“Awa we Gaed tae Aikey”
Directed and written by Duncan Harley. An Iron Broo film performed by Charlie Abel & Fred Wilkinson. Narrated & edited by Charlie Abel. Doric supervisors Alison Abel (my ma fae Turra) and Grace Banks.
It’s the day after the 2nd of July 2019 and today we can release our shortlisted entry to the first-ever Doric Film Festival. “Awa we gaed tae Aikey”. The awards and presentations took place yesterday afternoon in the Belmont Cinema, Aberdeen.
There were around 240 guests packed in to screen 1 to see the awards and the entries shown on the big screen. There were over 30 entries and there were 3 categories. Schools, individuals and community groups. We were were in the community groups section and were shortlisted to the final 4, only one of which would get the coveted Doric Oscar. The winner of our group was from Torry Community Group. I was curious to find out if any of the participants stayed on OSCAR ROAD 🙂 (that’s an aptly named street in Torry)
Their film was an excellent piece on the history of Torry.
Every film I saw on the day was a winner so it must have been difficult for the judges to sit through 30+ films and choose a winner. Each film I saw had something very special about it. From the old footage of Aberdeen Harbour and old Torry, to the Fishing Boats of the Bloo Toon with Meethill Primary. There wis family poems and stories with video acted out, the whole thing was very moving for any doric person. To my knowledge, It’s the first time our culture has been celebrated in a film festival
Onyhoo…
We were fair tricket to be shortlisted into the final 4 in the Community category of the Doric Film Festival with our film Awa we gaed tae Aikey.
The Doric festival was a great success and brought in talent from across the northeast with some fantastic short film entries from schools, individuals and community groups. We thoroughly enjoyed working on our film about Aikey Brae with real northeast doric language and music.
When I was at school I remember being told off and even excluded from lessons for speaking doric in class, it happened a few times but now it warms my heart to see so many people celebrate oor mither tongue. A creative and descriptive language reekin o’ history and hard toil.
The film was Duncan Harley’s concept, and I would personally like to thank him for inviting myself and Fred to join him in the creation of the film. We learned a lot of tricks in the process and are looking forward to our next project. We hope the Doric Film Festival will continue and become an annual event. It’s sair needed in oor toon.
A big thanks to Frieda Morrison and her team for making the whole thing happen.
Entries will be available online I believe, very shortly https://doricfilmfestival.com/
If you are interested in Aberdeenshire history, please check out Duncan Harley’s recent book “The Little History of Aberdeenshire”
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Little-History-Aberdeenshire-Duncan-Harley/dp/0750989297
We released the music track “Aikey Brae” online. It’s on Amazon, iTunes, Spotify etc. A radio edit and the version of the full verse with the doric monologue as written by the original author G.S. Morris.
You can download the tracks for pennies. Less than a bug o tattie crisps. Please dae as we sair need the siller.
Here’s a CdBaby link https://store.cdbaby.com/cd/charlieabel3
Our website https://www.ironbroo.scot
my website https://www.charlieabel.scot
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pg/CeilidhAberdeen