From the Generation Game to Burns Night, Isla St Clair has returned to her folk roots. She talks to Viv Hardwick.

ISLA ST CLAIR, best known to millions for co-hosting BBC’s Generation Game with the hilariously waspish Larry Grayson, is now a recognised authority on Scotland’s traditional music.

Despite having lived for 20 years in England, the folk singer who went on to perform on TV, radio and stage, remains fiercely loyal to her Aberdeen roots and is the ideal choice for Bishop Auckland Town Hall’s Laurel Folk Scottish Evening on Wednesday.

As it is so close to Burns Night – January 25 – she’s looking forward to adding the authentic sound of a Burns song to a piper, the haggis, neeps and tatties (that’s swede and potatoes to us sasanachs).

“I love haggis and tatties, neeps and carrots mashed up together, that’s just fine. I’m not going to pretend otherwise, although we won’t go into what’s in a haggis,” she jokes.

The 57-year-old mother-of-two is a member of the Sinclair clan – she abbreviated her mother’s maiden name to use as a stage name having been born Isabella Margaret Dyce.

St Clair recalls having toured in County Durham when she kept up a commendable output of folk albums and live appearances throughout the Nineties and into the new century.

Her proudest moment is singing her mother’s song, Dunkirk – dedicated to St Clair’s uncle, who was killed during the Second World War – in the Remembrance Day service of 2000.

“I think that will prove to be one of the highlights of my life, to sing the song my mother wrote for her brother, who survived Dunkirk but was killed on D-Day, because the sentiments are international. It was terrifying, but marvellous,” she says.

But to the rest of us, it’s that fantastic run of TV shows, Generation Game, Max Bygraves Show, Morecambe and Wise, Royal Variety Show, Russell Harty Show, Blankety Blank and Parkinson, which made her a household name.

“It is some 30 years now since the Generation Game, particularly, so that continues to have some value or cache for me. It still helps and was a grand wee time and a diversion from what one would have thought was my career. But since I didn’t know what my career would be, it just turned up and I did it,” says St Clair, who reveals that her pay as Grayson’s co-star never made her financially secure.

“The show was very frivolous and I’d have preferred to have been known for my singing rather than prancing around in a frock and being pleasant to people, which I could do anyway. But it was hard making a living trundling around the folk clubs (after starting out at the age of ten) and it’s always been hard to make a living full stop. If I’d have thought out my career I’d have probably have done something totally different,” says the performer, who took a break from showbusiness for several years from 1984 while she raised a family.

On her return, in the Nineties, music took preference with radio shows, TV’s Songs of Praise and Highway, pantomimes, films, documentaries, folk clubs and 14 albums.

“You have to remember that I toured all over the place from the US to the USSR (with a show watched by Soviet leader Leonard Brezhnev in 1976) before I ever went on the Generation Game.”

Celebrity in her TV heyday was all hectic and never allowed the kind of marketing opportunities like today where St Clair would probably have a clothing range and perfume on sale.

“I’m the kind of personality who beats themselves up for not being at the coalface like everyone else. I went back to what I really enjoyed while having time for my children,” she says, and is proud of film contributions on Youtube, filmed by boyfriend Patrick King, such as When The Pipers Play, the last time the pipes and drums of the Army were together in tartan.

Currently, she and King have a show called Eyes Front which uses well-known songs and archive footage to recall the best of Britain.

■ Laurel Folk: Scottish Evening with Isla St Clair, Bishop Auckland Town Hall, Wednesday, 8pm (ticket includes Burns Night food). Box Office: 01388-602610 islastclair.com