Song 24:365 is The Dark Island, the second song of my Scottish trilogy this week in honour of our national poet, Robert Burns. I’ve had quite a revelation tonight as I’ve been looking into the history of this song as I had expected it to be a traditional Scottish song. It seems, however, that the song was written for a 1963 BBC film of the same name which was shot in South Uist and tells the tale of a mysterious torpedo found on the shores of Benbecula. The tune was originally called Doctor Mackay’s Farewell to Creagorry, and the most well-known words were written by lyricist David Silver.

I should also mention that this recording features my accordion – for which I should probably apologise!

There’s lots more Scottish music in my collection and to find out why I’m playing a song a day, click here.