How do we encourage collaboration and exchange across all traditional dance forms practised in Scotland? The short answer is that we, at Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland, offer support through three major routes – festivals, productions and residencies. Let’s zoom in on the range of residencies as one of these support routes we initiate, champion and secure funding for. Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance is only one of the three programmes of residencies we currently curate and deliver thanks to our funders and partners – Primary, Festival and Research Residencies.
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The Primary Residencies take their descriptive name after our hosts – the state-funded primary schools across Scotland. We initiated these residencies at three schools in Edinburgh and Musselburgh following the COVID outbreak as part of our campaign for Scottish and world trad dance becoming one of the primary ingredients of our primary school education. Amongst the primary resident artists so far we have featured Caroline Brockbank, Angel Godwin, Eleanor Sinclair and Alison Carlyle.
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The Festival Residencies are part of our Pomegranates festival highlighting the intrinsic link of traditional dance with poetry, film, music, heritage crafts and sustainable fashion. To mention but a few – the poets Jim Mackintosh and Ian McMillan, the Hip Hop artists Jonzi D and Kemono L. Riot, the visual artists and makers Mare Tralla, Gabriel Schmitz and Claudia Nocentini, the musicians Jon Bews and Rob Armitage and the fashion designer Alison Harm.
The Research Residencies are in partnership with our major partners Edinburgh’s Dance Base and Aberdeen’s Citymoves – two of Scotland’s national centres for dance. We deliver those through regular open calls and enable dance artists to undertake week-long research residencies at the studios of our partners. Most recently, the residents included Mairi Campbell, Kalubi Mukengela Jacoby, Shailini and Shashwati Vinod and Marianella Desanti (pictured below)
The University of Edinburgh and in particular Moray House School of Education and Sport is our major academic partner hosting more research residencies for traditional dance artists, which vary from long-term to short-term. The long-term residencies span an academic year, such as the recent residency of the US percussive dance artist Nic Gariess (pictured below), which continues to yield its legacy. The short-term residencies are formal placements at the Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland for dance artists who are undertaking their postgraduate studies in Dance Science and Education at the University of Edinburgh, most recently featuring Yingzhou Xie (Jayden), Lingqiao Hong (Ling) and Jiarui Liao (Rui).
Our ambition is to not only continue expanding these three programmes of the Primary, Festival and Research Residencies but also broker new such opportunities for trad dance artists across the country, including at national and regional museums and galleries, community schools and care homes, as well as internationally through our European and US partners.
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Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance
As we are planning the next iteration of Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance, allow us to reflect on this first-of-its kind Gaelic-speaking traditional dance artists-in-residency programme which we initially ran from April 2023 to April 2024 at Bun Sgoil Taobh na Pàirce – Edinburgh and Lothians only Gaelic-medium primary school. Our programme provided consistent (not one-off) weekly after-school Scottish stepdance workshops free-of-charge to over 20 upper primary students through the medium of Gaelic. The workshops were delivered by two local trad dance artists Eleanor Sinclair and Alison Carlyle who were supported by three local Gaelic singers Annmarie Mcruary, Sarah Moore and Catriona Nicholson providing tuition and accompaniment in Gaelic mouth music known as puirt à beul.
In addition, Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance was celebrated through several public engagement events, including Christmas (pictured above) and Easter sharings for the local Gaelic-speaking community at the school. It culminated in a fully-booked matinee performance (pictured below but do watch this short video here) shared with Gaelic, English, Chinese and Ukrainian-speaking communities as part of Pomegranates Festival Family Day on 28 April 2024 on the Netherbow Theatre stage at the Scottish Storytelling Centre – our springtime festival for world trad dance across venues in Edinburgh. We caught up with our Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance resident artist Alison Carlyle, soon after the final sharing and talked about stepdance and puirt à beul. As a percussive dance form which has its roots in Scotland in the 18th Century mass emigration and cultural suppression, stepdance was lost in Scotland but preserved and developed in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia by Scottish emigrants and brought back to Scotland by their descendants in the 1990s. Originally it would have been danced to puirt à beul – a Gaelic tradition of vocal music that replicates the rhythms and melodies typically played on instruments and which was often used to accompany dancing when instruments weren’t available. Alison also said:
Catriona Nicholson and I have really enjoyed teaching the puirt à beul and stepdance in the Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance after school club. Over our two terms together the group has worked hard on learning lots of songs and steps – but we’ve also had so much fun. Stepdance is made up of improvised sequences of learned steps, so our sessions involved the children developing both the ability to learn and remember the intricate movements and precise rhythms of the steps themselves, and the ability to link those together in a way which works with the songs. It’s also a creative form, and we worked together to make up some new steps and step patterns, with the children enjoying the chance to express themselves through dance. Through the puirt a beul the children learned new Gaelic vocabulary as well as focussing on singing the words quickly and accurately so that they could be danced to, experimenting with different styles and speeds of singing and how that affected the dance. A lot of the songs generated interesting discussions about Gaelic culture and history, and created the opportunity for the children to develop their knowledge of cultural heritage and their linguistic skills in a gentle, informal way. The classes were run through the medium of Gaelic so that the children were using the language in a social yet focussed environment. All of the children were engaged in both dancing and singing. As well as having the opportunity to improvise their own individual steps to each other’s singing, the children also worked in groups to choreograph dances to the songs they’d learned, choosing their particular favourite steps and agreeing which worked best to different parts of the songs. It was great to see them working as a team and supporting their peers – over the time we spent together the group developed a real sense of community and belonging. Of course, teaching something is always a great opportunity to learn yourself – Catriona and I both learned a lot about each other’s art form and developed our own skills, but the children’s engagement with the songs and steps was also very inspiring and often thought-provoking. We’ve been absolutely delighted with how much the children have learned and how much they’ve enjoyed the classes as part of Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance.Alison Carlyle
We were encouraged to see how Alison Carlyle and Catriona Nicholson were able to build on the success of this innovative initiative of ours and set up a series of Scottish stepdance and puirt à beul for young people in Portobello but outside of the formal education setting. Importantly, the Minister for Culture, Europe and International Development, Kaukab Stewart commended us for the first-ever Family Day in the history of the Pomegranates Festival, including the Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance sharing, in her welcome speech as part of her public festival presentation on 25 April 2024 at the Scottish Storytelling Centre.
If this first iteration of Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance explored the relationship between Gaelic song and dance covering strathspeys, reels, jigs, Scottish step and puirt à beul and provided space for over 20 young people, aged 8 to 12 to learn and practise, the sharings helped us engage a wider intergenerational demographic, encouraging engagement with Gaelic in social contexts.
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Going forward, we do believe that Gaelic trad dance and song have tremendous potential for asserting Gaelic arts and culture in a safe and receptive environment and hope that in the very near future we will be able to delve deeper into the underexplored pedagogical and performative links between Scottish stepdance and puirt à beul. We will continie to provide curatorial opportunities for resident artists in Scottish stepdance and puirt à beul and their young co-artists to perform on ours stages and spaces, including as part of Pomegranates.
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Curated by Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland, Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance initially ran from April 2023 to April 2024 at Bun Sgoil Taobh na Pàirce – Edinburgh and Lothians only Gaelic-medium primary school with the support of a Taic Freumhan Coimhearsnachd (Community Fund) award by Bòrd na Gàidhlig.
The title image is a portrait of Alison Carlyle – one of our Tha D airson Dannsa | D is for Dance resident artists. All images and videos © our contributors.
