Corrina Hewat (born 21 December 1970, Edinburgh) is a Scottish harpist and composer [1] who was awarded Music Tutor of the Year at Na Trads in 2013. [2] She has worked with poet Robin Robertson [3] and has written music for the Dunedin Consort. She sings with Karine Polwart and Annie Grace in what they describe as a 'girly trio' [4] and also appeared with Polwart on Lau's 2009 Arc Light album. She has collaborated with Patsy Reid (original founder of Breabach) and others as The Unusual Suspects. In July 2008 she performed with Bella Hardy at London's Royal Albert Hall as part of the first Folk Prom. In 2006 she appeared on Kathryn Tickell's The Sky Didn’t Fall album.
Kathryn Tickell, OBE, DL is an English musician, noted for playing the Northumbrian smallpipes and fiddle.
The BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards celebrate outstanding achievement during the previous year within the field of folk music, with the aim of raising the profile of folk and acoustic music. The awards have been given annually since 2000 by British radio station BBC Radio 2.
Martyn Bennett was a Canadian-Scottish musician who was influential in the evolution of modern Celtic fusion, a blending of traditional Celtic and modern music. He was a piper, violinist, composer and producer. He was an innovator and his compositions crossed musical and cultural divides. Sporting dreadlocks at the height of his performing career, his energetic displays led to descriptions such as "the techno piper". Diagnosis of serious illness at the age of thirty curtailed his live performances, although he completed a further two albums in the studio. He died fifteen months after release of his fifth album Grit.
The Celtic Connections festival started in 1994 in Glasgow, Scotland, and has since been held every January. Featuring over 300 concerts, ceilidhs, talks, free events, late night sessions and workshops, the festival focuses on the roots of traditional Scottish music and also features international folk, roots and world music artists. The festival is produced and promoted by Glasgow Life. Donald Shaw, a founding member of Capercaillie, was appointed Celtic Connections Artistic Director in 2006.
Karine Polwart is a Scottish singer-songwriter. She writes and performs music with a strong folk and roots feel, her songs dealing with a variety of issues from alcoholism to genocide. She has been most recognised for her solo career, winning three awards at the BBC Folk Awards in 2005, and was previously a member of Malinky and Battlefield Band.
The Scots Trad Music Awards or Na Trads were founded in 2003 by Simon Thoumire to celebrate Scotland's traditional music in all its forms and create a high profile opportunity to bring the music and music industry into the spotlight of media and public attention. Nominations are made by the public and in 2019 over 100,000 public votes were expected across 18 categories.
Malinky is a Scottish folk band specialising in Scots song, formed in autumn 1998.
Patsy Seddon is a Scottish harpist, violinist and traditional singer in Scots and Gaelic.
Rachel Hair is a folk harpist from Scotland. She plays the Celtic harp, also known by the Scottish Gaelic word clarsach.
Faultlines is the debut studio album by Scottish folk musician Karine Polwart, released on 19 January 2004.
Mairi Campbell is a Scottish folk singer and musician. Campbell's songs and music have a rooted and powerful quality that range from the everyday to the universal, both in sound and subject matter.
Bella Hardy is an English contemporary folk musician, singer and songwriter from Edale, Derbyshire, England, who performs a combination of traditional and self-penned material. She was named Folk Singer of the Year at the 2014 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, having previously won the award for Best Original Song in 2012 for "The Herring Girl".
Traces is the fifth studio album by Scottish folk musician Karine Polwart, released in 2012. It was her first solo album in four years, though in the meantime she had appeared as part of the collaborations Darwin Song Project, The Burns Unit and The Fruit Tree Foundation.
Breabach is a Scottish folk music band formed in 2005. In 2011, they received nominations for ‘Best Group’ at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards. They won Scottish Folk Band of the Year in 2012 and Live Act of the Year in 2013 at the Scots Trad Music Awards.
Barrule is a Celtic and folk trio from the Isle of Man. The band's three members are: Tomas Callister (fiddle), Jamie Smith (accordion) and Adam Rhodes (bouzouki). Barrule's discography includes both original and traditional Manx language songs.
Davy Steele was a Scottish folk musician and songwriter. He sang with Drinkers Drouth, Ceolbeg, and was a founding member of the Scottish folk supergroup Clan Alba. In 1998, Steele joined the Battlefield Band as lead vocalist and guitarist, and he also played the bouzouki and bodhrán. He was married to Patsy Seddon, a founding member of The Poozies. They had one child together and Steele had three more children from an earlier marriage. Steele was diagnosed with a brain tumor and died on April 11, 2001, in a hospice in Edinburgh.
Songs of Separation was a music project created in the aftermath of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum to explore through the medium of music ideas of separation. It was organised by double-bass player Jenny Hill and brought together ten female folk musicians from Scotland and England for one week in June 2015 on the Isle of Eigg. The resulting album won the "Best Album" category in the 2017 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards.
Rachel Newton is a Scottish singer and harpist. As well as playing both acoustic and electric harp she also plays viola, fiddle, piano and harmonium. She performs solo as well as in the bands The Shee, The Furrow Collective and Boreas and was formerly a member of the Emily Portman Trio. She was a member of the Lost Words Spell Songs project and is a co-founder of The Bit Collective, a group campaigning for equality in folk music.
New Voices is an award for emerging composers made by the Celtic Connections festival annually since 1998. It is a musical commission which enables recipients to compose and perform a significant new suite of music of about forty-five minutes, based on traditional themes. Usually there are three commissions each year, with each composer performing their work at a lunchtime concert on one of the three Sundays of the festival. The funding provides for the musician both to develop the work, and to direct its performance, typically by five to ten musicians, at its première. In the earlier years, the composer was invited to further develop the work and revisit it at the festival the next year, but this is no longer practised.
The Edinburgh International Harp Festival is an annual harp festival held in Edinburgh, Scotland that includes concerts, workshops, and courses, as well as one of the world's largest exhibitions of harp-makers. Organized and promoted by The Clarsach Society, two staff members, and a team of volunteers, the festival is held in April of each year and attracts more than 500 harpists from more than 25 countries.