TWO hundred and sixty-five years on, the dust raised by the ignominiously departing General Johnnie Cope refuses to settle.

Released in association with the weaving of the mammoth Prestonpans Tapestry, this engaging compilation charts the earlier, triumphant stages of Charles Edward Stuart's ultimately disastrous 1745 campaign as far as his famously short, sharp victory at Prestonpans. Drambuie Kirkliston Pipe Band sets the scene with an atmospheric arrangement of the pibroch My King has Landed in Moidart, while popular or lesser-known Jacobite songs, either of the period or written in romanticised hindsight, include Karen Matheson's beguiling An Fhideag Auirgid, Lady Nairne's Charlie's Landing from Jean Redpath, and the Whistlebinkies rattling out the exhilarating satire of Cam' ye Ower Frae France. The McCalmans' vocal harmonies excel in a stirring rendition of James Hogg's Bonnie Prince Charlie, a vintage live recording catches the Corries bearing The News from Moidart, while Ceolbeg's epic delivery of Johnnie Cope tempers swagger with poignancy.