ALASDAIR FRASER

Is one of the great masters of Scottish folk music. Born in Clackmannan, he discovered the fiddle at age 8, and it has accompanied him ever since. In 1973 he won the “National Mod” fiddle competition, and after graduating from university with a degree in physics he decided in 1985 to dedicate his life to music.

He is an exquisite performer, both dynamic and delicate, who has inspired millions of fiddlers around the world with his albums, performances and, for more than 20 years, his fiddle camps in Scotland and California. Now also in Spain.

His film credits include solo performances on the soundtracks of several major films, including Titanic, Last of the Mohicans, Wyatt Earp and The Spitfire Grill.

He formed the band Skyedance, whose very special latest album, “Live in Spain”, featured collaborations with some of the most important musicians from the Iberian Peninsula. Recently, apart from working with his friend and composer Paul Machlis, he has published four delicate and brilliant albums (“Fire and Grace”, “In the Moment”, “Highlander’s Farewell” and “Abundance”) with Natalie Haas. Both are clear examples of his free spirit, musical path and of the perfect duo they form together.

ZOË CONWAY

Irish fiddle player, Zoë Conway, is a prodigious talent, equally at home in both traditional Irish and classical styles. Zoë has performed across the globe, both as a solo artist and also playing with international acts such as Riverdance, Damien Rice, Rodrigo y Gabriella, Lisa Hannigan, Nick Cave and Lou Reed among others. She is a holder of the much coveted All-Ireland Senior Fiddle Champion title, winning the prestigious competition in 2001. She was voted Best Traditional Female of the Year in Irish Music Magazine and she is also a featured musician on the current Leaving Certificate music syllabus in Ireland. Zoë is increasingly in demand as a tutor, regularly giving workshops and lectures on the merits of classical and traditional music on the violin. She has performed at festivals such as Glastonbury, L’Orient, Tonder and Womad and has also performed in some of the most prestigious concert halls in the world including The National Concert Hall, Dublin; The Kremlin, Russia; The Kennedy Centre, Washington; The Broadway Gershwin Theatre, New York and Carnegie Hall, New York.

Zoë Conway and John Mc Intyre have been described as “simply one of the best folk duos on the planet” (BBC), and audiences in Ireland and beyond keep coming back for more. The duo has recorded on major film soundtracks including Finding You (Red Sky Studio 2021), Riverdance The Animated Adventure (Universal 2021), and Zoë has recorded on award-winning Float Like A Butterfly (Samson Films 2018) and Artemis Fowl (Disney 2020) as soloist with a hand-picked symphony orchestra in George Martin’s world-renowned AIR studios in London.
Zoë and John have collaborated over the past five years with award-winning Scots Gaelic singer Julie Fowlis and bouzouki player of international renown, Éamon Doorley. Together, they have released a couple of albums and are currently working on new material.

José Climent

José Climent is one of the pioneers of the fiddle in Castillian folk music. He is one of the founding members of the band La Musgaña and toured with them for many years, performing internationally all over Europe. In 1991, he started with Jaime Muñóz the folk music sessions of Taberna Elisa in Madrid. During those years he also performed with musicians such as Javier Bergia, Xosé M. Budiño, and Barahúnda. He taught Castillian bagpipes in Casa de Zamora (Madrid) from 1998 until 2013 and has performed and recorded several bagpipe albums. Between 2015 and 2018 he published two solitary projects. He is currently performing with two Castillian folk projects: Climent & Ballarín duo and trío Atairao. Both projects published new albums in 2022.

As a fiddle teacher, he has participated in multiple workshops with Begoña Riobó, Alasdair Fraser and Blanca Altable. Recently, he has started with Blanca Altable and Carlos Martín Aires the “Arrejuntada Violinera” (fiddle gathering), a physical and virtual gathering that looks for the characteristic sound of Castillian fiddle playing.

BLANCA ALTABLE

Blanca Altable (1984) is one of the few fiddlers in the traditional scene in Castilla. She begins her studies of classical violin at 5 years of age, but soon she devotes herself to the fiddle since hers is a family of traditional musicians.
With a particular and creative vision, she makes much of her repertoire from the dulzaina, her fieldwork as a fiddler consisting of adapting scores for dulzaina to the fiddle. Particularly, music from the centre and north of Castilla, since her grandfather, Simón Altable, was a dulzaina player and started Blanca in the oral tradition from this region.
Out of this fieldwork, she has co-founded two projects: Blanca Altable & Chuchi² y Cira Qu; And also participated in other folk projects like El Hombre Folkíbero & Cía.
Always in search and study, her advanced education as a fiddler grows with her participation in international fiddle camps in California, New York and Scotland, getting closer to places and social environments where fiddle music happens in a vernacular and spontaneous way … Galicia, Basque Country, Quebec, Scotland, USA.
She has got the opportunity of playing in scenarios and festivals all over Spain, showed her music in the USA, Africa and part of Europe, and participated in projects like VocalizÁfrica, Nélida Karr, Vallarna, Dario Bontempi, Salvador Amor, Pure Hemp, Sammy Jankis, Kasparov Vs Deep Blue, Roberta Medley, Sons d’ Cabiella…
She is an increasingly demanded teacher as well, committed to personalized and creative education.

