Annette Selwyn is currently vice captain of Larbert High School. A talented musician, she is a member of the traditional music group at the school and winner of the Amnesty Youth Award for songwriting and performance. For this project Selwyn arranged James Hogg’s ‘Bird of the Wilderness’ and oversaw the performance and recording of this arrangement.

When I was first asked to arrange the piece I thought it would be an interesting challenge. I had the piano part first which was relatively straightforward, the difficulty came in adding the violin and the cello. I wanted to develop a counter melody with the cello as I feel the instrument deserved to feature prominently instead of simply providing a baseline. My arrangement is a little melancholic as the wilderness strikes me as being a lonely place yet by contrast birdsong can be uplifting. I hope this piece honours the original work by James Hogg and I hope this music can be enjoyed by visitors to the exhibition.