Matt Armour

Matt passed away, after a short illness, on 9th February, 2009 at the age of 73.
"I first sang in Matt's club some 35 years ago. Sharing the same roots of Scotland's North East fisherfolk gave us an extra close affinity through music. He was a leader - looked up to and needed by so many; decisive, strong, fair and tremendously kind. A rare man in today's society. I have much to be grateful to him for. He was my friend"
Isla St Clair
Here are some extracts from Matt's sister Magi's tribute to her brother, 'Maxie':-
"He was a very happy-go-lucky boy: big for his age and, as his muscles grew, he developed very, very strong. In his mid-teens he was champion shot-put of the whole of the Scottish schools. Nobody messed with him. In all honesty, I don’t think that anyone has ever wanted to mess with him. He was just … too good natured".
"As I speak, the names will vary quite a lot because of course he was Matthew, and to many of you here he was Matt. To me, he was always Maxie - and he always called me Magi".
"Our father was born in the Orkney Islands and the song, “The Hills of Caithness” was for him. We used to spend a lot of time up there in later years, but when my father was just sixteen - he was like Matthew, he was very big for his age - they had a terrible practice there at the beginning of the First World War. If they thought you should be fighting the trenches, the ladies of the town would give you a white feather for cowardice. The third time my father was given this white feather he ran away to join the army. He was still sixteen and soon he was in the trenches - in the “black Flanders mud”.
"Times have changed, of course, and the fish went further and further away: the boats had to go away for longer, in terrible conditions. The sons went to University, and then the policies and the quotas did the rest. But then there would be another sound in Anstruther; there would be the claxton sound for the lifeboat. That stopped everything; that galvanised the whole town. The builder would put down his tools, the baker would throw down his knife – and they ran. Cars would slow down, even turn round, and the lifeboat men would jump on the running boards to get back down to the harbour for the launching of the boat. We all went there as well - everybody went there as well. There was always some man ready to step forward at the last minute to make up the crew. They’d pull on these thick fishermens' jerseys and the big, heavy southwesters and the oilskins and they set off with cheering from us all into the terrible, stormy seas. More heroes for a young boy".
"And so - to the music. All the places, all the friendships, all the pubs. The Shoulder Of Mutton, Little Horwood, Whittlebury, The Stables at Wavendon, The Vaults, The Song Loft, The Gaberlunzies’ ceilidhs, Stony Stratford and its festival – who am I to be giving you a list? You know far better than I do the music scene. Haven’t mentioned half and, with the internet, you already know as much as I know about these things. They’re certainly not all there and they’re certainly not in the right order. You remember".
"We celebrated some months ago and he sang two songs for me. “They say that I’m feeble and old, Magi. My steps are less sprightly than then. My face is a well written page, Magi. And time alone the pen. And now we are aged and grey, Magi. And the trials of life may be done. Let’s sing of the days of the past, Magi. When you and I were young”. I did wonder then if perhaps he’d forgiven me for the earlier bullying. Oh, and his other song was about whisky!".
“The folk world was his world, his kind of world. He loved the informality; he loved the welcome; he loved the voices all joining in; the songs of yesterday, today and tomorrow; oh, and the beer”!
“They say you can never forget someone you care for: they come knocking at the door of your memory, whether you invite them or not. Oh, I can see him alright: glass in hand, smiling. But it’s his voice I hear, his deep, gravelly, smoker’s voice and it’s singing, “And I’m glad that I have known you since the time when I was young. The stories that we’ve shared and the countless songs we’ve sung. And if one day I’m missing here, as missing I shall be. Raise your glass and sing an old, old song for me”.
“Raise your glass and sing an old, old song for me”.
Here are a couple of videos filmed by Nick Gordon. They are both taken at Sunday Lunchtime Sessions (Matt called them Workshops) in The Vaults Bar, Stony Stratford - the session Matt ran religiously every Sunday for 30 years. It is supposedly the longest continuously running folk session in the UK. The first video is of a typical grand finale, probably during Stony Live, the Summer festival he co-founded and organised. The second was filmed the Sunday after Matt died and the soundtrack is Matt singing his own song, 'A Wee Session', a great favourite. The closing shot is of myself (Roddy Clenaghan), and his daughter Jane singing that same song.
I found this video on YouTube. It is Ed Miller singing Matt's Song, 'The Isle Of May'. Ed, along with many others, has also recorded Matt's 'Generations Of Change'.