Renewing Aquaintance

In Scotland, the practice of giving presents was recorded by the Church in 1693 (the year after the MacDonalds lost their Glencoe franchise) as follows: "It is ordinary among some Plebeians in the South of Scotland, to go about from door to door upon New Year's Eve, crying Hagmane."

There isn't space in this article to ponder on the derivations of First Footing, although the custom of ensuring that the first foot is male and dark is believed to be a throwback to the Viking days when blond strangers arriving on your doorstep meant trouble. So where was I?

In Scotland , Auld Lang Syne gradually displaced an older song Goodnight and Joy Be Wi' You A' . It was probably sung before, but it was first written down in the 1700's. Robert Burns is the person whose transcription got the most attention, though he never claimed authorship, so the song is associated with him, but how do we account for its global popularity? Well, of course, generations of Scots living in other parts of the world have made sure they kept their heritage intact, but the real reason for the song's popularity - in North America at least - lies with a Canadian bandleader by the name of Guy Lombardo.

Lombardo first heard the song in his youth sung by Scottish immigrants to his home town of London , Ontario , and when he founded a band - the Royal Canadians - with his brother in 1916, he introduced the song when they played for a Scottish audience in Glencoe; no, not the one mentioned above but the Canadian one.

When the band got the chance to headline a New Year's Eve party at New York 's Waldorf Astoria in 1929, they played Auld Lang Syne approaching midnight and counted down. Such was the impact that for nearly fifty years after that, Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians played each New Year's Eve on radio and, later, on television specials from the Waldorf, with the song becoming a Hogmanay staple.

Now there are pop versions of the song, disco remixes and even a controversial single of the Lord's Prayer set to the tune of Auld Lang Syne. George Reynoso, an independent music retailer in El Paso , Texas , sells a CD through his website that includes country, polka and dance versions of the tune, claiming to have got the idea from a hard-to-find Mexican dance version of the song called Corrido de Auld Lang Syne .

This most popular of Burns' songs has become the song among English-speaking peoples for bidding farewell to the old year and welcoming the new. It combines a theme of present conviviality with a poignant sense of the loss of earlier companionship brought about by both time and distance and is undeniably perfect for a Hogmanay on which we reflect on days gone forever and days yet to come.

If you're fortunate enough to be singing Auld Lang Syne this Hogmanay, never mind if you get the words wrong or cross your arms when you should be holding hands; the fact that we are honouring the words of a Scotsman born more than two hundred and fifty years ago is a cause for rejoicing in itself.

Have a happy, healthy and peaceful New Year.