Children's Folk Dance and Music

About Northern Lights

Margaret Allenby-Jaffe recruited her first Theatre Group during World War II, whilst still a pupil at Skipton Girls' High School. She was working for Northern Command Voluntary Entertainments Services, and her brief was to provide song and dance for the shows. The first group consisted of eight local girls as dancers, and two singers.

During this period of providing entertainment for many different nationalities, Margaret's lifelong interest in folk dance was born, as she collected folk songs and dances from the allies to add to the group's repertoire. Twenty years later, this interest bore fruit as Margaret and her husband Nigel published various books on European Folk Dance. Together they have visited nearly every country in Europe, from the north of Finland to the south of Spain with a lot more in between! The results of these journeys have been invaluable, unique and wonderful books that in turn have provided the Folk Dance community with enormous amounts of information and insight.

Many years later, they established a Summer Ballet School in North Jutland for the Danish Education Authorities, and thus paved the way for Theatre Group to begin their travels, as they joined the Danish students annually in their productions.

Now the Group has travelled extensively, performing in London, France, Switzerland, Austria, Italy and Spain. They have represented England with great success at the World Folk Dance Festival in Palma, Mallorca on several occasions, gaining the Silver Medal in 2005. They have also appeared at the International Eisteddfod in Llangollen many times, winning First Prize with 94 marks out of 100 in July 2009.

Emma Tillotson performing in Palma, Mallorca, 2005

Northern Lights performed at the World Folk Dance Festival in Palma, Mallorca, from April 14th-18th 2009, and at the International Musical Eisteddfod in Wales on July 11th 2009, where they won FIRST PRIZE!