PAULA GÓMEZ

From Segovia, passionate about music, tradition and cultural diversity. Over the last few years, she’s been amazed by teaching and its capacity to transfer much more than just notes.

She begins her musical studies in conservatorio profesional de Segovia, but she doesn’t find her true passion in music until she meets Blanca Altable and attends Crisol de Cuerda. Later on, she expands her knowledge of harmony, improvisation and composition in Música Creativa de Madrid and ESMUC in Barcelona. Following the same steps as Vanesa Muela and Cristina Pérez Tejera, she studies traditional percussion from Castilla.

She has worked as a folk violin teacher and in music and movement projects in several schools from Madrid and Vigo. She has also taught violin in Crisol de Cuerda and other summer camps for kids.

As an artist, Paula starts the project Triguiñuelas, where she mixes didactics and the traditional music from her hometown. At the end of 2020 she releases a CD-book titled “Un día con el abuelo”, followed by a presentation tour of more than 80 concerts. At the same time, she is a member of the Xosé Liz band and performs regularly with the galician bagpiper Óscar Ibáñez.

In 2018, she creates and works as the artistic director of the festival “El Folk de la Reserva” in the San Ildefonso farm, Segovia, which becomes one of the reference festivals of the Castilian music.

NATALIE HAAS

Natalie’s youth has not stopped her from recording several albums and collaborating with many important musicians. She comes from a classical music background, but she began to be interested in Celtic music when she first came to Alasdair’s Valley of the Moon camp at the age of 11. Alasdair Fraser encouraged her to explore the rhythmic and harmonic basis that the cello once had in traditional Scottish music. Now she is a musical reference of incredible creativity and generosity.

She’s also a dedicated teacher, doing private tutoring, teaching at several of Fraser’s fiddle camps and at Berklee College. She performs regular with the Scottish fiddler and has recorder several CDs with him. Also collaborates regularly with other great musicians like Hanneke Cassel, Natalie Mcmaster, Patsy Reid, etc.

Alec Brown

Alec Brown is a contemporary cellist from Pine Bluff, Arkansas who now lives in Limerick, Ireland. Having completed a practice-based Ph.D. at the University of Limerick in 2019 specialising in incorporating the cello into Irish traditional music, Alec continues to push the boundaries of what the cello is capable of within the idiom of Irish traditional music by collaborating with many artists both in and out of the tradition. As a result, he blends techniques that span multiple genres to create a unique sound which he can truly call his own.

Along with releasing his acclaimed solo album, The Stepping Stone in 2017, he has performed extensively throughout Ireland, England, Europe, Japan and has recently performed on Broadway in the cast of the critically-acclaimed Irish dance show “Velocity” at the New Victory Theatre in 2018, resulting in a 5-week tour of the US in March 2022. Alec is also a full-time member of award-winning singer-songwriter Emma Langford’s band, with whom he has toured throughout Germany in 2019 and 2021 and Ireland since 2013.

John McIntyre

John grew up in the Cooley Mountains of north County Louth where he took up guitar at 8 years of age. He began his career as electric guitarist with the successful indie band, The Revs with whom he performed on many famous stages and festivals including Oxygen, and Slane in Ireland, Reading and Leeds in the UK, and toured extensively in USA, Australia and Europe. He has worked alongside many world-renowned producers, and is now also producing and recording in many genres. John studied classical guitar and piano for many years, and from early childhood was immersed in the language, songs and traditional dance music of south west Donegal – his father’s homeplace.

Together with Zoë Conway has been described as “simply one of the best folk duos on the planet” (BBC), and audiences in Ireland and beyond keep coming back for more. The duo has recorded on major film soundtracks including Finding You (Red Sky Studio 2021), Riverdance The Animated Adventure (Universal 2021), and Zoë has recorded on award-winning Float Like A Butterfly (Samson Films 2018) and Artemis Fowl (Disney 2020) as soloist with a hand-picked symphony orchestra in George Martin’s world-renowned AIR studios in London.
Zoë and John have collaborated over the past five years with award-winning Scots Gaelic singer Julie Fowlis and bouzouki player of international renown, Éamon Doorley. Together, they have released a couple of albums and are currently working on new material.

Jesús Enrique Cuadrado “Chuchi”

Jesús Enrique “Chuchi” is a big name in folk contemporary guitar world in Spain. His versatility and style have made him be one of the most precious guitar players in the Iberian Peninsula folk scene. Cofounder of Vallarna, the Buho Dinámico duo with bouzoukist Carlos Martín Aires and the awarded folk duo Blanca Altable & Chuchi⎮.
As guitarist, composer or arranger he has worked with Folkfussion, A Gramalleira (recording with Goyo Yebes from Celtas Cortos), Celtas Cortos (folk cover of Retales de una Vida), Xerfa, María Salgado and Anxo Lorenzo (Galician pipes virtuoso).
He has been taught by renowned guitarists from Spain, Scotland and US such as Tony Macmanus, William Coulter, Scott Law, Carlos Beceiro, Raúl Olivar and Yann Falquet to say just a few. His curiosity about new musical styles and his broad background make him to be one of the most demanded musicians among the Castilian and Spanish folk scene.

