PS 095 – Alasdair Mor MacDonald of Boisdale’s Salute

Primary Sources

C2 Boysdall’s March C2.11: 28
D1 Failte Fir Bhoisdail / Salute to Allister More Mac Donald First of Boisdale D1.10: 56
K1 Failte Fear Bhoisdail / MacDonald of Boisdale’s Salute K1.28: 71
KS Failt fir Bhosisdale / Allister More MacDonald Salute KS.12: 29

Notes on Gaelic Title

Fàilte Fear Bhaghasdail Boysdall’s March C2; Failte Fir Bhoisdail / Salute to Allister More Mac Donald First of Boisdale D1; Failte Fear Bhoisdail / MacDonald of Boisdale’s Salute K1. Boisdale’s Salute. According to Donald MacDonald, this is a tune to celebrate Boisdale’s accession to his estate which was apparently in c. 1758 – see R.D. Cannon and K. Sanger, Donald MacDonald’s Collection of Piobaireachd. Volume 1 (1820), The Piobaireachd Society (2006), p. 86. Thus either ‘Salute’ or ‘Welcome’ might seem appropriate, but it is characteristic of Colin Campbell to use the word ‘March’ in its eighteenth century sense of ‘pibroch’ (it only became attached to the ‘Quickstep’ or 2/4 March after 1828). On the forms fear/fir see Fàilte Fear Cheann Loch Mùideart (PS 275).

Roderick Cannon (2009), rev. Barnaby Brown 2016