Here is a wee collection of thoughts about the end of the Year of Homecoming. How was it for me? Very thought provoking. In no particular order I recall…………..
Michael Marra and Frank McConnell at the Ceilidh Place in Ullapool – the morning after their brilliant performance in A Wee Home from Home in November. I was really struck by the fierce passion aroused in these veteran performers by Rabbie Burns poetry and lyrics. It takes a lot to get these calm souls riled, but they were both roused to indignation by the fact that Burns, the sacred wordsmith, had been submerged beneath tartan, parading, Americana and commercialism during the Homecoming Year. How could we surround such a brilliant artists with such tat – was the jist. I was really touched by this protective instinct towards a fellow artists work – even a deceased one. It was like Burns truly was their brither.
Earlier in 2009, a friend Mark Sheridan couldn't make it along to a meeting I considered rather important – a group of radio fanatics was trying to set up a new speech-based Scottish radio service. Mark sent his apologies. He was rehearsing a new play. Ten months later – and despite the very best efforts of the group -- the radio service is nowhere. Well, everyone liked the idea but no-one wanted to commit cash. Meanwhile, Mark's play was in Eden Court Theatre in October – and it transpired he was not just part an actor, he had written the words, musical score and cast the play with his old friends Mike Russell (Culture Minister) and Ian Anderson (Radio Scotland) in the lead parts. The Flight of the Arctic Tern was absolutely fabulous. And I couldn't get over Mark's modesty about his role. This would be a great play for next year's Caithness MOD – set as it is in English and Gaelic, and located in Durness with mentions of the whole Northern Coast. Well done Mark -- dogged determination, single-minded focus and very capable friends – just the combination of life qualities you need to stay afloat in Scotland.
SNH's Nature Homecoming – again in Eden Court – was another great gig. OK – I was chairing it, but that's not the point. There were heartfelt and detailed presentations by John Love, Sir John Lister Kaye and Paul Walton about the success of three re-introduced species – the sea eagle (my dad Bill Riddoch – then an Eagle Star insurance boss backed the first release of birds on Rum 35 years ago) the beaver and the corncrake. What really moved me about the event though, was the inclusion of poets and singers in the "Nature" theme. Normally its animals in one conserved corner and humans in the other. But Arthur Cormack and his accompanist Ingrid performed marvellous Gaelic nature songs and Angus Peter Campbell had the house enthralled with poems that described perfectly the struggle for language survival. The parallels drawn between the decline of language, natural habitat and species in the Highlands was stunning … and for once not totally depressing. Gaelic needs a mass learning course (perhaps on a new radio service?) but Sea Eagles are doing just fine. The big question raised – should we reintroduce the lynx next? The audience vote – an overwhelming yes!
Other highlights in brief….BBC4's This is Scotland season. Just utterly fab – especially John Byrne's knowing and subversive Johnson and Boswell. This – and the wonderfully opinionated History of Scotland – prove there is no need for dumbed down, so-so broadcasting in Scotland. The subjects, talent and production ability is all here. At the big Homecoming Global Impact conference in Inverness, Scottish historians John MacKenzie, Tom Devine, Jim Hunter, and Steve Murdoch all proved why they should be given the airtime, encouragement and cash to do a "David Starkey" and take the debate about history to the next stage on Scottish radio and TV. Speirs and Boden at the Orkney Folk Festival proved the English CAN sing. John Byrne's exhibition at the RSA on the Mound proved entirely worthy of the £4 entry fee. And if you are on Orkney tonight (Monday), go to St Magnus Cathedral and hear a fabulous Norwegian Band prove that I should have made more of an effort to catch their name in the melee at the Norwegian Consulate's Winter bash in Edinburgh earlier this week.
This is by no means an exhaustive list of stuff – I'm sure its fear of leaving out something obvious, impactful and MASSIVE that deters people from making ANY record of the year past! But I've got to say, the sentence that still stays with me was uttered by Tom Devine at a Homecoming Event in the parliament in July. Migration from Scotland is not a recent or a Clearance thing. People have been leaving this country steadily and solidly for 850 years.
Why is that? Some migration is "normal", outgoing, voluntary and adventurous. But much of Scotland's migration is the product of centuries-long despair that this society will ever encourage and fairly reward talent and effort. All is not well, and as I continue to learn beginners Swedish and Norwegian in preparation for three weeks writing and visiting the Nordic countries in January 2010, I honestly wonder where I'll be in a year's time.
Hey ho.
