Description

Niel Gow’s Lament for the Death of his Second Wife

Niel Gow’s marriage to Margaret Urquhart of Perth is said to have been a particularly happy one. Judging from the grief at the core of this lament, he must have been utterly devastated by her death in 1805. It is a magnificent composition for the fiddle and a fabulous exploration of the instrument’s sonority. No wonder then, that it is one of his most popular tunes and widely regarded as one of the finest slow airs ever written for the fiddle.