Isla Cameron

Isla Cameron was born in Blairgowrie, Scotland,[2] but was brought up in Dorset and Somerset.[1] While trying to become an actress she joined Joan Littlewood who had co-founded the Theatre Workshop in 1945.[1] Joan's husband at the time, Ewan MacColl was to become Cameron's singing partner for much of the 1950s.[1] Peter Kennedy produced a series of Sunday morning BBC radio programs in 1953 and 1954, called As I Roved Out. Two of these were later issued on the Folktrax label, with Cameron 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 public house in Holborn, London. It was run by MacColl and his new wife, Peggy Seeger. Cameron became a resident at this folk club, but by this point her film career had taken off.

In 1959, Cameron 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.[1] 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 appeared on the soundtrack album, singing "Bushes and Briars" (Julie Christie mimed in the film) and "The Bold Grenadier". Trevor Lucas, later to become the husband of Sandy Denny also sang on the album, and Dave Swarbrick played on some of the tunes.[1] 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.

In 1956, Cameron released a solo album of British folk songs, Through Bushes and Briars,[3] on the Tradition label run by Patrick Clancy of The Clancy Brothers. In 1962, Cameron and Tony Britton recorded Songs of Love, Lust and Loose Living. The following year Peter Kennedy recorded her singing with accompaniment by Jack Armstrong on Northumbrian pipes. She sang songs by Bob Dylan and Bertold Brecht but rarely sang after 1966, when acting took over her life.[1]

She died in her home in Islington, London on 3 April 1980, having apparently choked to death while eating; an obituary in a 1981 issue of Folk Music journal states that she "died after mis-swallowing some food."[4]

• Isla Cameron on IMDb