You may wonder what an Arctic Tern has to do with a glorious MacBrayne’s touring coach and a group of people obviously having fun. Are they vintage birders in flight themselves? Well… the poet Norman Bissell has the answer and it’s quite a story.
Helensburgh based composer, musician and writer Mark Sheridan has been touring his latest production The Flight of the Arctic Tern throughout the Highlands this week. It’s been to Caol, Skye, Raasay, Inverness and Ullapool but the lucky people of Cove got a preview of the show last Saturday night.
Cove Community Hall was filled to the gunwales for this moving story of emigration and land clearances. Local folk even brought along ship’s ropes and anchors to adorn the front of the stage. The local sailing club provided sails to lower the ceiling and give the place something of the feel of the Tall Ship in Glasgow where the show premiered at Celtic Connections in January 2009.
It was introduced by local journalist and broadcaster, Ruth Wishart, and its innovative mix of narrative, music, sound effects and images received a warm reception from an appreciative audience.
It tells the story of how Alexander Gunn left his home in Durness in 1853, at the age of 19 and sailed thousands of miles on the barque, Ivanhoe, from Glasgow to Australia. Veteran broadcaster Iain Anderson splendidly narrated this astonishing tale as a letter sent to him from Gunn in Australia.
A historical and environmental commentary was provided by Gaelic broadcaster, Hugh Dan MacLennan, substituting for Minister for Culture Michael Russell who joined the tour later in the week. This commentary included testimony given to the Napier Commission in 1883 about the Strathnaver Clearances which tragically began whilst Gunn’s father was fighting Napoleon at Waterloo – and these led to the depopulation of much of Sutherland.
The commentary also drew revealing parallels with the annual journey of the Arctic Tern, flying 22,000 miles from the north of Scotland to the Antarctic, Australia and back – and which Gunn wistfully witnessed during his long voyage and on his eventual arrival.
First and foremost, however, this was a personal tale of adventure which compellingly conveyed what it must have been like to make that hazardous voyage.
Every aspect of the ship’s journey was covered from the impressive sight of the shipyards along the Clyde, building dozens of boats; to whales and gannets out in the open sea; from illness and death in stifling heat when the ship was becalmed off Africa to a hurricane in the area known as the Roaring Forties; from encounters with an albatross and penguins in the Antarctic to the final arrival in Australia three months later.
But there were lighter moments too, in the ceilidhs which took place on board; and there were lively accounts of shinty matches on a beach at Balnakeil on New Year’s Day and later in Australia.
The music, which was also composed and orchestrated by Mark Sheridan, perfectly complemented the fluctuating moods of the story with a sprightly fiddle tune accompanying the shinty scenes and his lovely piano playing expressively reflecting the never-ending flight of the albatross. He also adapted traditional Gaelic songs to work with the storyline and wrote new music for some of the poems by the Durness bard, Rob Donn MacKay.
Also in the excellent band were Patsy Reid on fiddle, James Lindsay on bass, and Tom Dalzell on soprano saxophone, some of whom were in the composer’s applied music course at the University of Strathclyde. Matthew Herd filled in for Dalzell during part of the week when he was on Celtic Connections launch duty in Glasgow.
They were joined in Gaelic songs by double National Mod Gold Medallists, Mairi Macinnes and Sineag MacIntyre. Sineag had just won the Gold Medal at the Oban Mod that week and sang beautiful duets with Mairi, both a cappella and in the famous Uist song Gu Mo Slan. Mairi’s poignant rendition of Tha Mo Thriall-s Do Shimeuca (My Journey Lies to Jamaica) was a definite show highlight as was Gleann Gallaidh from a Rob Donn poem. Their final Homecoming song with the full band ended the show on an appropriately driving upbeat note.
This production was also a triumph for the other half of the Sheridan household because it was directed by the author’s wife, Marion Sheridan, who also took many of the stunning projected photographs of the sands at Durness with the waves pounding in; and the shots of ruined houses, empty glens and old gravestones which accompanied the narrative in places.
She also incorporated highly effective sound effects of the sea, gull cries and the creak of the ship which added essential atmosphere throughout the piece.
There could not be a better show to capture the true spirit of what Homecoming means to the people of the Highlands. It deserves a much wider audience in other parts of Argyll and throughout Scotland.
Meantime you can listen to the whole show on a great double CD; and see now some of the images, with additional information, on the Flight of the Arctic Tern website
Reporter: Norman Bissell, Scottish Centre for Geopoetics, Isle of Luing.
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