Peter Andrew Hall 1936 - 1996

[Dick Glasgow]

Peter Andrew Hall 1936 - 1996

Peter opened this treasurehouse, reading widely and collecting from tramps and travellers, farmworkers and northeast folk. In 1962 he was a founder member of the Aberdeen Folk Song Club, and went on to establish a group to perform the rich northeast material in 1967. The final line-up of the Gaugers (Peter Hall, Tom Spiers and Arthur Watson), issued Topic's Beware of the Aberdonian in 1976, and were completing an important series of commercial recordings for Aberdeen City Library at the time of his death

Peter Andrew Hall, 1936-1996

Possibly Scotland’s most enduring traditional folk song group, 'The Gaugers' first performed together in 1964. One of their earliest gigs was at Aberdeen folk club where they were bluntly introduced as follows,

‘They’re nae a’body’s cup o’ tea – but ye might like them – The Gaugers’!!

MP3 ~ Peter on Baritone Concertina & Vocals ~ Beware of the Aberdonian

The Gaugers ~ Beware of the Aberdonian

The Gaugers By Steve McGrail
Published in The Living Tradition

The new group had no leader as such, but Peter's influence was enormous due to his own work on field recordings and particularly his knowledge of the Greig / Duncan collection. Tom recalls "he was so well known at Kings College library in the 60s, that he had permission to take the original manuscripts home. He carried them in the front basket of an old delivery bike".

Tradition Bearers ~ The Gaugers

After MacColl, another of the building blocks of the 1960s folk revival were the Aberdeen group, The Gaugers. Song was the heart of this group – Tam Speirs, Arthur Watson and Peter Hall were all good singers – though they were also innovative in using instrumentation (fiddle, concertina and whistle) without a guitar or other rhythm instrument to tie the sound together.

Folk song & the club scene

The Fighting Scot ~ The Gaugers

Awa wi the Rovin Sailor by Gaugers