past events: 2004-05 (spring)
Easter Ceilidh | Dunedin Assembly | St. Andrews Highland Ball | STDT dance competition | IVFDF | Glasgow University 50th Anniversary Masked Ball | beer & skittles | Newcastle Festival | New Scotland Annual Dance | Student Festival Ceilidh
New Scotland Easter Ceilidh 2005
Photos from the Easter ceilidh
Dunedin Assembly 2005
by Mike (Dunedin)
Dunedin's 2005 Assembly was held on 19th March at St George's School for Girls, and seemed to be a great success! Although Gordon Shand couldn't make it himself, we had excellent music from his band, fronted for the evening by Ian Cathcart. We even made a small profit this year - helped, no doubt, by our NOT opening every bottle of sherry at the start of the evening, so actually being able to take some back this year! (There's no truth in the rumour that the remaining sherry from last year's Assembly was used to liven up committee meetings...).
Many thanks to Jim and Christine for MC'ing the evening, to Rosalie for the tickets, to Rachel for the programme, and to all the staff at St George's for their help over the evening. And a speical thanks to Linda for ensuring that there was sufficient space between each table this year!
St Andrews Celtic Society Highland Ball
Photos from the dance and meal
Photos from the dance on the SUSCDF website
by Alex
To those unfamiliar with the St. Andrews Celtic Society Highland Ball, the Younger Hall, where it is held, is (in)famous for its 'bouncy floor'! This year's ball was held on Saturday 12th March.
After a short coach trip, New Scotland members who had departed from Edinburgh arrived in St. Andrews and were united with several members of our (triumphant!) STDT competition dem team. There was just enough time to get changed and 'book' a couple of partners before the dance began. The dancers were piped in, in a Grand March, and the dancing started with "J.B. Milne". The band were excellent, and the first half simply flew by.
The dinner during the interval was delicious, and New Scotland occupied a large proportion of the dining area! With the beginning of the second half, it was time to 'work off' our dinner in another fun half of dancing (and not too challenging on the brain either, thanks to all the dances being re-capped!); the end seemed to come all too soon.
With that, a coach full of very tired New Scotland members arrived back at Appleton Tower at about 2:30am - A really fun dance (and a very bouncy floor!)
STDT dance competitions 2005
Photos of our winning routine and the team with trophy and medals
by Christine and Rachel
On Saturday 12th March the Scottish Traditions of Dance Trust held 'Dance is Alive in 2005!', its 2nd traditional dance festival in Stirling. As well as workshops, an evening ceilidh, and highland dance competitions, the festival included a 'Freestyle Choreography' section which New Scotland decided to enter. The requirement was to put together a 4 minute display including traditional dancing; so we decided to draw on our multitude of talents and choreograph a routine combining Scottish Country, Highland and Scottish Step dancing.
After scarily few practices, and a 'not-in-costume-dress-rehearsal' at Social Dancing (which went mostly right!) it was off to Stirling for the competition. We were up against 4 other teams in the 17's and over class. Most of the competitors had a Highland dancing background, although Edinburgh's Appalacian dancers 'Kick the Cat' were also competing. The whole experience was very nerve-wracking, especially when we saw how good the entrants were in the 16's and under! The other teams in the 17's and over were also very good and extremely varied - I did not envy the three judges having to pick a winner!
It was good to know that there were lots of friendly faces in the audience from our 'supporters' who had travelled through from Edinburgh to cheer us on! And the result? Well in the end it was all well worth it - the judges decision was ... New Scotland had won!!! I'm sure you could hear the cheer from our team a few miles away, as we headed for the stage for our big shiny gold medals and trophy.
Well done to everyone involved for their achievement!! The judges were particularly impressed with our choreogrphy so top marks to Nic for that! Thanks for our success due to Nic (NS Dem Convenor) who devised the dem with help from Rachel (NS Country Dancing Teacher), Fiona (NS Step Dancing Teacher), and to Stephen, who found us the music and made it the right speed for everyone to dance to. All the above also danced in the team, and the other team members were Rachael, James, Yoshimi, Martina, Anna and Christine.
