Nicola Benedetti, violinist:
The fiddle is one of the three national instruments of Scotland, so it is fitting that the violin is closely associated with our national poet. Burns was a capable fiddler himself and would often play when he frequented the Bachelors Club, which he founded, in Tarbolton, South Ayrshire. It was there that he met David Sillar, one year younger than him, and like, Burns the son of a small farmer. The two men became firm friends. Sillar was the recipient of two verse-epistles from Burns. "The Second Epistle to Davie" is a heartfelt testament to their close friendship in which Burns pays tribute to Sillar's talents as a fiddle player and poet. In truth, although he published a set of poems in 1789, he was no great poet but, by all accounts, Sillar was a better fiddler than Burns! From the end of 1783 Davie Sillar lived in Irvine, north Ayrshire, where I myself was born earning his living first as a grocer and then as a schoolmaster. He was an Irvine Councillor and eventually a Baillie and died in Irvine - much respected - in 1830.
