Storytelling sessions, workshops and a concert at Whitehills! Saturday 11th April

March 26, 2026Leave a comment

Coming up on Saturday 11th April! I’m going to be running a Hand Puppet Workshop, Family Storytelling Session and a Family Scots Song Workshop – all at the Blackpots Pavilion in Whitehills!

The Hand Puppet workshop runs from 11am to 12pm – Learn to bring a hand puppet to life – Bring your own puppet or borrow one of Pauline’s many characters for the workshop. For bairns aged 5 and up and their grown ups. Unaccompanied grown ups are of course welcome an aa! £5

The family storytelling session runs from 1 to 2pm and costs £3. Come hear some tales of legendary leviathans,

boastful bosuns and mysterious mermaids! Suitable

for age 2 to 102! Any auller than that an I’m sure you hae a tale or two to tell

The family Scots Song workshop will run 3 to 4pm and costs £3. Sing yer hairts oot at this fun Scots song workshop for wee ones and their grown ups – again, unaccompanied grownups are aye welcome!

The pavillion pop up cafe will be open – hot dogs and drinks from £1.

I’m also chuffed tae be takkin part in the Scots Variety Concert in the Whitehills Village Hall at 7pm. I’ll be in fine company wi Doug Hay, Moira Stewart, the Portsoy Pipe Band, local highland dancers, Mike Blackburn, Aaron Clark and Graham Legge!

Book via Whitehills Playing Field on Facebook

or by calling Doug Hay on 07979 360238

Cultural Tides – Doric Workshops at Meethill School

March 11, 2026Leave a comment

As you can see from the second photo, it was a bright and sunny day up in Peterhead yesterday for my first visit to Meethill School as part of the Cultural Tides project organised by Aberdeenshire Museums Service !

I had great fun with the first two Doric workshops – an introduction to Doric in the morning where the P5 and 6 pupils had fun showing off how much Doric they knew, miming Doric words for eachother to guess (10/10 from what I saw!) and creating a Doric vocabulary for use in the other workshops.

In the afternoon they voted (very wisely!) for their favourite of 5 traditional songs connected with Peterheid and the surrounding area, decided what the song was “missing” and added a whole new verse (and a half! Watch this space)

I also got to see the school’s Storytelling Chair for the first time. (First photo) It was made by the folks at HMP Grampian in memory of Mr Black, who was the headteacher until 2024. there are amazing images from childrens’ books all over it and… some of my favourite Doric words!

An ABC visit to Faithlie Care Home

November 12, 2025Leave a comment

A grand visit tae Faithlie Care Home in the Broch on Monday daen Doric ABCs for Doric Books

The theme this wik wis “Skweel” an we hid some grand songs an tales an blethers. We spoke aboot fit wi got intae trouble for fan wi were bairns. Aene quine got the tawse for forgettin her pencil!!

(An then it turned oot aene o the carers hid my mither as a teacher fan she wis a bairn!!)

The Scots Tawse used for corporal punishment (aka “the belt”) in schools. Photo from Wikipedia.

Doric ABCs at Kintore!

November 6, 2025Leave a comment

Fit a grand visit tae the residents o Overdon Care Home in Kintore wi Sheena on Tuesday! This was a session organised by Doric Books far we’ve been daen oor Doric ABCs

Active, Blethers an Community Singing!

The theme this wik wis “Hame” an we hid stories aboot a wifie fa winted a bigger hoose (an mair aifter that), Purley Wurley Puddock an a hale bunch o sangs includin Sheena’s Washin Machine sang!

(Photo fae a ghostie nicht wi did a couple o year ago – we were ower busy tae tak photos on Tuesday!)

Scots Song and Elephant Poo!

September 3, 2025Leave a comment

The things you learn about when teaching Scots Songs!
Last night I was teaching one of three Scots Song sessions at SC&T Youth – 16 amazing singers aged 6 to 11 – and I learned that there is PAPER made out of ELEPHANT POO!

This was all in the context of learning about “The Bonnie Ship The Diamond” of course – Elephant Poo Paper is much more sustainable than the whaling industry was. We like whales, and we like elephants and now we all like Elephant Poo Paper – apparently it feels like silk! 🙂

Teaching Scots Song in Schools with SC&T Youth

May 24, 2025June 8, 2025Leave a comment

I’ve been having a brilliant time in schools the past two weeks teaching Scots Song with SC&T Youth ! The Scottish Traditional Taster Sessions have so far been in Muirfield Primary and Ferryhill Primary with Primary 5, 6 and 7 pupils learning Guitar, Clarsach and Penny Whistle as well as a “Class song” which they sing accompanied by another primary on their instruments and two songs which they sing unaccompanied but along with the other participating classes.