As winners of the Freestyle Choreography competition, we were also invited back to perform at the Thistle Centre in Stirling the following day. So, having had a second does of dancing at the St Andrews Ball on the Saturday night, we were back in Stirling on the Sunday for a repeat performance of our routine. Unfortunately, the stage was way too small so it was a 'pavement dancing' experience with a nice slope to add to the challenge - this was no problem in itself, but the temperature was freezing so it was hard to feel your feet. We threw in a performance of Bonnie Anne with accompanying step dancing to warm up, and that went down very well as did our winning routine. Before we could get carried away with a full blown MacDonald of Sleat, or Culla Bay into Round House Reel, however, we had to rush team members back to the rugby match at Murrayfield, so the people of Stirling were sadly deprived!
And finally, just to let you know that you will be able to see the award winning display during the Dunedin Dancers 18th International Folk Dance Festival in July. The winning routine will be part of New Scotland and Dunedin's display during the festival performance at the Church Hill Theatre, Edinburgh, on the night of Thursday 28th July.
IVFDF 2005
by Rachael
On the morning of Friday, 25th February a busload of NS members set off at 9am for a ten-hour bus journey to UEA, Norwich for IVFDF (Inter Varsity Folk Dance Festival) 2005. However, some who 'unfortunately' had other commitments during the day were forced to catch a plane to London and then continue the journey to Norwich by hire car - infinitely more comfortable.
The choice of activities on Friday night was between two ceilidhs. The English ceilidh proved to be very popular and was held in the largest of the IVFDF venues. The French ceilidh, though still great fun, was more challenging and necessitated extreme care to avoid collisions in a small room with lots of (at least partially) drunk people who had only just been introduced to the dance style yet were enthusiastically spinning as fast as humanly possible! (Reminiscent of a NS ceilidh really, so we all felt quite at home!) The official IVFDF dancing finished at midnight but a room had been reserved for those who still had enough energy and motivation to continue into the wee small hours with 'late night dancing'. Some lively musicians accompanied the dancing for most of the night. It all started with fairly sedate (well, as sedate a manner as NS can manage!) Scottish ceilidh dancing but soon developed….oh yes, it developed! I am proud to report that NS members were by far the most lively participants in these post-witching hour festivities - would you expect anything less - and introduced unsuspecting IVFDF participants to delights such as the Basque dance (involving rhythmically hitting various parts of your anatomy off the floor) and the Turkey Trot (a traditional Edwardian piece, according to Vicki) which provided for great hilarity and which I'm sure will be remembered for quite a long time to come! I believe, though hopefully I was hallucinating, that there was a 4am rendition of 'We are Sailing', complete with seating rowing actions, from a number of NS members: the public performance of this has, slightly worryingly, been one of Joel's life-time ambitions! I was forced, by overwhelming tiredness (yes, I am weak and suitably ashamed!) to retire to bed at 4.30am, but I am assured that the excitement continued all night.
For both Friday and Saturday nights, we were housed in sleeping bags on the floor of the main venue. Some IVFDF veterans had even come prepared with airbeds and blankets, which, believe me, were needed!
On Saturday morning, for those awake enough to participate, there were a large number of dance workshops on offer including Lindy Hop (actually Charleston!!), Medieval and Maypole dancing. At 12pm, the 12-hour ceilidh marathon began. The band changeovers coincided with performances from the different university groups. New Scotland's Display - the Strathspey and Reel step routine followed by McDonald of Sleat (where Nic managed to persuade all the ladies to wear bright red lipstick so that the men all had beautiful lip imprints on their cheek) accompanied by Seonaid doing solo Highland - was received very well, though the cheers got louder as the evening wore on and people got more and more drunk! The bands involved in the ceilidh marathon got progressively more amazing as the night went on and it is taking all my self control to prevent myself from launching into a 6000 word essay on how fantastic "Whapweasal"'s saxophonist was! Another night of dancing ensued but I think that people retired to bed slightly earlier than the previous night with the exception of Henri who, unless I am very much mistaken, managed to go for three days and participate in an early morning 'Street Jazz' class without any sleep. That girl deserves an endurance medal!
