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Twin Sisters Study Scottish Dance

Cheryl Bentley/SUNCOAST

Ally Rogerson, left, and twin sister Emma study Scottish Highland dancing. The Trinity-area girls have won trophies and medals at Highland dance festivals

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By Cheryl  Bentley | The Suncoast News

Published: September 24, 2008

when she was 8, as a science fair project at Longleaf Elementary School, in the Trinity area, Emma Rogerson chose to create a shoe that would give maximum height in jumps to help her in her Scottish Highlands dance.

Not to be outdone, using scientific principles, her twin sister Ally created a dance mat for another Scottish dance.

Now 10, the twins are still in the thralls of the Scottish Highland dance. They have collected numerous medals and trophies in dance competitions in this country and Canada and have been given scholarships the past two years by the New World Celts to study the dance in Canada.

The Dunedin chapter is the largest of the organization, which now has national and international chapters, and was founded eight years ago in Safety Harbor.

According to the twins' teacher, Diana Dubock, Scottish dancing evolved from competitions heads of clans gave in the 16th century to choose bodyguards.
"It's full of fun and jumps and leaps," Dubock notes.
Later, Scottish dances and classical ballet came together as French and Scottish royalty married to shore up their countries against their common enemy, England. Both dances are characterized by leaps and have common terms, such as the pas de basque, a move somewhere between a step and a leap.
"Pretty cool," is how Emma sums up the dance. Both girls mention it is not only a dance but also a sport.
And a rigorous one at that. According to their teacher Dubock, a three-minute Highland fling typically has 252 hops. Three minutes of dancing the fling is the equivalent of running a mile, Dubock explains.
The girls travel to Dubock's Spring Hill-area studio twice a week for hourlong classes. Dubock is one of only eight Scottish dance teachers in Florida, she says. Her students come from as far away as Daytona Beach and Gainesville and range in age from 5 to 57.
The twins also practice for about half an hour a day at home in Trinity. "You start with exercise. Then you do dances, and you get tired. You stay on your toes and dance," Ally explains.
Competitions both in the United States and Canada are incentives for the girls to keep on their dancing toes. They are the "funnest" of all the Scottish dance activities, Emma notes.
The Scottish Official Board of Highland Dancing choses the steps that will be in each dance featured in the year's competitions. Students in each of four divisions compete for trophies and medals and move to higher divisions with enough wins.
Competitors are dressed in traditional Scottish dress. That can be expensive, noted the twins' mother Darya Rogerson. A pair of hand-knitted Argyle socks can run as much as $300 a pair, she said. She was able to buy discounted ones for $150. Kilts are about $200, vests $100 and ghillies, the soft shoes worn during many types of Irish and Scottish dancing, from $30 up.
Still, said Rogerson, the dance is worth the expense. Her daughters' self-esteem has skyrocketed by studying dance, she said. "It has propelled them to another level of feeling good about themselves."
It has also developed a sense of family history. Darya's mother was Canadian and did not leave that country until she was 18.The girls' father Jeff, a project engineer for Colorado-based Flatiron Construction, grew up in Prince Edward Island in Canada. His mother and grandmother both did Highland dancing there.
Today, Ally and Emma dance for both grandmother and great-grandmother, who is now 95, during vacations in Prince Edward Island.
That connection with their heritage is no small thing, said Ron Barnette, a Dunedin resident. Barnette is chairman of the scholarship committee of the local chapter of the heritage group New World Celts, which has awarded the twins dance scholarships the past two years.
"We find discipline and learning and appreciation of their own heritage is important for their growth and achievement."

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