Isla Cameron (5 March 1927 – 3 April 1980) was a

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

-born, English-raised actress and singer.

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

noted that "Cameron was one of a quartet of key figures in England's postwar folk song revival – and to give a measure of her importance, the other three were

Ewan MacColl James Henry Miller (25 January 1915 – 22 October 1989), better known by his stage name Ewan MacColl, was a British folk singer-songwriter, folk song collector, labour activist and actor. Born in England to Scottish parents, he is known as o ...

A. L. Lloyd Albert Lancaster Lloyd (29 February 1908 – 29 September 1982),Eder, Bruce. (29 September 1982A. L. Lloyd – Music Biography, Credits and Discography AllMusic. Retrieved on 2013-02-24. usually known as A. L. Lloyd or Bert Lloyd, was an English ...

, and

Alan Lomax Alan Lomax (; January 31, 1915 – July 19, 2002) was an American ethnomusicologist, best known for his numerous field recordings of folk music during the 20th century. He was a musician, folklorist, archivist, writer, scholar, political activ ...

". She was a respected and popular folk music performer through the 1950s and early 60s as well as appearing in several films; she focused almost exclusively on her acting career from 1966 onwards. Cameron provided the singing voice for actress

Julie Christie Julie Frances Christie (born 14 April 1940) is a British actress. Christie's accolades include an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. She has appeared in six films ranked in the British Film Institu ...

's part in the hit 1967 film version of

Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Literary realism, Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry ...

's '' Far From the Madding Crowd'', but changed career direction and became a film researcher in the early 1970s before her early death in a domestic accident in 1980. One of the traditional songs in her repertoire, "

Blackwaterside "Down by Blackwaterside" (also known as "Blackwaterside", "Blackwater Side" and "Black Waterside"; see Roud 312, Laws O1 and Roud 564, Laws P18, Henry H811) is a traditional folk song, provenance and author unknown, although it is likely to have or ...

", recorded by Cameron in 1962, was subsequently popularised by notable "next generation" U.K. folk music performers

Anne Briggs Anne Patricia Briggs (born 29 September 1944) is an English folk singer. Although she travelled widely in the 1960s and early 1970s, appearing at folk clubs and venues in Britain and Ireland, she never aspired to commercial success or to achie ...

Bert Jansch Herbert Jansch (3 November 1943 – 5 October 2011) was a Scottish folk musician and founding member of the band Pentangle (band), Pentangle. He was born in Glasgow and came to prominence in London in the 1960s as an acoustic guitarist and ...

and

Sandy Denny Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as " guably the pre-eminent British folk-rock sin ...

Early life and experience

Isla Cameron was born in Blairgowrie, Scotland, but spent her childhood and teens in

Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne, or simply Newcastle ( , Received Pronunciation, RP: ), is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. It is England's northernmost metropolitan borough, located o ...

. Growing up on

Tyneside Tyneside is a List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, built-up area across the banks of the River Tyne, England, River Tyne in Northern England. The population of Tyneside as published in the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2011 census was 774,891 ...

, she learned some traditional children's songs and rhymes but always considered herself a revivalist rather than a traditional singer, selecting a range of songs to sing from wherever she found them to her liking.Cameron, Isla: liner notes to 1966 XTRA LP ''Isla Cameron'' In around 1945

Joan Littlewood Joan Maud Littlewood (6 October 1914 – 20 September 2002) was an English theatre director who trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and is best known for her work in developing the Theatre Workshop. She has been called "The Mother of M ...

, who had co-founded the

Theatre Workshop Theatre Workshop is a theatre group whose long-serving director was Joan Littlewood. Many actors of the 1950s and 1960s received their training and first exposure with the company, many of its productions were transferred to theatres in the West ...

with husband

, was performing with the Workshop in Newcastle and, impressed by the "absolutely pure voice" of Cameron, then in her late teens, invited her to join as lead singer-narrator for a production of a MacColl-authored ballad opera entitled "Johnny Noble", since the person previously in this role was leaving to get married. Cameron joined, and went on to perform with the Workshop for four years, including tours with different productions in England, Germany, Sweden, and Czechoslovakia.

Singing career

MacColl encouraged Cameron to pursue a singing career, one result of which was the issuing of a 78 rpm recording on

His Master's Voice His Master's Voice is an entertainment trademark featuring a dog named Nipper, curiously peering into the horn of a wind-up gramophone. Painted by Francis Barraud in 1898, the image has since become a global symbol used across consumer elect ...

in c. 1951, featuring Cameron singing an unaccompanied rendition of "

The Fair Flower of Northumberland "The Fair Flower of Northumberland" (Roudbr>25 Child 9) is a folk ballad. Synopsis A Scottish knight is imprisoned by the Earl of Northumberland (or another high official). The knight persuades the Earl's daughter, the titular fair flower, to ...

