[Review length: 226 words • Review posted on October 22, 2013]