Farewell To The Creeks: A Song History

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"Farewell to the Creeks" is the best-known tune of Pipe Major James Robertson, who was born at Portsoy, Banffshire, in 1886 and joined the Gordon Highlanders in 1906.[1] Sent to France with the regiment's 1st Battalion in August 1914, he remained a prisoner of war for nearly the whole conflict, and he made the tune while held at Sennelager near Paderborn.[1] Piping Press dates its composition to 1915 and has published a copy Robertson wrote out himself in 1952.[2] The same publication describes it as a 6/8 march and warns that it is often wrongly credited to J. B. Robertson, the well-known Scots Guards piper.[3] Robertson later settled in Banff, working as janitor at Banff Academy and serving as a special constable, and Hamish Henderson recorded him for the School of Scottish Studies in 1952.[1]

Great Highland bagpipe with cloth-covered bag, ivory-mounted drones and chanter laid on its side

Robert MacKinnon, Great Highland Bagpipe, Glasgow. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Public domain (CC0). Shown for the instrument; it has no connection to the tune.

Sources differ on what the "Creeks" are: Tobar an Dualchais ties the title to the Creeks of Portknockie on the Moray coast.[1] The Traditional Tune Archive passes on Norman Kennedy's view that the name refers to the Creek people rather than to inlets of the sea,[4] while Mainly Norfolk reports Ian F. Benzie, who knew the pipe tune as "The Creeks," wondering whether it was first named after "The Breeks," a rock formation by Portsoy harbour.[5]

During the Second World War, Henderson, then an intelligence officer with the Highland Division, set words to it as "The Highland Division's Farewell to Sicily," also sung as "Banks of Sicily";[4] Tobar an Dualchais says the song followed a performance of the tune by the massed bands of 153 Brigade at Linguaglossa, not long before the Highland Division's departure from Sicily in 1943.[6] The song has since been recorded by Ewan MacColl (1958), Robin Hall and Jimmie Macgregor (1960), Dick Gaughan (1977) and Old Blind Dogs (1994), among others.[5] Away from the pipes, the Traditional Tune Archive gives the melody in D major, classes it as both a pipe march and a jig, and lists a 1976 recording by Alistair Anderson and a printing in Grumbling Old Woman (1981).[4]

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Sources

  1. Tobar an Dualchais: "Pipe Major James Robertson".
  2. Piping Press: "P/M Joe Wilson, Calum Campbell, James Robertson and Farewell to the Creeks".
  3. Piping Press: "Editor's Notebook: Farewell to the Creeks / Dan's Book / Rolf Obliers / Williamsburg USA / Inverness 1970".
  4. Traditional Tune Archive: "Annotation:Farewell to the Creeks".
  5. Mainly Norfolk: "The Highland Division's Farewell to Sicily / Farewell to Sicily / Banks of Sicily".
  6. Tobar an Dualchais: "The Banks of Sicily".