GRAMMY Award-winning multi-instrumentalist Tim O’Brien returns to Scotland to play two concerts for Americana promoters Fallen Angels Club this month. A regular visitor to Scotland and particularly Celtic Connections since the late 1990s, West Virginian O’Brien appears at St Andrew’s in the Square, Glasgow on Wednesday, May 17th and at Teviot Row Debating Hall in Edinburgh on Thursday, May 18th as part of a UK tour to mark the release of his new album, Where the River Meets the Road. Both concerts will feature support sets from African-Canadian singer and banjo player Kaia Kater who grew up listening to Canadian folk music and has studied Appalachian music extensively in West Virginia.
fallenangelsclub.com
NEW Orleans-born singer-songwriter Mary Gauthier returns to Scotland for two concerts at the end of May. Gauthier was a late starter in music. She wrote her first song at the age of thirty-five and has gone on to document aspects of her life including her adoption, her runaway teenage years and her problems with alcohol and drug addiction in a repertoire that has now been covered by singers including Candi Staton, Amy Helm and Bettye Lavette and is taught at education establishments such as Vanderbilt University. She appears at the Lemon Tree in Aberdeen on May 31 and as part of Borders based music promoters String Jam Club’s 20th anniversary celebrations at the County Hotel, Selkirk on June 1.
marygauthier.com
JAZZ quartet New Focus play two concerts in Scotland this month. The group, co-led by award-winning pianist-composer Euan Stevenson and Scottish National Jazz Orchestra saxophonist Konrad Wiszniewski, released their second album, New Focus on Song last summer to considerable acclaim, resulting in them being invited to broadcast live from London’s South Bank Centre as part of BBC Radio 3’s 70th birthday celebrations. They appear at Sabhal Mor Ostaig on Skye on Saturday, May 20 and at Tolbooth, Stirling on Friday, May 26.
euanstevenson.com
THE FRASER Shaw Trust is marking the release of a CD featuring tunes by the late Islay-born piper and whistle player with three events.
A party in the Sparkle Horse in Glasgow's West End on Tuesday, May 16 will be followed by the official launch concert in Bruichladdich Hall, near Shaw’s home in Port Charlotte, on Islay on Tuesday, June 27. A further celebration of the work of the musician, who died in May 2015 at the age of thirty-four, will be held on Monday, August 7 in St Luke’s Church in Glasgow as part of the annual piping festival Piping Live!
The CD, called Mac Ile: The Tunes of Fraser Shaw, precedes a tunebook to be published in the autumn, with all proceeds going to the MS Care Centre in Lochilphead. Proceeds from the album will be used for the advancement of education, arts and culture and for the relief of those living with multiple sclerosis in Scotland, particularly on the Isle of Islay. FraserShawTrust.com
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