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He's a radio legend with a huge and avid band of listeners. Kenny Kemp takes the floor with Robbie Shepherd - that's MBE, not DJ

ROBBIE is sipping an 18-year-old Macallan in one of Glasgow's expensive nightspots. It's a disgraceful #7.50 a nip, which is hard to bear for an Aberdonian who used to count ha'pennies and threepenny bits for a living. Still, he isn't paying this time.

It's the last Thursday evening before Christmas and the Corinthian is hoaching with the vacuously hip and happening in their shiny glad- rags. Robbie talks with vitality about the merits of drum and bass, he waxes lyrical about the importance of strict tempo, and he even mentions an old mate who was going to play at Madonna's wedding gig in Dornoch that evening. But the talk is also of the legendary Jimmy Shand, a long-time friend who has been very ill. Few of the designer- suited men recognised this grey-haired celebrity wearing his black leather jacket, steel-rimmed specs and an off-pink shirt. Yet this is Robbie Shepherd - Robbie Shepherd MBE since his inclusion in the New Year's Honour's list - BBC Radio Scotland's longest running presenter who next week celebrates 20 years as host of the Scottish dance programme, Take The Floor.

He is in Glasgow recording his Hogmanay radio show at the City Chambers, but a day later Shepherd was back at home in Bridge of Don when he received the sad and inevitable phone call about the loss of one of Scotland's greatest musicians. Sir Jimmy of Auchtermuchty had passed away.

"He was a charming guy, a proper family man. Myself and my wife, Esma, got to know him very well over the years and we became very close to the whole family," recalls Shepherd after the news is broken.

Shepherd is in the Shand mould; modest and gently self-mocking. And he too has played a crucial part in keeping the Scottish music flame alive. His Saturday evening show at 6.30pm is warm and couthy, a homely glimpse of the other Scotland which still exists beyond the earshot of the self-consciously cool young city folks who prefer the ephemera of Moby and Eminem.

After the announcement of Sir Jimmy's death, Shepherd and his production team postponed their scheduled programme for a live tribute to Jimmy Shand, broadcast from Beechgrove Studios in Aberdeen. It was a poignant and tearful affair.

"I heard at 8am on Saturday morning and we decided it was possible to do the show. Everyone downed tools to help. Freeland Barbour of the Occasionals rushed up from Edinburgh and bandleader Jim Johnston and Ian Cameron, who wrote Jimmy's biography, all chipped in. We also had Ian Powrie, himself an accordion legend, on the phone from Australia.

"It was a sincere tribute for a truly great musical ambassador and it had to be done very quickly."

Shepherd's normal programme is a wonderful mix of button and piano accordion, toe-tapping fiddle and drums. It has a kailyard north- east of Scotland style, but it is razor sharp in hitting its target audience and is among the best on the whole network. Shepherd gets fan mail from Ireland, Scandinavia and the US, where recording of his programmes are highly sought. But next week he is going online - digital radio will increase the range - and he expects this to increase the listenership overseas.

Alongside Sir Jimmy Shand, there are a host of other names which trip off the tongue; Bobby McLeod from Tobermory, Ian Powrie, Andrew Rankin, Jim McLeod, Adam Rennie and Jim Cameron. And, with Edinburgh's George Street hosting the world's largest Strip The Willow last night, the attraction of that music remains. The Gay Gordons, the Eightsome Reels and the Dashing White Sergeants have stood the test of time in Scotland - ingrained in the Scottish soul. And hearing it played on the radio by the finest exponents remains a sublime experience for thousands.

If anyone suggested removing Robbie Shepherd from the radio schedule there would be a country-wide outcry, with farmers from Echt and Foggieloan likely to blockade the Beeb's HQ in Queen Margaret Drive. The powers-that-be know this. Scottish controller John McCormick recently suggested that Shepherd might like to cut his Sunday morning show, the Reel Blend, to 90 minutes because he would be getting the benefit of extra exposure because of the arrival of digital radio. Shepherd, quietly spoken at the best of times, would have none of it. He told McCormick firmly that two hours was what he wanted. And that remains the case today.

But nothing is for ever. And while Shepherd has never missed a regular programme in 20 years - even when he goes on holiday he pre- records his shows - he hits 65 in April.

"There will come a time when a new voice will have to take the music forward. I'll have few regrets when that happens. I've had a marvellous run," says Shepherd.

"I've had the privilege of working with some fantastic people in the BBC. My current producer, Kenny Mutch, has been a great friend and stalwart. Then there was Freeland Barbour, so professional and meticulous. He taught me a huge deal about broadcasting. (Indeed, Barbour's band the Occasionals were the Christmas guests rescheduled to make way for the Shand tribute).

"But really I owe it all to Arthur Argo, the Aberdeen broadcaster and writer. He brought me into Beechgrove Garden in Aberdeen and gave me the break."

Apart from the most wonderfully distinctive Doric accent, Shepherd reckons his broadcasting success is that he doesn't compete with his guest bands. "There's no ego involved for me because I'm not a threat. I'm not a musician. All I want to do is present the dance bands in the best possible light."

Shepherd was born in Dunecht, outside Aberdeen, in 1936, the same year that the Radio Times first noted it was recording Scottish dance music. He recalls lying in bed at home, where his father was a cobbler and mother an enthusiastic amateur pianist. "I remember listening one balmy summer night to the village hall next door and the sounds of Jim Cameron band."

Shepherd's mother, Helen, who is 92, tried to encourage him to stick in at his piano lessons, but he admits he didn't have the talent. He did have the talent for maths and won a bursary to Robert Gordon's in Aberdeen. But he was forced to leave school at 15, when his father fell ill, and he took a job as an audit assistant for 30 shillings a week in the accountancy firm of John Watt in Union Terrace. Shepherd worked hard at night school, eventually becoming a chartered management accountant.

Shepherd, who married in 1961, has lived in Bridge of Don since 1964. There is nothing flashy about him and he says he prefers the home life. "I just bought the house because it had a big garden, and we like gardening."

"I spent 13 years then with Clayben, the fish processing and transport company which was part of Salvesen group." He was involved in many larger deals and a management buy-out before being brought in to radio by Arthur Argo to commentate on sheep dog trials. It was then he made the decision to concentrate on his radio work. "If I'd stayed with Clayben, I would never have had the time to do radio work. I was very lucky, I just left at the right time."

Shepherd is concerned about the future. "I do worry that the five- piece band, which features two accordions, fiddle, double bass and drums, is in decline. It's the cost. Today, you have to pay a lot for a dance band and the modern midi-systems on an accordion means that a band leader can play without a bass and drums. I'm afraid the wonderful driving sound of the double bass - a hallmark of the music - is fast disappearing."

The scene has also moved on. When Shepherd began in 1981, the free- form ceilidh scene was just beginning to influence the rigid tempos of the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society, which insisted that every step be put down properly. Now the younger generation has loosened all that up.

This, and the passing of Shand, has been viewed wistfully by Shepherd. "I was brought up with the great Scottish dance band leaders playing live on the radio, and that is changing. Soon it might be time for someone younger to take over."