A More General Question

[6April1320]

Does anyone else find that, more and more, our beloved Highland festivals and games are becoming pan-Celtic games?

Don't get me wrong. I love our Irish brothers and sisters and have all the respect in the world for the rest of the Seven Nations. But why does it seem to be getting harder and harder to find festivals featuring a solid slate of entertainers that are Scottish or play strictly Scottish music?

Welcoming all thoughts.

[Rex_Tremende]

Possibly because it's increasingly more expensive to produce an event, and in order to draw sufficient enough crowds to warrant one, you need to appeal to a wider audience, and also attract a a broader base of vendors willing to pay for their few square feet of space on site. It could also be that there are competing events within driving vicinity, and you might have to take what you can get. Finally, it could have something to do with rival factions vying for control and behind-the-scenes politics that sometimes happens when missions collide over scarce resources.

Those are my thoughts.

Regards,
Rex.

[Mael Coluim]

Spot on, Rex!

[Phogfan86]

Rex from way downtown -- BANG.

I know the Highland games I usually attend are a political nightmare to organize, full of personal agendas and dual relationships. I wouldn't join a Highland games board if you overpaid me.

I also think that, well, most regular garden variety folks don't know the difference between Scotland and Ireland, so it happens.

[6April1320]

A logical response, Rex, and one that I have heard several times before. And I will not deny that, especially in tough economic times, every event is fighting for the potential attendee's dollar.

Yet, from my culturally-stifled little spot in the world, I need drive no more than 100 miles to attend festivals dedicated to the following traditions: Irish, Greek, Native American (though, I'll grant you, many tribes are represented), Polish, Serbian, German and Italian.

As one who likes to experience different cultures, I have been to these festivals in recent years. They seem to find a couple of days' worth of entertainment, food and attractions unique to their heritage. So, I don't know about that reasoning.

[Riverkilt]

Well, I AM my Irish brother as well as a Son of Somerled.

I happen to enjoy the mix since I am a Celtic mutt, and I imagine most who are fortunate enough to research their family tree will find a similar mix.

Many games use the word Celtic in their name. Don't think there's a subversive effort to "dilute" the purity of the Scottish race - and good luck figuring out just what that is with eons of invasions...highland, lowland, island, etc. I like to honor the various pan-Celtic branches of my family tree and a "Celtic" gathering, or a Highland games with Irish, Welsh, Viking, et.al. booths and vendors allows me to do just that.

I just found out a few months ago that I am descended from Scandanavian blood. Makes sense as a Son of Somerled/Clan Donald descendent. Makes the Viking presence at Highland Games seem welcome to me rather than intrusive. Apparently Skye was just a way station, as was Cape Breton Island, on my family's journey to the Colonies.

My grandfather Murdoch had no love for the Irish...but he didn't know he had a strong Irish line. Ironic eh? Each of my four grandparents has a strong Irish line. Even with the logic of Somerled, finding out my DNA is Scandanavian forced me to make an adjustment in my concept of my heritage.

Can't we all just get along?


Ron
Scottish, English, Irish, Welsh, Viking, German, Dutch blood that he knows about so far.
(and yes...I do know that Vikings apparently didn't actually wear horned helmets)

[davedove]

Yet, from my culturally-stifled little spot in the world, I need drive no more than 100 miles to attend festivals dedicated to the following traditions: Irish, Greek, Native American (though, I'll grant you, many tribes are represented), Polish, Serbian, German and Italian.

Perhaps these festivals don't have any trouble getting sufficient attendance.

Or perhaps the Scottish groups have become so entrenched in the general population that people don't tend to differentiate them anymore. The Scottish have been coming over since the earliest days of the English colonies. Big influxes of the other groups came later, so perhaps they're still recent enough for people to maintain the difference in their minds. It seems to me that the Scottish, and the Welsh, tend to get lumped into a general "British" background.

Who knows?

[SteveB]

As we are a kilted clan,
I have always found it amusing the number of vendors of items associated with Scotland at the local Irish festival. Haggis and kilts, and the bucket shops of genealogy for the clan septs and "arms". Including one year of Highland Games demonstrations and competition.
The New Hampshire Highland Games did an excellent job of putting together an event that was predominately Scottish. Most of the Celtic performers did their Scottish material with very little of the Irish showing. The vendors were all Scottish oriented, and the event was special in that nature. As a member of NHScot, (the sponsor) I can well appreciate the work it takes to schedule all the factions that it takes to get the games to happen.
I have the mix of ancestry by way of Ulster to my Scot roots. Happily Scot-Irish-Dutch-German-French-American MUTT.
Slainte

[6April1320]

First of all, I have no beef with festivals that call themselves "Celtic." I know what I'm getting when I attend such events and I enjoy them very much. My initial post is directed at those that bill themselves as Highland games or Scottish festivals. If I pay my money under the impression that it is to be a celebration of things Scottish, is that not what I should get?

Second, I fail to see how anything I have written could be taken to imply that I am in any way concerned with the diluting of the Scottish race, Riverkilt. Please. My Irish girlfriend and two Irish best friends would find that amusing. No, my post wasn't about that. It was an observation that those of us of Scottish heritage, with whatever else it may be mixed, may enjoy the opportunity to celebrate that culture without having to share the proverbial stage for, oh, a couple of days out of every year, exactly in the same manner as the other cultures I have mentioned do, and rightly so.

Third, I have no problem with a Scottish festival hosting an Irish musician or pan-Celtic band. But when the bill is dominated by Irish groups and/or generically Celtic performers, it is a Scottish festival in name only. And that is what I find disappointing.

[Kilted.Genarian]

I'm under the impression that event insurance rates are prohibitive and that it's much more cost-effective to 'join forces' than to try to sponsor a strictly 'Scottish' or 'Irish' event. When the insurer hears 'hammer throw', 'caber toss', or 'stone put' in combination with 'beer', 'whisky' and 'wandering spectators' they tend to quote $ figures that could purchase an ambulance or two!