A Collection of the Newest and best Reels
by Stewart, Neil

Full title: A Collection of the Newest and best Reels or Country Dances adapted for the Violin or German Flute with a Bass for the Violincello or Harpsichord.

Publisher: Edinburgh

Date: [1761-63]

Description:

Roughly contemporary with Bremner's Collection of Scots Reels, the various publication addresses suggest that this collection continued to be sold over some decades. It originally appeared in nine numbers each of eight pages, beginning with nos. 1-2, then 3-6 (in 1762) and 7-9 (Gore).

Notes:

Several tunes have 'each part to be played but once over' or similar instructions regarding repeats. The 8th number includes reels that appear 20 years later in Mackintosh's first book with different basslines but almost identical slurs: if they are indeed Mackintosh's he was still a teenager when they were published here.
'Greig's Pipes' is given in ae'a'c#'' scordatura. On p46 of the GB-DUcl copy someone has altered the bassline of 'The Lasses of Stewarttown' in ink, reducing it to the simplest repeated pattern.
The entire book (other than the jigs) has simple, four-beat basslines. Some tunes in the first section have minims here and there instead.

Gore: S12-1

Biographical info: Neil Stewart (c.1730 - before 1816) taught dancing in Newcastle upon Tyne for 8 years (some time before 1773); he was in Edinburgh by 1775, briefly in partnership with Mr McLean running a dancing school. Stewart had music shops at various addresses, until his whole stock was auctioned in 1805. (Glen 1, vii-viii)

Location(s):

GB-A SB 787 Ste
GB-Gm M8754 / 786.45 (last two pages supplied in MS from John Glen's copy)
GB-DUcl 92463 (at one time James Davie's copy, acquired by J. Murdoch Henderson in 1947)
GB-P N45

Digitised items

This source has not been digitised.