Isla Cameron

Isla Cameron
Born	March 5, 1930 Scotland
Died	1980 (aged 49–50)
Genres	Folk
Occupation(s)	Actress, singer
Years active	1945-1980

Isla Cameron (March 5, 1930 – May 1980) was a Scottish actress and singer.

Isla was born in Scotland but was brought up in Dorset and Somerset. While trying to become an actress she joined Joan Littlewood who had co-founded the Theatre Workshop in 1945. Joan’s husband at the time, Ewan MacColl was to become Isla’s singing partner for much of the 50s. Peter Kennedy produced a series of Sunday morning BBC radio programs from 1953 – 54, called As I Roved Out. Two of these were later issued on the Folktrax label, with Isla singing three folk songs, Seamus Ennis playing uilliann pipes and tin whistle, Ewan MacColl singing some songs and Ron and Bob Copper also singing. In 1956 she appeared in another radio program Ballads and Blues: Sea Music. In 1960 “The Singers Club” opened in “The Princess Louise” pub in Holborn. It was run by Ewan and his new wife, Peggy Seeger. Isla became a resident at this folk club, but by this point her film career had taken off.

In 1959 Isla appeared, uncredited, in the film Room at the Top. Her most memorable cinematic moment was in 1961 in the spooky thriller The Innocents where she imitated a child’s voice and sang “Oh, Willow Waly”. The composer Georges Auric incorporated her singing into the orchestral soundtrack. Another horror film, Nightmare, followed in 1964. She acted in the 1967 version of Far From the Madding Crowd but her contribution was left on the cutting room floor. However, her voice appears on the soundtrack album, singing “Bushes and Briars” (Julie Christie is miming) and “The Bold Grenadier”. Trevor Lucas, later to become the husband of Sandy Denny also sings on the album, and Dave Swarbrick plays some of the tunes. Her biggest acting role was as the stern librarian Miss McKenzie in the 1969 version of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie where she could use her Scottish accent to advantage.

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