Sunset On Loch Leven

Scottish Country Dance Instruction

1- 8 1s/2s/3s circle 6H round and back, and end drawing 2s into centre to face up nearer hands joined, 1s end in centre nearer hands joined in 1st place facing down, 3s end in original places.
9-16 1s/2s dance The Rondel to change places, 1s end on sidelines facing 3s.
17-24 1s set to and turn 3s ¾, Men LH, Ladies RH (1s outside), finishing with nearer hands joined; 1s dance up between 2s and cast to 2nd place.
25-32 2s/1s dance a Poussette Right Round.
33-40 1s/3s dance The Espagnole:- to end 2,3,1.

(Dance crib compiled by the deviser, David Darbyshire, 2023)

Dance Information

The village of Kinlochleven developed from the building of the aluminium works in the early 1900's. Water to power the turbines to provide about 25MW of electrical power for the aluminium smelters was routed down 6 parallel pipelines about 1 metre in diameter from the Blackwater reservoir, over 1000 feet above the hydroelectric power station. The huge amount of spent water discharge enters the River Leven down a duct under the roadway in a most spectacular fashion. The works were decommissioned in 2000.

The image below shows the mountain Garbh Bheinn to the left. This is the first mountain I ever climbed at age 9 with my cousins who lived below the mountain at a house with the same name.

I originally intended to call my dance Garbh Bheinn but thought that few people would recognise the name and considered Sunset on Loch Leven to be a better name choice.

Suggested Music: Cherry Blossom Time CD2 by Gordon Shand Track 13 Kurazukuri or Cherry Blossom Time CD1 by Gordon Shand Track 14 Great Little Lady.

(Dance information by the deviser, David Darbyshire, 2023)

One is a freshwater loch, the largest lowland loch in Scotland, located immediately to the east of the burgh of Kinross in Perth and Kinross council area, central Scotland.

This dance is named after the other Loch Leven, a seawater loch at the head of Loch Linnhe, which lies between Ballachulish (near the base of Glencoe) and Kinlochleven at its eastern end.

Kinlochleven is a village located in Lochaber, in the Scottish Highlands. To the north lie the Mamores ridge, and to the south lie the mountains flanking Glen Coe.

Loch Leven (pronounced Li' un) extends 8¾ miles (14.1 km), varying in width between 220 yards (200 m) and just over 1 mile (1.6 km). It opens onto Camus a' Chois at North Ballachulish, part of Loch Linnhe at its western end.

There are nine small islands, some rocky and covered with heather, and some just smooth green grass near the western end of the loch. The village of Glencoe lies on its southern shore.

The village of Kinlochleven was formed from two previously separate small communities: Kinlochmore to the north of the River Leven in Inverness-shire and Kinlochbeg to the south of the Leven in Argyll, following the construction of an aluminium smelter and associated housing for its employees.

The processing plant was powered by a hydroelectric scheme situated in the mountains above, making Kinlochleven the first village in the world to have every house connected to electricity, coining the phrase "The Electric Village".

A road connecting the village to Glencoe and the south was not constructed until 1922. Until this date, the village could only be reached from the south by boat or on foot.

Sunset On Loch Leven And Kinlochleven Village
Shows The Mountain Garbh Bheinn, With Pap Of Glencoe In The Distance - Late Afternoon, November 2000

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