", noted in her obituary as "a daring innovation in those days". Additional unaccompanied performances released at that time comprise "The Turtle Dove" backed with "Lay The Bent to the Bonnie Broom", and "Died for Love" plus "The Queen's Maries" backed with "Queen Jane". She also appeared on tracks of her own on two joint Topic 78 releases in 1951 with MacColl, singing "Cannily, Cannily" on one release, and "The Firman iremans Not For Me" on the other. Cameron was also featured frequently on MacColl's radio series "Ballads and Blues". In 1951, the American folklorist

visited Britain to compile 2 volumes in a monumental Columbia LP series entitled "A World Library of Folk and Primitive Music", Cameron contributed three songs, "My Bonny Lad", "Brigg Fair" and "Died For Love" to Volume 3 of the series, released in 1955, and a fourth, "O Can Ye Sew Cushions?", to Volume 6, released the same year, which dealt with the music of Scotland. Lomax's recordings that include Cameron, both released and unreleased, are presently held in the Alan Lomax Archive at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

. Peter Kennedy produced a series of Sunday morning

BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927. The service provides national radio stations cove ...

programs in 1953 and 1954, called ''As I Roved Out''. Two of these were later issued on the Folktrax label, with Cameron singing three folk songs,

Seamus Ennis Seamus may refer to: * Séamus, a Gaelic male given name Film and television * Seamus (''Family Guy''), a character on the television series ''Family Guy'' * Seamus, a pigeon in '' Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore'' * Seamus McFly, a f ...

playing uilleann pipes and

tin whistle The tin whistle, also known as the penny whistle, is a simple six-holed woodwind instrument. It is a type of fipple flute, a class of instrument which also includes the recorder and Native American flute. A tin whistle player is called a whistl ...

, Ewan MacColl singing some songs and Ron and Bob Copper also singing. In 1956, she appeared in another radio program, ''Ballads and Blues: Sea Music''. Also in 1956, Cameron released a solo album of British folk songs, ''Through Bushes and Briars'', on the U.S.

Tradition A tradition is a system of beliefs or behaviors (folk custom) passed down within a group of people or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. A component of cultural expressions and folklore, common e ...

label run by

Patrick Clancy Patrick Michael Clancy (7 March 1922 – 11 November 1998), usually called Paddy Clancy or Pat Clancy, was an Irish folk singer best known as a member of the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem. In addition to singing and storytelling, Clancy play ...

The Clancy Brothers The Clancy Brothers were an influential Irish folk music group that developed initially as a part of the American folk music revival. Most popular during the 1960s, they were famed for their Aran jumpers and are widely credited with popularisi ...

. She appeared on the 1958 album ''Folksong Jubilee'' with Rory & Alex McEwen singing on 7 tracks (2 of them solo), and with Ewan MacColl on the 1958 Riverside (U.S.) album ''English and Scottish Love Songs'', performing on 8 tracks accompanied by the American performer

Ralph Rinzler Ralph Rinzler (July 20, 1934 – July 2, 1994) was an American mandolin player, folksinger, and the co-founder of the annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival on the Mall every summer in Washington, D.C., where he worked as a curator for American art, ...

on banjo and guitar; a number of the same tracks (with some additional ones from the same session) were shared with a 1958 Topic (U.K.) album entitled ''Still I Love Him''. Meanwhile, in 1957, a U.K. film company, Data Film Productions, had filmed Ewan MacColl, assisted by Cameron and others, singing a number of songs about coal mining for the National Coal Board, illustrating them with "little proto-pop-promos featuring local people in the relevant regions as their casts" (it is not clear how many feature Cameron). Under the name "Songs of the Coalfields", these were released as six separate stories in episodes of "Mining Review" (a monthly newsreel "magazine" for the coal industry and mining communities) and later (1964) combined as a single 16mm film, available in the

British Film Institute The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves filmmaking and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery to encourage film production, ...

archive. She also participated in the recording of three of Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger's " Radio Ballads", entitled ''The Ballad of John Axon'' (1959), ''Song of a Road'' (1959) and ''The Big Hewer'' (1961), later released on LP in 1965 and 1967 although ''Song of a Road'' was not issued until 1999. In 1960, "The Singers Club" opened in The Princess Louise public house in

Holborn Holborn ( or ), an area in central London, covers the south-eastern part of the London Borough of Camden and a part (St Andrew Holborn (parish), St Andrew Holborn Below the Bars) of the Wards of the City of London, Ward of Farringdon Without i ...

