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BBC Scotland Television First Broadcast
Fiona Grant
March 14, 2013, 8 a.m. (Message 63857)
Replying to the question about what was danced on 14 March 1952 as part of the second television broadcast from Scotland: From BBC Scotland: http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/aboutus/wirelesstoweb/history/ >Television had a sombre start in Scotland with the broadcast of the funeral of King George VI on 15 February 1952. Four weeks later the Kirk O'Shotts transmitter aired Television Comes To Scotland from Edinburgh's large music studio to the whole of the UK. The show featured a prayer of dedication, a vote of thanks from the Lord Provost of Edinburgh, followed by ten minutes of Scottish country dancing. It didn't go down well in London with the Controller commenting, "Speeches dreadful. This sort of television dullness is most depressing." Luckily, the audience was won over with programmes such as the first TV play, JM Barrie's The Old Lady Shows Her Medals, news and parliamentary coverage and the first television outside broadcast at the Edinburgh Festival Tattoo. And: >The Kirk O'Shotts station in Lanarkshire was officially launched on March 14, 1952. The first TV programme to be broadcast in Scotland showed the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society performing the Duke of Edinburgh Reel. >The opening ceremony was held in Studio One in Broadcasting House, Edinburgh. The first clip you hear is Lord Tedder, Marshall of the RAF, as he invites the Right Honorable James Stuart, Secretary of State for Scotland, to declare the station open, which you can hear in the second clip. Radio Times notes that the band was Tim Wright and his band: See: http://www.raretunes.org/performers/tim-wright-band Tim Wright Band A popular Edinburgh dance band associated with the Cavendish ballroom in the city. The band was formed in the 1930s and broadcast on the early Scottish dance Music programme on BBC radio. They recorded for the Scottish Country Dance Society and became popular at Hunt and Highland Balls. The band featured on the first programme televised from Scotland. The band's unique sound came from having several fiddlers (and no accordion) and their adherence to scored arrangements (by Frank Moy) of rare tunes sourced from the old collections. Tim Wright provided piano accompaniment and the band also featured Andy Bathgate on clarinet. Wright retired in 1959 and the band was continued under pianist Jimmy McIntosh. The band was revived in the 1970s under the leadership of Andy Bathgate and the name The Cavendish Dance Band. Highly likely that the dance was the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh, as the studio was in Edinburgh, it was most likely that it was Edinburgh branch dancing, and Allie Anderson and Florence Leslie were members of the branch and they had written the dance recently. As the broadcast was live, there is no archive of the programme, but a sound recording was made of Tedder's opening speech, which is now in the BBC archive. Fiona, Bristol,UK
Re: Are there no surviving copies of The Kilt is my Delight? I've looked at your link and can't see any. I remember watching the programme and seeing my Highland Dance teacher - Bobby Watson perform. Great excitement when television had only just arrived in NE Scotland! Jean Martin Aberdeen The only BBC archive copy of The Kilt is My Delight is of one broadcast, dated 19 June 1962, featuring Jimmy Shand and a set of youthful, elegant and accomplished dancers who do the two handed quicktime turns with skip change of step, not pas de basque. Moira Anderson sings. Fiona Bristol UK