The difference from most family get togethers, however, is that the Spences will be doing it on national television.

Well used to appearing on television and radio himself with his day job, as soon as Erik came up with the idea, he phoned producer Bob Kenyon of Kenyon Productions and pitched him the idea of getting the family together to play.

"At that time they were recording a music series from Tulloch Castle in Dingwall, but felt it was going to be too much of a rush," Spence added.

However, the producer liked the idea and the Spence family group, now named Colvadale, will make their world debut on STV's "Ceol" Christmas special on Monday.

First, however, the Inverness branch of the family had to be properly introduced to their island counterparts and headed for Unst, Shetland's most northerly island, to meet up with cousin Steven.

"I'd never met him before, but I was very keen to in light of what we were proposing," Erik explained.

Steven Spence, whose father is Erik's first cousin, is a well established Shetland fiddler and former member of the band Hom Bru. He is also recognised as a major influence on the band Fiddlers Bid, who continue to perform some of his original compositions. A pupil of the renowned fiddler Tom Anderson, Steven began composing at the age of 11 with a tune written for his mother and has produced his own album and book of original compositions, both entitled "Spencie's Tunes", with a follow up album "Spencie's Tunes Volume 2", released last month.

That initial meeting was a success and Erik made a later trip to the islands to meet up with Steven and another relation, Steven's first cousin Gary Peterson, for a session in Lerwick.

"I just felt it was good to get a wee Spences session, nothing more than that," Erik commented ahead of the recording. Hopefully it will all come together because we have never played as a unit before. All we had was one session in Gary's house."

Colvadale, which takes its name from Erik's grandparents' home on Unst, will feature Steven on fiddle, Erik on keyboards and accordion, Gary, who is still a serving member of Hom Bru, on banjo and mandolin and Erik's daughter Iona, a photographer with The Inverness Courier, on acoustic guitar and flute.

The Spence family will also be augmented by one non-family member, well known Inverness pianist Jackie MacDonald, for some of their sets in the programme.

The Clan Spence and friends recording for STV. Bobby Nelson

"I was quite keen to use the material that Steven himself had written," Erik added.

"We bandied some ideas about and came up with two selections, 'Spencie's trip to Edinburgh' and a reel he wrote for his son, 'George's Reel'. Then I thought, since I'm playing your tunes, you can play one of mine," Erik laughed.

So the set for the show will include his best known tune, "Alone With My Thoughts", a tribute to a young Marine killed in the Falklands War in June 1982. The song, with Gaelic lyrics by a Highland minister, was BBC Scotland's winning entry for the Pan-Celtic Festival in Killarney in 1984.

The set will finish with three traditional Shetland reels and in keeping with the family theme, the last of these is "John Spence of Uyeasound", named after Erik's uncle.

This will not be the only opportunity to see Steven Spence on television. He was interviewed by Martin Clunes for the "Men Behaving Badly" star's new documentary series "Islands of Britain", which will be screened by ITV1 early in 2009. He and Clunes hit it off so well that Steven gave the actor a fiddle which he has passed on to his young daughter, raising the prospect of some Shetland-style fiddling in the Clunes household in a few years time.

As for the Spence family's future outings, Erik acknowledged that distance was an issue.

"I suppose with modern technology you can file stuff and interact with people," he said.

"But at the end of the day it's all about getting together, so who knows?"

* "Ceol Special" will be screened by STV on ITV1 at 11.40pm on Monday.

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