, London. It was run by MacColl and his new wife,

Peggy Seeger Margaret "Peggy" Seeger (born June 17, 1935) is an American Folk music, folk singer and songwriter. She has lived in Britain for more than 60 years and was married to the singer-songwriter Ewan MacColl until his death in 1989. She is a member ...

. Cameron became a resident at this

folk club A folk club is a regular event, permanent venue, or section of a venue devoted to folk music and traditional music. Folk clubs were primarily an urban phenomenon of 1960s and 1970s Great Britain and Ireland, and vital to the second British folk r ...

and continued to have a high profile as a singer, while at the same time, her film career was also taking off. With fellow Tyneside artist

Louis Killen Louisa "Lou" Jo Killen (born Louis Killen; 10 January 1934 – 9 August 2013) was an English folk singer from Gateshead, Tyneside, who also played the English concertina. Killen formed one of Britain's first folk clubs in 1958 in Newcastle upo ...

, Cameron released a 1961 album entitled ''The Waters of Tyne: Northumbrian Songs and Ballads'', and in 1962, an album with Tony Britton entitled ''Songs of Love, Lust and Loose Living''. Also in 1962, Cameron contributed 6 songs to a Folkways (U.S.) release entitled ''The Jupiter Book of Ballads'', performing "Lord Randall", "The Dowie Dens of Yarrow", "Mary Hamilton" (with John Laurie), "Blackwaterside", "High Barbaree", and "The House of the Rising Sun". That same year, her own full-length album was released in the U.S. on Prestige International, entitled ''The Best of Isla Cameron'', with guitar, banjo and autoharp accompaniment provided by

. The following year Peter Kennedy recorded her singing with accompaniment by Jack Armstrong on

Northumbrian pipes The Northumbrian smallpipes (also known as the Northumbrian pipes) are bellows-blown bagpipes from Northeastern England, where they have been an important factor in the local musical culture for more than 250 years. The family of the Duke of ...

, for an album ''Northumbrian Minstrelsy'' (shared with Bob Davenport and the Rakes) on which she performed 6 songs. In 1963–1964, she was regularly featured in Rory McEwen's Blues and Folk music programme on ABC regional television entitled "Hullabaloo". In 1965, Cameron was one of several performers who took part in "Hallelujah!", a Sunday evening TV series devised by Sydney Carter and featuring Carter himself, Cameron, Nadia Cattouse, the Johnny Scott Trio and Martin Carthy; an album featuring selections from the series was issued on Fontana in 1966, featuring Cameron on lead vocal on six selections and joining with the remaining cast on two more. In 1966 she released another full-length album, entitled simply ''Isla Cameron'', on XTRA records, this time accompanied by

Martin Carthy Martin Dominic Forbes Carthy MBE (born 21 May 1941) is an English singer and guitarist who has remained one of the most influential figures in English folk music, inspiring contemporaries such as Bob Dylan and Paul Simon, as well as later ar ...

on guitar on 6 of the 12 tracks, the others being performed unaccompanied. On this record she sang songs by

Bob Dylan Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan; born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Described as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture over his nearly 70-year ...

and

Bertold Brecht Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known as Bertolt Brecht and Bert Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a ...

, in addition to traditional numbers. By this time, Cameron, now in her late-30s, was an established and well regarded performer on the U.K. folk music scene, one of her featured songs "Blackwaterside" being influential on the emerging next generation of younger performers such as

and

, all of whom subsequently recorded versions of it. However following the release of her 1966 self-titled album, Cameron decided to concentrate more on her acting career, and also film roles.

Acting career

In 1959, Cameron appeared, uncredited, in the film '' Room at the Top''. Her most memorable cinematic moment was in 1961 in the spooky

thriller Thriller may refer to: * Thriller (genre), a broad genre of literature, film and television ** Thriller film, a film genre under the general thriller genre Comics * ''Thriller'' (DC Comics), a comic book series published 1983–84 by DC Comics i ...

'' The Innocents'', where she imitated a child's voice and sang "Oh, Willow Waly". The composer

Georges Auric Georges Auric (; 15 February 1899 – 23 July 1983) was a French composer, born in Lodève, Hérault, France. He was considered one of ''Les Six'', a group of artists informally associated with Jean Cocteau and Erik Satie. Before he turned 20 h ...

incorporated her singing into the orchestral soundtrack. Another horror film, ''

Nightmare A nightmare, also known as a bad dream, Retrieved 11 July 2016. is an unpleasant dream that can cause a strong emotional response from the mind, typically fear but also despair, anxiety, disgust or sadness. The dream may contain situations o ...

