Scots Trad Music Awards | |
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Awarded for | Scottish traditional music |
Sponsored by | MG ALBA |
Country | Scotland |
Presented by | Hands Up for Trad |
Hosted by |
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First awarded | 2003 |
Television/radio coverage | |
Network | BBC ALBA |
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. [1]
The awards are organised by Thoumire's organisation Hands Up for Trad. Since 2008 the awards have been sponsored by MG Alba, and the event is televised on BBC Alba.
Since 2019 the ceremony has including the awarding of The Belhaven Bursary for Innovation in Scottish Music, sponsored by Belhaven Brewery. The prize consists of £25,000, an ale brewed with the winner's name on it, an appearance at an event at Tartan Week in New York and the use of the winner's music in an advertising campaign. The cash prize is the largest music prize in Scotland, matched only by the Mercury Prize. [2]
The ceremony was held at the Caird Hall in Dundee [3]
The ceremony was held at the Engine Works in Glasgow [4]
The awards had been due to be staged in the Caird Hall Dundee, but were moved online due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and presented by Alistair Heather and Mary Ann Kennedy. The categories were also adapted for the circumstances. [5] [6] [7]
The awards were staged in Aberdeen [8]
The awards were staged in Perth and broadcast live on BBC Alba. [9]
The awards were staged at Lagoon Centre, Paisley and broadcast live on BBC Alba. [10]
The awards were staged at Caird Hall, Dundee and broadcast live on BBC Alba. [11]
The awards were staged at Caird Hall, Dundee and broadcast live on BBC Alba. [12]
The awards were staged at the Inverness Leisure Centre and broadcast live on BBC Alba. [13]
The 2013 ceremony was held in Aberdeen. [14]
The ceremony was held in the Perth Concert Hall. [15]
Scotland is internationally known for its traditional music, which remained vibrant throughout the 20th century and into the 21st, when many traditional forms worldwide lost popularity to pop music. Despite emigration and a well-developed connection to music imported from the rest of Europe and the United States, the music of Scotland has kept many of its traditional aspects and has influenced many other forms of music.
Blazin' Fiddles are a contemporary Scottish fiddle band from the Highlands and Islands. They formed in 1998 to showcase Scotland's distinct regional fiddle styles. The band have a number of awards, including; the MG ALBA Scots Trad Music Awards Live Act of the Year, Album of the Year and Folk Band of the Year. Their records are released on their own indie Blazin' Records label. They have been described as "...the LED Zepplin of the Folk World."
Maeve Mackinnon is a Scottish folk singer. Originally from Glasgow, she performs primarily in Scottish Gaelic, and also in English. She is also one of two Gaelic singers who share the same name.
The Paul McKenna Band are a five piece folk musical group from Glasgow, Scotland.
Joy Dunlop is a Scottish broadcaster, singer, step dancer and educator from the village of Connel in Argyll, who now lives in Glasgow, Scotland. Singing predominantly in Scottish Gaelic, she performs folk music, song and dance in a contemporary style rooted in the tradition. She is a weather presenter for BBC Scotland and BBC ALBA and formerly a volunteer radio presenter with Oban FM
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.
Duncan Chisholm is a Scottish fiddle player and composer. He has released seven solo albums as a solo artist. His studio album, Affric, released in 2012, was longlisted for the Scottish Album of the Year (SAY) Award. In 2022, he released a seventh studio album, titled Black Cuillin. He tours with the Scottish Gaelic singer Julie Fowlis' band. He is also a founder member of the folk rock group Wolfstone. He played fiddle for Runrig.
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.
Lauren MacColl is a Scottish fiddle player from Fortrose. She has released three solo albums as well as a duet album with flute player Calum Stewart. MacColl is a member of the fiddle quartet RANT and contemporary folk band Salt House.
Skerryvore is a Scottish Celtic rock group formed in Tiree, Argyll and Bute islands in 2004. Its founding members are the Gillespie brothers, Daniel and Martin. Regular Tiree visitors include Fraser West and his friend Alec Dalglish, both from Livingston, West Lothian. The group took their name from the Skerryvore lighthouse which lies 12 miles (19 km) off the coast of Tiree. The group's current members include Craig Espie, Alan Scobie, Jodie Bremaneson and Scott Wood. Skerryvore have released six studio albums, with the addition of a ‘deluxe’ version of one. It includes some live tracks, a compilation album, and a live album.
Corrina Hewat is a Scottish harpist and composer who was awarded Music Tutor of the Year at Na Trads in 2013. She has worked with poet Robin Robertson and has written music for the Dunedin Consort. She sings with Karine Polwart and Annie Grace in what they describe as a 'girly trio' and also appeared with Polwart on Lau's 2009 Arc Light album. She has collaborated with Patsy Reid 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.
Sarah Hayes is a British folk musician and multi-instrumentalist. She is a member of the indie folk band Admiral Fallow and also a solo artist.
Tim Edey is an English multi-instrumentalist and composer who grew up in Broadstairs, Kent and is now based in Perthshire, Scotland. In 2012 he was Musician of the Year at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards and, with Brendan Power, Best Duo. He was awarded "Musician of the Year" in the 2020 MG Alba Scots Trad Music Awards.
Craig Irving is a multi-award-winning Scottish musician from Inverness, Scotland.
Griogair Labhruidh is a Scottish Gaelic singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and recording artist from Gartocharn with strong roots in the Gaelic tradition of Ballachulish in the Scottish Highlands. After many years recording the Gaelic traditions of his local area, Gaelic became his dominant language and he is one of the few musicians who can speak and perform in a mainland Gaelic dialect, rather than the standard Hebridean Gaelic. Well-versed in the ceòl mòr piping tradition of his native district, Labhruidh is a member of the Afro-Celt Sound System and has also produced Gaelic music in non-traditional genres, such as hip-hop. In 2014, Labhruidh, who sings in a sean-nós style, became the main vocalist for the Gaelic supergroup Dàimh. He was Gaelic Singer of the Year at the MG Alba Trad Music Awards of 2015. He contributed a chapter to the book Dhá Leagan Déag: Léargais Nua ar an Sean-Nós.
Peat and Diesel are a three-piece band from Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis, Scotland, comprising Calum “Boydie” MacLeod, Innes Scott and Uilly Macleod. The band formed over Saturday sessions at the band members' homes in Stornoway, and grew in popularity through exposure on social media. The band's songs mostly concern a humorous take on island life, and are predominantly in English, although they include some Gaelic words and phrases.
Sian is a Scottish all-female traditional band who are known for their Gaelic vocal harmonies and celebrating Gaelic songs composed by women. They formed to raise the prominence of work by female Gaelic bards, which might not have received much attention or credit otherwise.
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.
Iona Fyfe is a Scottish singer from Huntly, Aberdeenshire known for singing Scots folk songs and ballads. In 2016, she was a semi-finalist of the BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award and, in 2017 and 2021, was a finalist of the BBC Radio Scotland Young Traditional Musician award. In 2018, she won "Scots Singer of the Year" at the MG ALBA Scots Trad Music Awards. In 2019, she won "Young Scots Speaker o the Year" at the inaugural Scots Language Awards, winning "Scots Performer o the Year" in the 2020 Awards, and "Scots Speaker o the Year" in the 2021 Awards. She has advocated for official recognition of the Scots language, successfully petitioning Spotify to add Scots to their list of languages.