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Issue 2369: The Flight of the Sand-Martins

Object
The Flight of the Sand-Martins (Dance)
Submitter
Stephen Webb (SJW)
Assigned to
—
Priority
Normal
Disposition
Accepted
Description

This dance was devised by Patrick G Bankart and published in May 1954 in Reel 18. You have given a link to it already. It is a 40b Reel with 2 chords. The reference to jig was because in 1954 there was hardly any40b recordings available. The diagram in Reel 18 on p5 clearly shows a 4C set. It is not devised by Jack McConachie as suggested by Dance no 908. This 908 entry should be removed. And the date 1954 added after Patrick’s name. Note the hyphen in the name. Many thanks

Previous Actions

  • Date  March 12, 2021, 6:06 p.m.
  • User  Stephen Webb (SJW)

New issue submitted

  • Date  March 14, 2021, 10:49 p.m.
  • User  Anselm Lingnau (anselm)

Disposition changed to »Accepted« (previously »New«)

There was considerable discussion about this on the Strathspey list a few years ago, and before we make any changes to the database we should review that discussion, just to be sure.

  • Date  Jan. 21, 2023, 6:23 p.m.
  • User  Viktor Lehmann (tone2tone)

This is not as simple. It is almost not possible to summarise ALL former discussions and research on this matter. The only thing clear is: it exists in a multitude of variations. Apart from “The Reel” version, there are sheets floating around crediting one of the 48 bar versions to Jack McConachie. It is almost impossible to tell which one was first, which one is or should be the “official” version or how to deal with the multitude of variations on SCDDB. We had such issues before.
Therefore, any suggestion is welcome. Purely deleting one version and “uncrediting” one of the authors might be not our usual way to go.
My suggestion would be to go with the published version as in “The Reel”, crediting THIS version to Patrick G Bankhart and keeping the crib for THAT version. We could come up with extensiv extra notes trying to cover most of the facts we know about possible other devisers/variations and bar changes.
The other suggestion would be to keep both entries, keeping Bankhart as the one version that was reliable published (40 bar), and making the McConachie version the collecting pot for the 48 bar versions with extended extra notes. (If I stand correct, we had it before to keep substantially different versions of dances as separate entries, yet not that often under the same name). One of the McConahie unofficial sheets even shows the spelling “Sandmartins” (no hyphen, one word) and so and and so forth… I think it cannot be our goal to resolve this “historically correct”, but to describe the things floating around without damaging anyone’s possible credit.

  • Date  Feb. 28, 2023, 6:30 p.m.
  • User  Tim Bolton-Maggs (Timbletoes)

When I was taking the Oxford University Scottish Society classes in the mid-1960s I created the “Friday File” which was a collection of dances we used for the advanced group (which met in Somerville College on Friday evenings). One of the entries was “The Flight of the Sandmartins”. I have no idea of its provenance but Jack McConachie was active in Oxford SCD circles at that time so it could easily have been passed on by someone who learned it from him. A London connection is not precluded, however, as some of our members danced in London groups.