'', followed in 1964. She acted in the 1967 version of '' Far From the Madding Crowd'' but her contribution was left on the

cutting room floor A deleted scene is footage that has been removed from the final version of a film or television show. There are various reasons why these scenes are deleted, which include time constraints, relevance, quality or a dropped story thread, and can als ...

. However, her voice appeared on the soundtrack album, singing "Bushes and Briars" (

mimed in the film) and "The Bold Grenadier".

Trevor Lucas Trevor George Lucas (25 December 1943 – 4 February 1989) was an Australian folk singer, a member of Fairport Convention and one of the founders of Fotheringay. He mainly worked as a singer-songwriter and guitarist but also produced many album ...

, later to become the husband of

also sang on the album, and

Dave Swarbrick David Cyril Eric Swarbrick (5 April 1941 – 3 June 2016) was an English traditional folk musician and songwriter and one of the greatest fiddlers in the world. He was one of the most highly regarded musicians produced by the second Bri ...

played on some of the tunes. Her most prominent acting role was as the stern librarian Miss McKenzie in the 1969 version of '' The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie'', where she could use her

Scottish accent Scottish English is the set of varieties of the English language spoken in Scotland. The transregional, standardised variety is called Scottish Standard English or Standard Scottish English (SSE). Scottish Standard English may be defined ...

to advantage.

Later life and death

In 1971, a boyfriend of Cameron's was killed in a car crash and she retreated for some time to live in Yorkshire. In 1972 she returned to London and started to work as a film researcher, moving into a flat in

Pimlico Pimlico () is a district in Central London, in the City of Westminster, built as a southern extension to neighbouring Belgravia. It is known for its garden squares and distinctive Regency architecture. Pimlico is demarcated to the north by Lon ...

and virtually retiring from singing. She died in her home on 3 April 1980, having apparently choked to death while eating. An obituary in a 1981 issue of ''

Folk Music Journal The English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS, or pronounced 'EFF-diss') is an organisation that promotes English folk music and folk dance. EFDSS was formed in 1932 when two organisations merged: the Folk-Song Society and the English Folk Dan ...

'' stated that she "died after mis-swallowing some food."

Discography

Solo 78 releases

* 1951?: "The Fair Flower of Northumberland"/?? HMV ntraced, possibly erroneous citation in published work* 1951: "The Turtle Dove"/"Lay The Bent to the Bonnie Broom" HMV (10") B.10110 * 1951: "Died for Love" plus "The Queen's Maries"/"Queen Jane" HMV (10") B.10111

78 releases with Ewan MacColl

* 1951: "Cannily, Cannily" (Isla Cameron) / "

Poor Paddy Works on the Railway "Poor Paddy Works on the Railway" is a popular Folk music of Ireland, Irish folk and American folk music, American folk song (Roud Folk Song Index, Roud 208). Historically, it was often sung as a sea shanty. The song portrays an Irish worker work ...

" (Ewan MacColl) / Topic TRC 50 * 1951: "Moses on the Mail" (Ewan MacColl) / "The Firman iremans Not For Me" (Isla Cameron) Topic TRC 51 (Isla Cameron's 2 tracks were later included in Topic's first LP release, "Ewan MacColl with Isla Cameron & The Topic Singers")

Solo albums

* 1956: ''Through Bushes and Briars and Other Songs of the British Isles''

TLP 1001 * 1962: ''The Best of Isla Cameron'' Prestige International INT 13042 * 1964: ''Lost Love'' (EP, 5 tracks) Transatlantic TRA EP 109 (tracks come from the 1962 LP "Songs of Love, Lust and Loose Living" with Tony Britton (TRA 105)) * 1966: ''Isla Cameron'' Transatlantic XTRA 1040

Peggy Seeger, Isla Cameron and Guy Carawan

* 1957: ''Peggy Seeger presents Origins of Skiffle'' (EP, four tracks) Pye Jazz NJE 1043

Rory and Alex McEwen and Isla Cameron

* 1958: ''Folksong Jubilee'' HMV CLP 1220

Ewan MacColl and Isla Cameron

* 1958: ''English and Scottish Love Songs'' Riverside RLP 12-656 * 1958: (as Isla Cameron and Ewan MacColl): ''Still I Love Him'' Topic Records 10T50 (many tracks duplicated with the above album, some with altered titles) * 1957/1964: ''Songs of the Coalfields'' Data Film Productions (6 short films, re-released as single combined version in 1964)

Various artists (1960)

* Various artists, 1960: ''Field Trip – England'' Folkways FW08871. Isla Cameron sings "Johnny Todd" (with Ewan MacColl) and "Bushes and Briars". The notes say "Collected by Jean Ritchie & George Pickow".

