Keith DaggettI usually try to keep this page to the history of American Music but this man has done so much for the appreciation and spreading of roots music that it would be a sin to omit him.
Aly Bain was born on May 15, 1946. He is a Scottish fiddler who learned his instrument from the old-time master Tom Anderson. The former First Minister of Scotland Jack McConnell called Bain a "Scottish icon."
Bain was born in the town of Lerwick, in the Shetland Islands of Scotland. In the early years of his career, he was—briefly and unofficially—part of the band The Humblebums with Gerry Rafferty, Billy Connolly and Tam Harvey. He was one of the members of the band "Gordon Hank and the Country Ramblers", which also included Gordon Smith, Ian Stewart and Jack Robertson in 1967 and was based in Shetland.
He became nationally prominent as a founding member of The Boys of the Lough a Scots-Irish folk group, with whom he played for over 30 years.
Simultaneously, Bain pursued a solo career in collaborative and television projects with Pelicula Films director Mike Alexander and producer Douglas Eadie, working on several international television series: The Down home Recordings (which described how fiddling music spread from Scotland and Ireland to America), The Shetland Sessions (recorded at the Shetland folk festival in 1991), Aly Meets The Cajuns, and six series of the Transatlantic Sessions.
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