An Event at the Kirkcudbright Fringe, September 2026
That’s deiseil, pronounced jay-shal, Scots Gaelic for “ready!” So! Are you ready?
A strange boy is weaving
A course of grace and havoc
On a yellow skateboard
Through midday sidewalk traffic
Why on earth should I be quoting these lines from Joni Mitchell’s song, Strange Boy, in the opening to a piece on an event at this year’s Kirkcudbright Fringe?
As I sat watching Deiseil – Dancing in Time, a virtuoso performance from dancer Alison Carlyle and traditional fiddle player–and dancer–Amy Geddes, I was reminded of something I had seen just half an hour previously.
I had arrived in the town centre car park in Kirkcudbright. On the covered stage which faces the car park, a number of teenage girls, just out of school, were lounging. Well lounging does not quite describe it. There were a several things going on. A book was being read in the back corner by a girl who was indeed lounging, at full length. Towards the front, some makeshift hurdles were being jumped by a couple of girls. But most eye-catching of all was a girl practicing a tricky manoeuvre with a skateboard. This involved flipping it over with her foot. I was mesmerised, not quite sure what she was doing or how, but clear that she was nearly there with it. Just a little more practice and it would be perfection.
Just half an hour later as I sat watching Alison Carlyle and Amy Geddes, I wished that girl could have been in the hall with us. She would, in her turn, have been mesmerised by the spectacle of the percussive dance that was being reeled out for a spellbound audience. The intricate and rhythmic patterns, the accompanying fiddle music.
In truth the audience was, so far as I could judge, almost entirely over the age of 50. There were a few obvious exceptions—children who, at a crucial moment in the programme, proved to be talented dancers. The potential for engagement of young people in this art is obvious.
As someone not at all well schooled in dance, I found myself recognising fragments of ballet and other dance traditions woven into the story. Indeed the connections between step dancing and flamenco and the influence of step dancing on the evolution of tap dancing in the United States are not hard to recognise.
The central story of the performance was told in part by the dance and the music and in part by the intertwined playback of recorded voices.
This narrative explained how the tradition of percussive step dancing, as it originated in the north of Scotland, had been lost from the indigenous culture but preserved by Gaelic speaking Scottish migrants to Cape Breton in Nova Scotia. The production of Deiseil – Dancing in Time has as one of its central objectives to reintroduce this lost art to its country of origin.
In truth, the evidence for this transmigration of culture, from the Scottish Gaels to the Gaelic speaking communities of Cape Breton, is a hypothesis, rather than an established fact. Indeed, whether step dancing entirely left Scotland at all was one of the points touched on the following day at a well attended panel discussion of the themes arising from the event.
Members of the panel were: Amy Geddes the fiddle player of the previous day; Gerry Mulgrew, Producer and Director of the show; David Francis, songwriter, lyricist, storyteller, guitarist, and dance-caller; Alyne Jones, ethnological consultant, who has for many years been building an archive of Scottish tradition based on interviews, photographs and video. I should also mention Ruby Zajac who introduced and very ably chaired the discussion.
A key theme of the discussion was the way the codification of Scottish Dance for the purpose of competition had both assisted the spread of tradition across borders to the Scottish diaspora whilst simultaneously reducing the element of spontaneity and undermining the potential of the tradition to evolve creatively.
Alyne Jones brought a rather fascinating video tape recording to the proceedings. Full marks to the organiser who had arranged a player and a screen for performance of Drumalban. Drumalban was a group formed by James MacDonald Reid in the late 1980s, its purpose “to present old Scottish folk dances with traditional songs and instruments.” [1]
The dance we watched was formal in its choreography but notably included distinct percussive elements such as might have been censored in competitive dancing. The recording was notable for its pipe accompaniment by a young Martin Bennett.
So the question might be asked: did percussive step dancing really disappear so completely from the Scottish tradition?
But then there are questions as regards the likely genesis of percussive dancing in Northern Scotland in the first place. Could this really have happened in a culture where floors were of beaten earth and where the wearing of shoes was not a given. Might not these percussive elements have evolved in Cape Breton when perhaps these predisposing material cultural elements were more readily available?
The answers to these questions may be chewed over by academics but from the point of view of dance as a living artform, it is clear that cultural exchange, from wherever it may come, can reinvigorate a tradition. That is precisely what shone through in Deiseil – Dancing in Time. You will find a list of upcoming performance below. Don’t miss a chance to go and see it!
Late in the discussion, with reference to engendering interest in step dance amongst the people of Scotland, a voice came from the audience: “Don’t let it be schooled!” This was, I think, an appeal against over-formalisation and encoding. Also, possibly, a warning of the kiss of death that school is inclined to bring to its subject matter. Which brings me back to that girl on the open air stage in Kirkcudbright car park, so diligently trying to perfect her skateboard flip–and to Joni Mitchell’s Strange Boy:
He keeps referring back to school days
And clinging to his child
Fidgeting and bullied
His crazy wisdom holding onto something wild
He asked me to be patient
Well I failed "Grow up!" I cried
And as the smoke was clearing he said
"Give me one good reason why."
Endnotes
Deiseil Airson Dannsa Upcoming Events
Details of Discussion Event
A Strange Boy, Album, Hejira, Track 4, Joni Mitchell–Listen on YouTube
References
1] The Lowlands and Borders Pipers’ Society Collogue Presentations I – James MacDonald Reid
Carruchan
Deiseil – Dancing in Time: Reclaiming a Lost Rhythm
An Event at the Kirkcudbright Fringe, September 2026
That’s deiseil, pronounced jay-shal, Scots Gaelic for “ready!” So! Are you ready?
