ROBBIE Shepherd MBE, who has died at the age of 87, was renowned for his wonderfully distinctive Doric accent, but he believed that his broadcasting success was down to the fact that he did not compete with his guest bands on his much-loved BBC Radio Scotland show, Take the Floor.
"There's no ego involved for me because I'm not a threat", he told the Sunday Herald in December 2000, on the eve of his 20th year as host of the Scottish dance programme. "I'm not a musician. All I want to do is present the dance bands in the best possible light". Which is exactly what he did, year after year, for 35 years.
Like many others before and since, the newspaper praised Shepherd for playing a crucial part in keeping the Scottish music flame alive, adding that, like his good friend Jimmy Shand, who had recently died at the age of 92, Shepherd was modest and gently self-mocking.
"His Saturday evening show at 6.30pm is warm and couthy", the Sunday Herald continued, "a homely glimpse of the other Scotland which still exists beyond the earshot of the self-consciously cool young city folks who prefer the ephemera of Moby and Eminem".
Shepherd's programme was a captivating blend of button and piano accordion, toe-tapping fiddle and drums. While it had a kailyard north-east of Scotland style but it knew how to appeal to its target audience and was among the best on the whole network. Shepherd himself received fan mail from Ireland, Scandinavia and the US, where recording of his programmes were highly sought.
Many tributes were paid to Shepherd yesterday. The Aberdeen journalist Neil Drysdale tweeted: "He may have described himself as 'just a loon fae Dunecht', but he was 'Mr Doric' to so many. Robbie loved the north-east, the music and the people of the region and he was a genuinely nice man!"
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Scots musician Gary Innes, who took over the show when Mr Shepherd retired and became close friends with him, said: "I am so sorry to hear of the passing of Dr Robbie Shepherd MBE. Robbie was an incredible man, musician and champion of the Doric language. A true legend and until we meet again ma man, 'aw the best till then'."
Iona Fyfe, the singer and MG ALBA Musician of the Year, paid her own tribute, describing him as "So kind, supportive and encouraging towards me since early 2000s. In 2017, I was honoured to make a speech dedicated to him at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland when they made him [Doctor]. "He lit up every room he entered", she added. "One of the only broadcasters who championed the Doric dialect of the Scots language".
Garry Scott, Deputy Editor at the Herald, said: "As a young journalist I met Robbie Shepherd in the BBC’s Aberdeen studio. My dad was always a big fan of Robbie's traditional Scottish music show so I was looking forward to speaking to him. I was pleased to be able to tell my dad he was just as enthusiastic in real life as he was on the wireless".
Shepherd was born in Dunecht, outside Aberdeen, in 1936, the same year that the Radio Times first noted it was recording Scottish dance music.
He once recalled lying in bed at home, where his father was a cobbler and mother an enthusiastic amateur pianist. ''I remember listening one balmy summer night to the village hall next door and the sounds of Jim Cameron band.''
Shepherd's mother, Helen, tried to encourage him to stick in at his piano lessons, but he he didn't have the talent. He did have a talent for maths, however, and he won a bursary to Robert Gordon's in Aberdeen.
Forced to leave school at 15, when his father fell ill, he took a job as an audit assistant for 30 shillings a week in the accountancy firm of John Watt in Union Terrace, Aberdeen. He worked hard at night school, eventually becoming a chartered management accountant.
He added: ''I spent 13 years then with Clayben, the fish processing and transport company which was part of Salvesen group.'' He was involved in many larger deals and a management buy-out before being brought in to radio by Arthur Argo [the Aberdeen broadcaster and writer[ to commentate on sheep dog trials. It was then he made the decision to concentrate on his radio work.
"If I'd stayed with Clayben, I would never have had the time to do radio work. I was very lucky, I just left at the right time".
When in September 2016 Shepherd decided to leave Take the Floor after 35 years, BBC Scotland director Ken MacQuarrie said: "Robbie is one of Scotland's most recognisable voices".
Shepherd himself said at the time: "I like to think that I am broadcasting to a lady in the top tenement in Glasgow at the same time as I am chatting to a lady in a croft".
His career also included stints on BBC Scotland's Beechgrove Garden and presenting televised sheepdog trials. He was a regular commentator on the Highland Games circuit - including the Braemar Gathering, a favourite of the royal family, and wrote books on Scottish dance music and Scottish country dancing. He also penned a newspaper column in Doric.
The Herald Diary carried a story three years ago in which a reader recalled Shepherd hosting a request show and announcing that the next piece of music was for a listener who was 111. When the tune ended he apologised, admitting the listener was in fact 'ill'.
A tragic gap in Scottish cultural life
In 2008 Shepherd received the unlikely accolade of being affectionately lampooned in his own Doric dialect by the north-east's favourite comedians, Desperate Fishwives.
In the first of a new series, the Doric comedians had Shepherd getting drunk on champagne and marrying Britney Spears, then asking Pamela Anderson who "the twa baldy men" sitting in front of her were.
Shepherd approved of the sketch. "Desperate Fishwives is huge in the north east, where they sell out every performance", he said. "I have watched their careers grow, and go along to every recording with my wife Esma, I love their comedy. They are keeping the Doric alive and introducing it to a new and wider audience.
"For them to poke fun at me is a huge honour. It shows I'm still at the top of the tree. And they have my voice down very well."
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