At the end of the week all 3 classes perform their instrumental pieces, class songs and joint songs in front of the rest of the school and teachers – and the two schools I’ve been involved in have totally nailed their performances!

The class songs this year were –
Mary Mac, The Fisherman’s Lassie and The Bonnie Ship The Diamond. Both Mary Mac and the Bonnie Ship were new songs to the repertoire this year and have gone down very well with the pupils!
The joints songs have been the classics Barnyards of Delgaty and The Wellyboot Song.

Convincing P7s that Bothy Ballads are the coolest thing on earth must go down as one of my biggest achievements of 2025!

Week 5 with SC&T Youth!

February 23, 2024Leave a comment

Well today was our last week in Aberdeen’s primary schools as tutors for SC&T Youth! Cornhill Primary School – thankyou for your amazing enthusiasm and wonderful singing!

Once again, pupils from three classes had 4 hours – only 4 hours! of tuition in penny whistle, clarsach, guitar and … Scots Song!

Despite my ever-worsening laryngitis, the pupils of P4, P4/5 and P5 learned to sing The Silver Darlings, The Fisherman’s Lassie and The Barnyards of Delgaty as well as learning all bout the history of the songs and how they describe life in the North East of Scotland. I’ve posted in greater detail about all of these songs in the past few weeks, but I’ve not yet posted about the songs the pupils have been learning for their grand finale!

It is of course Billy Connolly’s The Wellyboot Song – which probably doesn’t need much of an introduction! One of the teachers managed to find this recording of Billy singing it in 1976 -which I can share here cos there’s no swearing! 😀

Noo I’m aff tae nae spik for a wik! 😀

The Silver Darlings (continued!)

February 7, 2024Leave a comment

Anither grand day today at Ashley Road Primary School! The P3, 4 and 5 pupils (2 classes of each!) are fair gettin on wi their class songs – The Fisherman’s Lassie, The Barnyards O Delgaty and The Silver Darlings which I spoke about yesterday. (They’re also learning a fourth song which everyone is to join in with, but more on that in another post!)

There are a few videos online, but I like this one the best – the recording is the original by Alastair McDonald and the film that has been put to the song shows old footage of the fishing fleets and the fish gutting lassies swiftly preparing the fish to be salted and packed into barrels. The pupils fair enjoyed watching it!

Ashley Road School and the Silver Darlings

February 6, 2024Leave a comment

It’s another busy week ! This time starting off with the pupils of Ashley Road School who we Scat Youth tutors are visiting to teach penny whistle, guitar, clarsach and Scots song!

I’m teaching the P3s The Barnyards O Delgaty and the P5s the Fisherman’s Lassie (both of which I’ve spoken about in previous posts)… but the P4s are learning The Silver Darlings – a song about the herring boom in Scotland which peaked in 1907. “The Silver Darlings” is a fond nickname for the herring.

The song was written by Jim McLean, Bob Halfin and Andy Hulskrammer and later on this week I’ll share a video of a recording of it with Alastair McDonald. (Find a discussion of the song origins here on mudcat: https://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=40414 )

The pupils are taught the meaning of the song they’re learning – as well as any unfamiliar Scots words. Many pupils in each school have families who came from farther afield, but no matter where they’re from, they’re all doing a grand job of learning and pronouncing the Scots and Doric!

The image I’ve chosen to illustrate this post is an etching by James McBey (1883-1959) from 1908. The title is “Herring Fleet, Aberdeen” – the etching has made its way across the pond where it is stored at The Boston Public Library Arts Department. James McBey was local to the area and may be familiar to those that visit Aberdeen Art Gallery where there’s a fantastic exhibition of his work. My daughter and I love the interactive display of how etchings were made! (Thoroughly recommended!)

A Grand Week at Sunnybank School

February 2, 2024Leave a comment

I’ve got some braw photies for you today from my week with SC&T Youth at Sunnybank School!

As I said in my post at the start of the week, the P6s were learning The Barnyards O Delgaty – quite the feat for those with non-Scots families, but they pronounced the Scots beautifully and I wis affa impressed wi their “knyot” in Meg MacPherson’s brose!

I posted a link to clarsach tutor Irene singing the song earlier this week, but here’s a link to Bothy Champion Joe Aitken’s performance at the Keith TMSA Festival in 2021 – back when we were still aa daen festivals fae oor livingrooms!

The Barnyards O Delgaty is sung about 22 minutes into Joe’s performance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4yqCYp2O0U

The photo below is of my Dad’s Uncle Willie – taken around 1920. I wanted to show the bairns what ploughing horses looked like, all yokit up. (Uncle Willie is clearly spruced up for this photo, wi his pocket watch and everything!)

The drawings are from a rather talented P6! First she drew one of Uncle Willie’s horses – long after the photo had been taken down off the board! And then she drew me and our cat Apollo