Very few people participated in the Sunday morning activities and after
forming '2007' on the floor from NS people's bodies (thus admitting that
Edinburgh is indeed mad enough, sorry, willing to host IVFDF that year)
we headed for the bus. The ten-hour bus journey wasn't as torturous as
I thought it might be and could even be classified as exceeding amusing
due to the traditional NS sing-song and Tom's amazing fairytale-telling
game which reduced about 10 of us to helpless hysterics within minutes.
In fact the game was so versatile that when others playing a video interrupted
us, we adapted the game to a 'New Scotland vs. Shrek' edition.
Glasgow University 50th Anniversary Masked Ball
Photos from the dance and after dance party on the SUSCDF website
A few more photos of the dance
by Rachael
New Scotland left Appleton Tower at 5.30pm on Saturday 19th February with a respectably sized coach-load of people headed for Glasgow University's 50th Anniversary Masked Ball. After several phones calls attempting to ascertain the exact location of the hall and a small detour down a Glasgow side street, we arrived at Langside Hall and traipsed downstairs to change.
Aside from the fact that the number of people in attendance far exceeded Glasgow's expectations (meaning that the attempt to execute a Grand March in a venue at least five times too small didn't go too well), a great deal of thought had gone into the preparation for the dance: the stage and side tables had been bedecked with helium-filled gold balloons and there were even hand-decorated golden masks (to purchase for 50p) available on the door lest anyone had 'accidentally' left theirs at home.
The programme proved to be very enjoyable (despite the fact that time constraints led to a quarter of the second half having to be dropped) and included many old favourites alongside two new dances that had been written especially for the event: 'The Glasgow Reel' (by Jen Wood) and 'Glasgow Gold' (by Jo Royal), which was a fun medley but fairly difficult to execute properly in the first instance and thus successfully cleared enough room on the floor to allow 'the pro's' to perform with slightly more space! The greatest curiosity of the evening had to be the star prize of the raffle - the celebratory 'Golden Swede'. Exactly who won this delightful gift escapes me at the moment, but I am sure it is displayed on someone's mantelpiece with great pride!
All in all, everyone had a most enjoyable evening and congratulations
go to Glasgow on 50 years of Scottish Country Dancing!
New Scotland & Dunedin beer and skittles outing
'Skittles' - photos on an entertaining evening!
by Neil
It was a cold and windy night when over 40 people gathered in a far flung
corner of Edinburgh (well it was Dudingston!) for the first of this year's
joint Dunedin and New Scotland socials - Beer 'n Skittles! With ages ranging
from 18 to ... (now that would be telling!) there was a great turnout
from both groups by the time the bowling got underway. The skill level
shown could be best described 'spirited' but it did strangely seem to
get better as the night went on! Bowling backwards resulted in much hilarity
and very few points but the highlight of the evening was definitely the
'speed bowling' competition!
Everyone who made it along had a great time and hopefully got a chance
to get to know everyone else. Many thanks to Christine for organising
things. We're hoping to hold another joint social event nearer the festival
so keep your eyes peeled!
It really is a great chance to put names to all those unknown faces you
invariably see at the festival.
Newcastle Festival 2005
Some photos of New Scotland and Dunedin team, and the after-competition dance
by Joel
The Newcastle festival is the biggest competition in which New Scotland competes each year. There are ladies and mixed technique sections and a display sections. We practice hard every year and usually get a decent score, though our most recent win was a couple of years ago in the display section in partnership with Dunedin Dancers.
This year a mini-bus load of New Scotland and Dunedin Dancers travelled down to Newcastle on the morning of Saturday 12th February, to meet up with a couple of car loads who had travelled down the night before. New Scotland representation included people not dancing in the competition, but who came to support the teams and join in the evening dance. Much to the disappointment of these NS spectators, our teams made no amusing mistakes and danced pretty flawlessly. The comments we received from the judge were also largely complimentary (particularly on our enthusiasm and 'exhuberance'!) and the score very good indeed (although Dunedin dancers mixed team just beat us this time so we're now about even on beating each other ).
The evening dance was very enjoyable. Those who had competed during the day did well to stay on their feet for the whole night, as by this time the ridiculously unearthly hour in the morning at which we left Edinburgh was beginning to tell! Some impressive driving from Christine had the bus back in Edinburgh the same night, for which we were all very thankful.
