The Junior Trad band opens with Dr Iain Dunnachie’s charming comedy An Evening Sail, where one hapless sailor’s determination to take his boat out leads to disaster after disaster, including escaping boats and wayward dogs! The Senior Trad band accompanies Winter in Scotland, a beautifully filmed educational short capturing frozen Scottish scenery.

Denny High School concludes with Jean L. Gray’s mesmerising Witch Craft, a prizewinning experimental short that uses textured glass, ink in water, and animated figures to create surreal visual poetry. Gray was a pioneering Edinburgh filmmaker and rare female presence in the male-dominated amateur film world of the time. Her work demonstrated remarkable technical ingenuity, using the tools, materials and environments available to her to make cutting-edge experimental work.

Dir. Dr Iain Dunnachie | UK | 1954 N/C U | b&w | 6 mins

Performing live: YMI Falkirk Junior Trad Band

Joint Production: SEFA and SFC, Templar Film Studios | UK | 1956 N/C U | colour | 9 mins

Performing live: YMI Falkirk Senior Trad Band

Dir. Jean L. Gray | UK | 1938 | N/C U colour | 5 mins

Performing live: Connor Campbell, Katie Clark, Bethany Ford, Stafaniya Martsul, Nathan Winters.

Screening material courtesy of National Library of Scotland Moving Image Archive.