Clean hands pure heart

About this book

A major commission for Tramway, Graham Fagen's new work further explores one of the artist's main themes - the creation and disconnection between a personal and national, historical and contemporary identity. 'At school we were taught what was our cultural heritage. We learned Burns off by heart and recited it back to our class. Outside school, however, the music I was listening to - Jamaican reggae - was, in a sense, the cultural antithesis of my heritage but it made more sense to me'. Working with acclaimed music producer Adrian Sherwood, two Burns songs - 'Auld Lang Syne' and 'The Slave's Lament' were combined, arranged and produced by Fagen, Adrian Sherwood and Skip MacDonald and performed by Ghetto Priest, The publication shows how this new work further develops Graham Fagen's main themes and places them in a wider context. Includes a poem 'Shuggar Heid' by James Robertson, whose latest book Joseph Knight is about the last black slave in Scotland, Scotland's relationship with Jamaica and the Empire.