{"id":18812,"date":"2023-03-05T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-03-05T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/projects.handsupfortrad.scot\/handsupfortrad\/?p=18812"},"modified":"2023-03-04T22:50:07","modified_gmt":"2023-03-04T22:50:07","slug":"hands-up-for-trads-women-in-music-and-culture-2023-margaret-bennett","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/projects.handsupfortrad.scot\/handsupfortrad\/hands-up-for-trads-women-in-music-and-culture-2023-margaret-bennett\/","title":{"rendered":"Hands Up for Trad’s Women in Music and Culture 2023: Margaret Bennett"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Hands Up for Trad\u2019s Women in Music and Culture 2023 list has been announced to celebrate just some of the women working in Scotland.  <\/p>\n

Launched as part of International Women\u2019s Day 2023<\/a>, we shine the spotlight on 15 women who all contribute towards Scotland\u2019s cultural landscape through their work. Read the list here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

We asked Margaret Bennett<\/strong> to tell us more about there work, influences and ambitions for the future.<\/p>\n

How did you first get involved in the arts and who were your early influences?<\/strong>
\nMy earliest influences were my parents: Gaelic on my mother\u2019s side and Scots on my father\u2019s side. Both sang and my father played the bagpipes & other instruments. Both were involved in the arts inasmuch as my mother was often invited to sing at ceilidhs and concerts and my father as a solo piper, or to play for dancers, for events and with a pipe band. My father was also a \u2018Burns man\u2019 and was regularly asked to do the Immortal Memory so at home the national bard was also an influence. I\u2019m one of four sisters and we sang together (and harmonised) taking our repertoire from a wide range of sources besides the Gaelic and Scots at home. Early influences (via our parents and school friends) were Gaelic singers (Calum Kennedy, James Smith, Kenneth McIver, Kitty MacLeod et al), Robert Wilson, Anne & Laura Brand, Fr. Sydney McEwan, John McCormick, Kathleen Ferrier, the Beverly Sisters, Hank Williams (and all the Hanks!), Patsy Cline, the Carter Family and others.
\nAfter leaving home my influences were from the Folk Revival of the Sixties, with Pete Seeger, Ewan MacColl, Joan Baez, Tom Paxton, the Corries, and the whole \u2018folk scene\u2019<\/p>\n

At a time which has been very challenging for many people working in the arts, how did you use the last 3 years to develop your creativity?<\/strong>
\nDuring the pandemic I worked on projects relating to traditional songs, music, writing and the performing arts:
\n1.
\nI joined the online sessions of the Traditional Song Forum, organised fortnightly for an international \u2018gathering\u2019 by Steve Roud and Martin Grebe. I gave two of the presentations all on the TSF YouTube channel:
\n\u2022\tDon\u2019t let us be strangers: A Sample of William Montgomerie\u2019s Fieldwork Recordings of Scottish Farmworkers, 1952 (14 June 2020)
\n\u2022\tSong collecting in Newfoundland with Kenneth S. Goldstein
\n\u2022\tGaelic Psalm Singing: understanding how it operates.<\/p>\n

2.
\nAs many people working from home also had the task of looking after children, I created 5 singing sessions for pre-schoolers, teaching them songs and rhymes:
\nMonday:\thttps:\/\/youtu.be\/evgW2_dTsjo
\nTuesday: \t https:\/\/youtu.be\/xm2L7DbXfoI
\nWednesday:\thttps:\/\/youtu.be\/m7Qs8g6E8fM
\nThursday:\thttps:\/\/youtu.be\/3HZNQfQjOP0
\nFriday:\thttps:\/\/youtu.be\/Pr_P8Oo41j8<\/p>\n

2.
\nCollaboration on an animated film by Cat Bruce, \u201cDusgadh\u201d, with an original musical soundtrack by Breabach, narrated by Margaret Bennett. See:
\n