Jill Craig

Wed, May 7th 2025 at 12:40 am - 2:00 pm

Jill is an inspiration in her field of music

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Jill runs many musical events and has inspired Unversity students with her teaching over many years.

She has also inspired many less talented children and general members of the public to get involved in choirs and orchestras.

Jill's enthusium and inspiration as a member of our Rotary Club has been invaluable over many years.

The speaker was Club member Gillian Craig presenting the lives and music of ‘Three composers with local connections’. The featured composers were Francis George Scott, James Oswald and Thomas Erskine. FG Scott (1880-1958), whose 1933 portrait by William Johnstone hangs in the Scottish Portrait Gallery, studied in Paris with Jean-Roger Ducasse and later became one of the 'Scottish Renaissance' group prominent in the first half of the 20th century. His son, George and daughter Lilias lived in St Andrews, and his grandson, David, lives locally and is a member of our Club. James Oswald (1710-1769) was a composer, cellist and dancing master born in Crail. He moved to Dunfermline and then to London where he set up in music publishing and became Chamber Composer to George III. His most remarkable works are the ‘Caledonian Pocket Companion’ which was hugely popular with the London public, and two sets of ‘Airs for the Seasons’ each named for a different flower in its appropriate season and having a recognisable ‘Scottish’ feel as did most of his music. Thomas Alexander Erskine (1732-1781), 6th Earl of Kellie and Lord Pittenweem, was an aristocrat and musician, a composer and violinist. He travelled to Mannheim as a young man and studied with Johann Stamitz, then returned to Scotland after his father’s death. A friend of James Boswell and nicknamed ‘Fiddler Tam’, he is now recognised as one of the most important British composers of the 18th century. He is also notorious for his dissolute life-style. Frank Quinault gave the vote of thanks.