Just look at what is happening in the streets of Glasgow’s Merchant City during the last week of July. Walking, dancing, drama: fun and games of all kinds… and Walking Heads is delighted our Glasgow Music Tour is part of it.

The multi-layered history of the Merchant City comes to life in tours of all kinds in this year’s fantastic, imaginative Merchant City Festival programme. Through historic buildings, along streets, into art galleries, theatres and the Necropolis cemetery… you can explore the links between slavery, tobacco and sugar… download an app to turn the city into a playground for an hour… follow a love story in an audio drama … hop on a comedy bus to the East End of Glasgow…

And of course we would be daft if we didn’t mention you can download our very own Merchant City Music Tour, ‘a musical history tour narrated by Jim Gellatly’.

To be honest we didn’t realise that is what we were making when we mapped out the routes for our Glasgow Music Tour. But Route 1 is pretty much the history of music in the Merchant City. You can start in George Square or skip to the Old Fruitmarket and follow a fascinating trail from variety theatre to indie rock in 100 years and all in under an hour. All you need is a smart phone or mp3 player and a set of headphones.

Admittedly there is a diversion to Barrowland, or ‘Merchant City East’ as one of our

friends describes it, which stretches the walk to an hour and a half. (Of course you can skip that if you want). There is plenty to keep you going in stories told by DJ Jim Gellatly as he leads you from the Old Fruitmarket to the Panopticon via 13th Note, Mono and Tron Theatre. There are some great stories about audience participation too!

Exploring the hidden stories of the city is (sorry, can’t help it) right up our street so we are going to do as many of the other tours as possible. Slavery, tobacco, the untold achievements of women – there is so much to learn in the layers of Glasgow’s history. And music weaves through it all.

We’re planning to add yet another layer of fun and games to our music tour for the Merchant City Festival but we will tell you about that later. Meanwhile here’s a taster of Route 1 of Glasgow Music Tour (aka Merchant City Music Tour) which you can download here.