ABSTRACT
A history of Scottish music has to deal with one more problems: most surveys are devoted to the traditional or folk music, leaving little room for the discussion of ‘art music’. With the words, Henry George Farmer, in his History of Music in Scotland, states his deep disapproval of the time of the ‘Relapse’, when, ‘apart from the lack of specialized teaching in this country, both Scotland and England were positive slaves in what Fuller-Maitland called the “foreign domination’”. One can hardly wish for a clearer example to demonstrate how much Johann Rupprecht Durrner had by then, six years after his arrival in Edinburgh, become an integral part of musical life in the Scottish capital. For the German public, he supplied the arrangements with extensive dynamic indications and exact metronome markings to ensure an authentic performance, crucial in rendering Scottish songs.
