Early Life
James Shand was born in East Wemyss in Fife, son of a farm ploughman turned miner and one of nine children. The family soon moved to the burgh of Auchtermuchty. The town now boasts a larger than life-sized sculpture of Shand. His father was a skilled melodeon player. Jimmy started with the mouth organ and soon played the fiddle. At the age of 14 he had to leave school and go down the mines. He played at social events and competitions. His enthusiasm for motor-bikes turned to an advantage when he played for events all round Fife. In 1926 he did benefit gigs for striking miners and was consequently prevented from returning to colliery work. One day Jimmy and a friend were admiring the instruments in the window of Forbes' Music Shop in Dundee. His friend said "It wouldn't cost you to try one". Jimmy walked in and strapped on an accordion. The owner, Charles Forbes, heard Jimmy and immediately offered him a job as travelling salesman and debt-collector. He soon acquired a van and drove all over the north of Scotland. He switched to the British chromatic button accordion, an instrument he stuck with for the rest of his life.
Read more about this topic: Jimmy Shand
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or life:
“O troubled forms, O early love unfortunate and hard,
Time has estranged you into a jewel cold and pure;”
—Edna St. Vincent Millay (18921950)
“Winter lies too long in country towns; hangs on until it is stale and shabby, old and sullen. On the farm the weather was the great fact, and mens affairs went on underneath it, as the streams creep under the ice. But in Black Hawk the scene of human life was spread out shrunken and pinched, frozen down to the bare stalk.”
—Willa Cather (18731947)