Louise Mulcahy

Louise Mulcahy is one of Ireland’s most talented and gifted instrumentalists in Irish traditional music today. Louise is an internationally renowned performer on the flute, uilleann pipes and whistle. Louise is a member of the highly acclaimed Mulcahy Family and no musical family today is more impressive in upholding the best principles of the tradition. Alongside four album releases with her father, Mick, and sister Michelle, Louise released her highly acclaimed début solo album titled ‘Tuning the Road’ in 2014 to widespread critical acclaim, “A complete wonder of an album from a truly brilliant musician” – Bill Margeson. She has toured extensively throughout the world including performances in Asia, New Zealand, Australia, Europe, America and Canada. Louise was voted Female Musician of the Year at the Live Ireland Awards in 2017 and together with her father and sister received the prestigious award ‘Tradconnect Album of the Year”
in 2017 for their latest album release titled, ‘The Reel Note’. Louise is a regular contributor to music programmes, nationally and internationally, both on television and on radio. Louise presented and researched the landmark documentary for TG4 titled Mná na bPíob which was released in 2021. Louise was named one of the stars of 2018 and praised for her groundbreaking
musicianship in The Irish Times Culture Review.

XOSÉ LIZ

Xosé Liz (flute/guitar/bouzouki) is one of the most active musicians in the Galician folk scene. Producer, composer and arranger, he masters plucked string instruments and flutes. He is an instructor for these instruments at the traditional music academy “e-Trad” in Vigo. He was the founder musician of important Galician bands in the 90’s such as Beladona, Entretrastes, Lizgairo and Riobó and, he collaborates with internationally known Galician artists such as Uxía, Rodrigo Romaní, Cristina Pato or Anxo Lorenzo.

ANA ROSSI

She has come a long way in her musical education, through l’Aula de Jazz i Música Moderna del Conservari del Liceu, and still on her way with Anna Catalá and the Voice Craft technique. She has intensified more on singing, ear education and harmony, but also studied piano, dance, and guitar.
Her professional career includes various styles (argentinian and latin-american folk, Iberian folk, MPB, jazz, pop …), sharing the scene with excellent musicians, such as Elisabet Raspall, Albert Bover, Juan Quintero, Juan Pablo Chapital, Mario Rossy, Marcelo Mercadante, Aleix Tobias, Xavi Lozano, Juan Quintero y Luna Monti, Martín Laportilla, Julio Santillán, Paulinho Lêmos, Eliseo Parra… .
She also posseses a rich experience as a teacher in several schools, teaching voice and body percussion to children as well as adults, among other disciplines.

María San Miguel

Beginning the violin at age three, Maria developed a passion for the instrument as well as a true vocation for music. She pursued her studies at the Conservatorio Profesional de Música de Valladolid and finished her music studies in University at the Conservatorio Superior de Música de Castilla y León. Her interest in trying to complete her music education brought her in touch with other music styles, eventually collaborating with the Edu Soto Plan Renove Band, Mariachi Guerrilla and more. Her newfound fascination for other culture´s music and its origins guided her to Scottish folk music which woke up her curiosity for the Castillian folk music being played in her own culture. Simultaneously her passion for teaching and pedagogy specialized in infants, learning from the musician and pedagog Paulo Lameiro, let her put together part of what is becoming a worldwide trend: Music Workshops for Infants. She has conducted these workshops to great success in both Spain and Germany. Currently, she continues her classical and folk music studies, taking classes from Alasdair Fraser, Natalie Haas, Diego Galaz, Begoña Riobó, Casey Driessen and belongs to the acclaimed European folk bands, “Atalantic Folk Trio”, “Brigantia” and “Dahvar”.

Galen Fraser

Galen Fraser is an accomplished fiddle player, composer, engineer and producer from the foothills of Northern California. Best known for his modern take on Celtic traditional music, he tours with the praised Galen Fraser Quartet, Soulsha, and the Europe-based Atlantic Folk Trio. Fraser has played with renowned musicians such as Alasdair Fraser, Natalie & Brittany Haas, Martin Melendez (of the Aupa Quartet), Hanneke Cassel, and Colin Cotter. He has performed at The Mandavi Centre, The Palace of Fine Arts, Symphony Hall in Boston, Ma, with members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and many other esteemed venues in the United States and Europe. With a love for improvisation and composition, Galen’s passion led him to pursue music as a career, earning his Bachelor’s Degree in Songwriting from Berklee College of Music. In August 2016, Galen released his debut solo album, “Mischief Managed” featuring all original fiddle music and songs with guests such as Natalie Haas, Alasdair Fraser, Jenna Moynihan and Conor Hearn.