Why on earth should I be quoting these lines from Joni Mitchell’s song, Strange Boy, in the opening to a piece on an event at this year’s Kirkcudbright Fringe?
As I sat watching Deiseil – Dancing in Time, a virtuoso performance from dancer Alison Carlyle and traditional fiddle player–and dancer–Amy Geddes, I was reminded of something I had seen just half an hour previously.
I had arrived in the town centre car park in Kirkcudbright. On the covered stage which faces the car park, a number of teenage girls, just out of school, were lounging. Well lounging does not quite describe it. There were a several things going on. A book was being read in the back corner by a girl who was indeed lounging, at full length. Towards the front, some makeshift hurdles were being jumped by a couple of girls. But most eye-catching of all was a girl practicing a tricky manoeuvre with a skateboard. This involved flipping it over with her foot. I was mesmerised, not quite sure what she was doing or how, but clear that she was nearly there with it. Just a little more practice and it would be perfection.
Just half an hour later as I sat watching Alison Carlyle and Amy Geddes, I wished that girl could have been in the hall with us. She would, in her turn, have been mesmerised by the spectacle of the percussive dance that was being reeled out for a spellbound audience. The intricate and rhythmic patterns, the accompanying fiddle music.
In truth the audience was, so far as I could judge, almost entirely over the age of 50. There were a few obvious exceptions—children who, at a crucial moment in the programme, proved to be talented dancers. The potential for engagement of young people in this art is obvious.
As someone not at all well schooled in dance, I found myself recognising fragments of ballet and other dance traditions woven into the story. Indeed the connections between step dancing and flamenco and the influence of step dancing on the evolution of tap dancing in the United States are not hard to recognise.
The central story of the performance was told in part by the dance and the music and in part by the intertwined playback of recorded voices.
This narrative explained how the tradition of percussive step dancing, as it originated in the north of Scotland, had been lost from the indigenous culture but preserved by Gaelic speaking Scottish migrants to Cape Breton in Nova Scotia. The production of Deiseil – Dancing in Time has as one of its central objectives to reintroduce this lost art to its country of origin.
In truth, the evidence for this transmigration of culture, from the Scottish Gaels to the Gaelic speaking communities of Cape Breton, is a hypothesis, rather than an established fact. Indeed, whether step dancing entirely left Scotland at all was one of the points touched on the following day at a well attended panel discussion of the themes arising from the event.
Members of the panel were: Amy Geddes the fiddle player of the previous day; Gerry Mulgrew, Producer and Director of the show; David Francis, songwriter, lyricist, storyteller, guitarist, and dance-caller; Alyne Jones, ethnological consultant, who has for many years been building an archive of Scottish tradition based on interviews, photographs and video. I should also mention Ruby Zajac who introduced and very ably chaired the discussion.
A key theme of the discussion was the way the codification of Scottish Dance for the purpose of competition had both assisted the spread of tradition across borders to the Scottish diaspora whilst simultaneously reducing the element of spontaneity and undermining the potential of the tradition to evolve creatively.
Alyne Jones brought a rather fascinating video tape recording to the proceedings. Full marks to the organiser who had arranged a player and a screen for performance of Drumalban. Drumalban was a group formed by James MacDonald Reid in the late 1980s, its purpose “to present old Scottish folk dances with traditional songs and instruments.” [1]
The dance we watched was formal in its choreography but notably included distinct percussive elements such as might have been censored in competitive dancing. The recording was notable for its pipe accompaniment by a young Martin Bennett.
So the question might be asked: did percussive step dancing really disappear so completely from the Scottish tradition?
But then there are questions as regards the likely genesis of percussive dancing in Northern Scotland in the first place. Could this really have happened in a culture where floors were of beaten earth and where the wearing of shoes was not a given. Might not these percussive elements have evolved in Cape Breton when perhaps these predisposing material cultural elements were more readily available?
The answers to these questions may be chewed over by academics but from the point of view of dance as a living artform, it is clear that cultural exchange, from wherever it may come, can reinvigorate a tradition. That is precisely what shone through in Deiseil – Dancing in Time. You will find a list of upcoming performance below. Don’t miss a chance to go and see it!
Late in the discussion, with reference to engendering interest in step dance amongst the people of Scotland, a voice came from the audience: “Don’t let it be schooled!” This was, I think, an appeal against over-formalisation and encoding. Also, possibly, a warning of the kiss of death that school is inclined to bring to its subject matter. Which brings me back to that girl on the open air stage in Kirkcudbright car park, so diligently trying to perfect her skateboard flip–and to Joni Mitchell’s Strange Boy:
Endnotes
Deiseil Airson Dannsa Upcoming Events
Details of Discussion Event
A Strange Boy, Album, Hejira, Track 4, Joni Mitchell–Listen on YouTube
References
1] The Lowlands and Borders Pipers’ Society Collogue Presentations I – James MacDonald Reid
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About Stephen Shellard
I am a retired College lecturer, having worked originally in supported programmes but latterly having taught social science subjects, Psychology and Politics, though my degree was in Sociology. I am from Newry in Northern Ireland, but now live in Dumfries in South West Scotland. https://carruchan.wordpress.com/about/