“There shouldn’t be too many speeches,” says Joe Campbell, Honorary President of the Robert Burns World Federation, interviewed in Rab Ha’s in Glasgow. “It’s a night for rejoicing.”
”The key elements to me are a bunch of people that are going to come along with an open mind and listen to what’s going on,” says Fergus Muirhead, Vice-President of Barcelona Burns Club.
“I know there are rules and regulations, but I don’t think there should be,” says historian David Ross. “I think that the night unfolding and a few folk getting up to do a turn is more than enough.”
For the food and drink, Campbell says it’s sufficient to have cockaleekie soup (a vegetable soup with prunes in it), haggis, neeps and potatoes, then cheese and biscuits.
“I carried huge amounts of haggis to Spain and Italy last year,” says Muirhead, “to have as starters for Burns Suppers, but the main course was a local dish. It can be anything.”
As regards the speeches, Campbell says that the immortal memory “has got to be serious to the extent that those present should be reminded that this was no ordinary man.”
“If someone who’s addressing the haggis understands what it’s about,” says Muirhead, “then they can get that across to the audience rather than someone that’s just reciting from the words in front of them.”
”Generally I come away every time flabbergasted at the talent that your ordinary guy in the street can come out with,” says Ross, “but that’s what makes the night for me, it’s not the strictures of it. I think Burns himself would be the man to have appreciated that.”
A TOAST:
- Burns Supper: key elements 3
- Burns Supper: key elements
- For more Burns info vsit www.rbwf.org.uk, www.rabhas.com and www.santjordigolf.com/en/Burns-Club