Isla Cameron and Louis Killen

* 1961: ''The Waters of Tyne'' Prestige International INT 13059

Isla Cameron and Tony Britton

* 1962: ''Songs of Love, Lust and Loose Living'' Transatlantic TRA 105; also issued as Transatlantic XTRA 1042, 1966

Various artists (Isla Cameron, Jill Balcon, Pauline Letts, John Laurie plus others

* 1962: ''The Jupiter Book of Ballads'' Folkways FL 9890

Isla Cameron, Bob Davenport, Jack Armstrong & The Rakes

* 1964: ''Northumbrian Minstrelsy Concert Hall'' AM 2339

With Ewan MacColl and others

* Various artists, 1956: ''Ballads & Blues – Sea Music'' Folktrax Cassette CASS-0376 (singers are Cy Grant, A.L. Lloyd, Isla Cameron, Ewan McColl) – a radio recording of MacColl's Ballads and Blues series 1953 episode "The Singing Sailormen", RPL radio, produced by Denis Mitchell. Cameron sings "Lowlands (Away)" and "My Bonny Lad". * Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger, 1965: ''The Ballad of John Axon'' Argo RG 474 (singers are Ewan MacColl, A.L. Lloyd, Isla Cameron, Fitzroy Coleman, Stan Kelly, Dick Loveless, Charles Mayo, Colin Dunn & Dominic Behan) (originally broadcast 1959) * Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger, 1967: ''The Big Hewer'' Argo RG 538 (singers are Isla Cameron, Ian Campbell, Joe Higgins, Louis Killen, A.L. Lloyd, Ewan MacColl) (originally broadcast 1961) * Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger, 1999: ''Song of a Road'' Topic TSCD802 (singers are Isla Cameron, John Clarence, Séamus Ennis, Louis Killen, A.L. Lloyd, Ewan MacColl, Jimmy Macgregor, Francis McPeake, Isabel Sutherland, Cyril Tawney, William V. Thomas) (originally broadcast 1959)

With Sydney Carter, Martin Carthy, and others

* Isla Cameron, Sydney Carter, Martin Carthy and Nadia Cattouse with the Johnny Scott Trio, 1966: ''Songs from ABC Television's "Hallelujah"'' Fontana TL5356. Isla Cameron sings "Two Brothers", Bertolt Brecht's "Wife of the Soldier", Tom Paxton's "Goodman, Schwerner And Chaney", "Gift to be Simple", "Whistle Daughter Whistle", "Johnny Has Gone for a Soldier", and joins the entire cast on "Shalom" and "Last Night I Had The Strangest Dream". In 2009, "The Firman iremans Not For Me" from the second Topic 78 release was included in

Topic Records Topic Records is a British folk music label, which played a major role in the second British folk revival. It began as an offshoot of the Workers' Music Association in 1939, making it the oldest independent record label in the world.M. Brocken ...

70 year anniversary boxed set ''

Three Score and Ten ''Three Score and Ten: A Voice to the People'' is a multi-CD box set album issued by Topic Records in 2009 to celebrate 70 years as an independent British record label. The album consists of a hardback book containing the seven CDs and a pa ...

'' as track fifteen on the fourth CD.

Film soundtracks

* 1961 (?1962): Isla Cameron and The Raymonde Singers: ''Just A Wearyin' For You'' / '' O Willow Waly'' (Theme from "The Innocents") (7" single) * 1967: Richard Rodney Bennett: ''Far from the Madding Crowd Original Motion Picture Soundtrack'' MGM C-8053/CS-8053 (Isla Cameron sings "Bushes and Briars" and "The Bold Grenadier")

Anthologies

* 1956: ''Ewan MacColl with Isla Cameron & The Topic Singers'' Topic TRL1 (includes Isla Cameron's 2 early Topic 78 tracks) * 1964: ''Folk Songs: Topic Sampler 1'' * 1967: ''The Best of Scottish Folk Music'' * 1968: ''100 Folk Songs and New Songs'' * 2000: ''The Best of Scottish Folk''

Notes

References

External links

*
Isla Cameron
at discogs.com

at "Mainly Norfolk" website * Details o
Isla Cameron 78 releases
at www.45worlds.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Cameron, Isla 1930 births 1980 deaths People from Blairgowrie and Rattray 20th-century Scottish women singers Scottish film actresses Tradition Records artists 20th-century Scottish actresses Actresses from Newcastle upon Tyne Actresses from Perth and Kinross