New Scotland Annual Dance 2005
Photos from the dance and after-dance party
by Remco
New Scotland's Annual Dance took place in James Gillespies' High School on Saturday 5th February 2005. Some 90 people aged 15 to 85 attended the highlight of Edinburgh University's Scottish country dance season.
New Scotland had organized a walk-through of the dances on Saturday afternoon from 1-4pm in Kirk O'Field, attended by around 30 people. Most of these were New Scotland, but there were also some from Glasgow and St. Andrews. The walk-through was called by Neil (who had written the programme so was proabbly teh one person who knew all the dances!), until his voice gave up, that is. Fortunately there were enough other people who knew what they were doing to help out.
Meanwhile at James Gillespies, the New Scotland committee (those who weren't at the walk-through or otherwise unavailable) did a great job decorating the hall. At the risk of sounding like someone from a BBC morning tv show: Catherine had chosen a lovely burgundy and gold theme for ribbons and balloons, and the pièce de résistance was a big bunch of dried flowers centered on the podium. After some final preparations, committee was ready to receive the first guests by 7pm, but no one actually walked in before 7.30pm when the dance was supposed to start [so shockingly impolite the youth of today! - ed]. This turned out to be a good thing, however, as the band had misplaced a piece of the drum kit, needed to borrow that thing from the school's music room, and the janitor kept randomly appearing but above all disappearing.
Somewhat late, the dance eventually got underway, and it was very successful with, excellent music from Gary Donaldson and his band. The full programme was also successfully completed with no one having to be carried off the floor in exhaustion! A noteworthy event in the first half was the debut of Rachel's new dance 'The Isle of Ornsay Jig' - a 'tad tricky', as Neil would put it [sorry had to edit the more usual Neil saying selected! - ed], but we pulled it off just fine. (And as a relative beginner, I must say it's a good feeling to have been taught what an 'espagnole' is, when all the so-called 'experienced' people have no clue, haha.)
Intermission was time for a gourmet dinner, as it was advertised. Many
New Scotland members had brought food, and although there were healthy
things like quiches and pasta salads, one may wonder why Edinburgh University
actually has a separate Chocolate Society… The second half was as
action-packed as the first half, although no new dances were tried out.
There was a raffle halfway through the second half, though, and although
committee won back most of the alcohol, chocolate and cuddly toy prizes
they had brought in, I have been asked to stress that the raffle was not
rigged!
At the end of the night, the group crossed the Meadows on their way to
Linda F's flat for the after-dance party. Judging from committee meeting
minutes, there was supposed to be £30 worth of punch, but when committee
actually arrived after cleaning up, it was as good as gone [poor committee!
- ed]. Socialising and eating our way further through a mountain of chocolate,
the birds were already singing when we went on our ways home.It remains
only to shame Linda for binning the left-over chocolate - but also to
thank her for hosting such a greta party (and to thank the cat for putting
up with us!).
New Scotland's Student Festival Ceilidh 2005
by Alex
New Scotland Student Festival Ceilidh was held on Wednesday 2nd February 2005 in Teviot Debating Hall.
We all know that the Student Festival is just like a re-run of Freshers' Week; and as such, this meant that it was time for a New Scotland Ceilidh! The "Gay Gordons" at the beginning was leisurely enough, with a conspicuous amount of room to dance in, but that wasn't to last for long… As usual, the vast majority of people were playing it cool and arriving 'fashionably late'. With a rather large queue forming of people wanting to dance, the committee members could be seen frantically trying to get as many people through the doors, as quickly as possible! The only problem encountered was that the Central Heating in Teviot could not be turned off, making the Debating Hall slightly reminiscent of a greenhouse…
Andy Kain and his band were on fantastic form, as was our caller, Michael, who somehow managed to arrange 150-200 people into sets for a very 'close quarters' "Dashing White Sergeant"! In fact, the dancing went so remarkably well for having so many people, that most stayed right to the bitter end; making the traditional 'Charge!' during "Auld Lang Syne" very interesting!...
A brilliant night and a success for New Scotland, who surely have to have been the highlight of the Student Festival 2005!