About this tune

Flowers of Edinburgh has been in circulation in Scotland since at least the mid-18th century, and was in all likelihood carried across to PEI by the first waves of Scottish settlers. Local interest in the tune was then refreshed by later waves of immigration, as in this instance cited by Leonard McDonald, whose forbears came from Ireland.

My mother and father didn't play. But a lot of these tunes, the first tune I played there was my mother's favorite tune, it was The Flowers of Edinburgh. When we'd be kids sit​ting on her knee she'd jig [sing] these tunes to us and that's where we learned them. And those tunes came right from the old country.

Listeners who are familiar with this tune should take note of how Island fiddlers have subtly altered the melody to allow for the insertion of lively bowing accents. Of particular note in this: the versions of Stephen Toole, Dennis Pitre, and Elliott Wight.

Notation for this tune as played by Elliott Wight is in Fiddle Music of Prince Edward Island.