The Scotch Hop

Linlithgow palace

Dancing tango is not I think, best learned in class.  Neither is Scottish country dancing, or at least the simpler forms of it that you usually find at ceilidhs - the simpler, party version of scottish country dancing.  Tango and ceilidh dancing are very different - one is wholly improvised, the other strictly a dance of patterns or set sequences.  You might think the way you learn both would be completely different, but I don't think so.

I took my sons to the first and last dances of the wonderful "Scotch hop" which takes place usually in the courtyard of Linlithgow Palace five times in July and August.   Video.  Would that there were more of these in other Historic Scotland or National Trust for Scotland properties.  There we met up with friends, and saw some of the local tango dancers out to ceilidh for the night.

My children and I have been going to the Scotch Hop for about four years, since my younger son was a toddler.  It is one of the highlights of our summer.  In the past they have gone happily, less for the dancing I think and more for the atmosphere of music, dance and excitement.  There is the promise of a ruined palace with dizzingly tall towers to explore up dark spiral staircases with juice and shortbread at half time.  Afternoon picnics, ice cream and adventure playground are the inevitable afternoon precursors to those long, light evenings.  In the picture below my younger son begins a happy association between sweet things and dance at the Scotch Hop.

Half time at the Scotch Hop, 2012

That association has continued on occasional trips to the much-loved Dalmeny Tango Tea Dances just north of Edinburgh with warm hosts Willie and Louise where the food is magnificent and sometimes there are even little girls to run around with outside, who may even dance (in the middle of the ronda).

Dalmeny, January 2015

It has often struck me as I ferry my children to activities in the modern manner how segregated by age these activities are. It is true of everything from tennis to art. I would rather they played football, informally, as yesterday, with a crowd of boys aged six to adult, speaking an unknown language  in the park in front of our house than they attend planned, structured and segregated activities which teaches them if anything that the kind of easy social interaction they had on the field is unusual.  

In Kaduna, Nigeria  during the late seventies my parents had an active social life at parties held in the houses of other, mostly military personnel who were there at the invitation of the Nigerian government.  Very occasionally we went as a family not to the smart Polo club but to the more imaginatively named Crocodile Club.  The crocodile is the symbol of the city.  It was a social club attended by ex-pats from all over the world most of whom were probably there because of the country's sudden oil wealth.  The adults went to drink and chat.  My father said there was a light lunch ("small chop").  I don't remember a garden as such.  More a kind of compound with plants suitably large for hide and seek, and below our feet the dusty, packed red earth.  For us children there was a sudden thrill in being outside in a new place, with other children we didn't usually see, the sense of adventure and freedom and yet with the knowledge, reachable, that our parents were around somewhere.  

Mine was perhaps the last generation of at least British children to have the freedom to roam and explore.  There were snakes and scorpions and terrifyingly large orange and black spiders with yellow webs, storm ditches with god knows what inside, mounds of rubbish with goats atop, afternoon downpours and low lightning, narrow paths through fields of tall sugar cane, mango trees that were great to climb but caused a rash, each bump, housing, we told each other with quiet horror, a little wriggling worm.  We explored it all on bikes and in small gangs and alone. 

The Scotch Hop is also wonderfully multi-generational in the way of the way of the Crocodile Club though given the palace's tall towers, open windows and the age in which we live when parents - me, I'm afraid included - are inexplicably so much less relaxed than our parents were, the children tend to have significantly less freedom to explore alone.

With granny, (left) 2012

This year was the first that my eight year old, Orry, wanted to dance all the dances with his friend Milly.  Neither of them really knew any of the dances; perhaps they had a dim recollection of the Gay Gordons from school or previous ceilidhs. The dances are "called": you walk through the simple routine once or twice before the music starts, but at age eight, I'm not sure how much that helps.  Before the dances the uncertainty, fear and resolve were written all over his face.  But provided they were in a set (group) with experienced people to help, or he could identify an experienced couple to copy, they were fine and went back time and again.  Ceilidhs are just about taking part and trying things out.  Even six year old Henry and little Charlotte wanted to try out two couple dances on their own.

She loved her first experience at the beginning of the summer - so much so that she wanted to make the last hop the focus of her fifth birthday which was on the same day.  Her mother and I, near them in a long line of dancers with partners our own height wondered how they were going to manage Orcadian Strip the Willow where you alternate between birling your partner and endless numbers of other men, women, boys and girls at speed for an exhilarating, dizzying, exhaustingly long time.  But seeing the two of them clap and stamp to the rhythm and jump up and down with sheer excitement and pleasure was one of my great memories of this summer.   Willing hands (and the superb volunteers) helped them down the line of dozens of couples. There is something wonderful about children participating, learning from others within the group especially when the learning is the by-product of the overall experience which is of music, dance, anticipation and laughter.

Thanks to Alix and Michal for permission to publish these photos and to Sue Anderson of The Scotch Hop for permission to use the photo of Linlithgow Palace.