A silence falls in Scottish cultural circles with the death of Owen Hand at the age of 64. He was not only, in his own words, ''a wandering minstrel'', he was also the most astute commentator on the ''fusion of minds'' that he hoped would be central to ''a real Scotland''. That he became disenchanted does not mean he lost his enthusiasm and clear vision. Sadly, ill health over the past decade removed him from cosmopolitan affairs.

Born near Edinburgh, he was the youngest of five children. He left school when he was 13, after his mother's death. He went down the mines, a move that was to inform his lifetime socialism. After this he took to the seas. From the near two years he worked on the whalers emerged a poignant awareness of man's vulnerability in relation to nature. This is wonderfully evoked in his internationally recorded song, My Donald.

Thanks to his friendship with the Irish musician, Al O'Donnell, I came to know him in 1970 and so watched this amiable giant move from respected musician to feted presence both in the London folk-club circuit and the not-so-quiet snugs of Edinburgh pubs. When I first lived in Edinburgh's Stockbridge area, he was a neighbour.

After marine life came National Service where, maybe due to services to the oral tradition, he was in the Royal Army Dental Corps. Improbably, I discovered the gentleman I knew was also a formidable boxer. In the Army he learned to play the guitar. His natural singing talent had found a complementary mate. During the 1960s he pressed - tomy knowledge - at least two albums for Transatlantic Records: Something New (1965) and I Love A Lass (1966). He also built up a formidable repertoire of songs and ballads from across Scotland, Ireland, America, Spain, and Cuba.

Though convivial, he was uneasy with the commercial world of recording. In the 1960s, with his first marriage dissolving, he went to Israel. His companion in a Kibbutz for six months was Ruth Dunlop. They were married in 1968. They returned to Scotland, settling in the New Town area of Edinburgh where they ran a bric-a-brac shop, Worldly Goods, which was succeeded by the specialist dress/uniform retailer, Hand In Hand. The

latter, guarded by a three-

legged, one-eyed dog, became an invaluable source for theatrical companies from all over

the world.

Musically he was in demand as a ''session man'' and self-

proclaimed ''echo-chamber''. A notable contribution was his duet with Hamish Henderson in the latter's Farewell to Sicily. Allegedly accompanying them on the 1977 Claddagh Records album Freedom Come All Ye were the Whistlebinkies. Versions of how this recording was liquidly assembled have become legendary. Suffice to say that both singers and the song left their more sober companions a long distance behind before the final notes broke silence.

In the late-1980s Owen became a mature student under the benign guidance of Hamish in Edinburgh University's School of Scottish Studies. In 1993, despite early signs of cardiac trouble, he graduated with MA Honours in Scottish Ethnology. His thesis dealt with the politics behind the songs in folk music during the 1950s and 1960s. Though found ''sound of mind'', he was diagnosed ''weak of heart'' as he told this writer in the mid-1990s. In 1997 he had a heart transplant. Ruth and he sold up the shop and moved to the country, near Coldstream. Rare meetings, too often at mutual friends' funerals, gave evidence to his will to ''live full and love wisely''. Attributes he abundantly embraced, assimilated and epitomised.

He is survived by Denise, daughter of his marriage to Myra Holland, his beloved Ruth, and their children, two sons, Seth and Ojay.

Owen hand, musician,

folk-music historian; born December 28, 1938, died February 16, 2003.