Jimmy Shand

James Shand was born in East Wemyss in Fife, Scotland, son of a farm ploughman turned coal miner and one of nine children.{{Cite web|url=http://www.theguardian.com/news/2000/dec/27/guardianobituaries2|title=Obituary: Sir Jimmy Shand|date=27 December 2000|website=the Guardian}} 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 into 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 Shand and a friend were admiring the instruments in the window of a music shop in Dundee. His friend said: "It wouldn't cost you to try one," so Shand walked in and strapped on an accordion.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}} The owner, Charles Forbes, heard Shand play 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.

Being a keen motorcyclist, Shand was also an enthusiastic supporter and spectator at the annual Isle of Man TT races. He also sponsored a motorcycle road racer from Errol, Perthshire called Jack Gow, a multiple Scottish Motorcycle Racing champion and later a motorcycle dealer in Dundee. Jack Gow was the son of Andy Gow who drove the bus which transported the Shand tour. Shand's interest in motorcycles began when a boyfriend of his sister had problems with his bike, which had broken down. Shand repaired it and was allowed to use it.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}}

He failed an audition for the BBC because he kept time with his foot. At a time when gramophones were very much luxury items he made two records for the Regal Zonophone label in 1933. His career took off when he switched to making 78s for the Beltona label (1935–1940). Most of the Beltona recordings were solo, but he experimented with small bands. This boosted sales. He appeared in a promo film shown in cinemas. While the image showed his fingers moving in a blur, Shand was disappointed to hear the sound track playing a slow air. He was prevented from joining the RAF by a digestive disorder, and spent the war years in the Fire Service. On New Year's Day morning in 1945 he made his first broadcast with "Jimmy Shand and his Band". This was the first of many such BBC radio and television appearances.

Soon after the war he became a full-time musician, and adopted a punishing life-style later adopted by rock bands.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}} He would play Inverness one night, London the next night and still drive the van back to bed in Dundee.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}} He took his trademark bald head, Buddy Holly spectacles and full kilted regalia, Scottish reels, jigs and strathspeys to Australia, New Zealand and North America, including Carnegie Hall in New York.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}} Now on the EMI/ Parlophone label, he released one single per month in the mid 1950s, including his only top 20 hit in the UK Singles Chart – "The Bluebell Polka" (1955).{{cite book

| first= David

| last= Roberts

| year= 2006

| title= British Hit Singles & Albums

| edition= 19th

| publisher= Guinness World Records Limited

| location= London

| isbn= 1-904994-10-5

| page= 493}} It was produced by George Martin. He was awarded an MBE in 1962. This period is remembered affectionately by Richard Thompson, who played Shand tunes on his Henry the Human Fly and Strict Tempo! albums. Thompson's Scottish father had been a keen Shand collector.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}} In 1991, Thompson paid tribute to Shand with an original song, "Don't Sit on My Jimmy Shands", from his 1991 album Rumor and Sigh.{{cite web |url=https://www.allmusic.com/album/rumor-and-sigh-mw0000263404 |title=Rumor and Sigh – Richard Thompson |publisher=AllMusic |access-date=27 November 2024 |last=Deming |first=Mark}}

{{Quote box |width=300px |align=right |quoted=true |bgcolor=#FFFFF0 |salign=right

|quote =

Call me precious I don't mind

78s are hard to find

You just can't get the shellac since the war

This one's the Beltona brand

Finest label in the land

They don't make them like that any more.

|source = from "Don't Sit on My Jimmy Shands" by Richard Thompson}}

In 1972, Shand went into semi-retirement. From then he played only small venues in out-of-the-way places for a reduced fee. He was made a freeman of Auchtermuchty in 1974, North East Fife in 1980 and Fife in 1998. He became Sir Jimmy Shand in 1999. His portrait is in the Scottish National Gallery, close to Niel Gow. In 1983, he released a retrospective album with the cheeky title The First 50 Years. At the age of 88, he recorded an album and video with his son, Dancing with the Shands.

More than 330 compositions are credited to Jimmy Shand. He recorded more tracks than the Beatles and Elvis Presley combined.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}} In 1985, British Rail named a locomotive Jimmy Shand. He was dissatisfied with the chromatic button-key accordions available on the market in the 1940s so he designed his own one. The Hohner company manufactured the "Shand Morino" until the 1970s. He is the only artist worldwide to have his name used by the Hohner company as a model name for a musical instrument.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}} There is a biography The Jimmy Shand Story: The King of Scottish Dance Music by Ian Cameron (2001). A number of his older recordings have been re-released by Beltona Records.

Since the 1950s the crowd at Dunfermline Athletic F.C. have left the ground after the game to the sound of Shand's "The Bluebell Polka".{{Cite web|url=https://www.dunfermlinepress.com/news/17812774.former-voice-east-end-park-dies-88/|title = Former 'voice of East End Park' dies at 88| date=2 August 2019 }}{{Cite web|url=https://www.masonrytoday.com/index.php?new_month=1&new_day=28&new_year=2016|title = Today in Masonic History - James "Jimmy" Shand is Born}}

{{Reflist}}

{{refbegin}}

• Howard, Rob (2003) An A to Z of the Accordion and related instruments Stockport:Robaccord Publications {{ISBN|0-9546711-0-4}}, p. 98

{{refend}}

• Music video {{YouTube|9I320RBBT34|"Bluebell Polka"}}
• {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20070515042238/http://www.beltona.co.uk/jimmy-shand-c-75.html The Beltona Record Company – Jimmy Shand]}} unavailable 6 July 2022{{dl|date=March 2025}}
• [http://www.jimmyshand.com Official website]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shand, Jimmy}}

Category:1908 births

Category:2000 deaths

Category:People from Auchtermuchty

Category:People associated with Dundee

Category:Scottish accordionists

Category:Knights Bachelor

Category:Musicians awarded knighthoods

Category:Members of the Order of the British Empire

Category:Parlophone artists

Category:Scottish miners

Category:20th-century Scottish male musicians

Category:20th-century accordionists