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a new duo Feat Colin McLean & David Keating playing lots of Tangos by the South American composer Astor Piazzolla and other interesting duets.

Colin McLean

Colin McLean is one of Ireland’s leading Classical Guitarists.  He has studied with some of the most prestigious teachers including Jerry Creedon, Fabio Zanon and Tilman Hoppstock.  He has received master classes from Paul Gregory, David Leisner Magnus Anderson and Craig Ogden.  Some of his achievements include  winning Feis Matthew two years running for solo Classical Guitar and being the first ever guitarist to win the Senior Recital in the Cork School of Music.  He has an Honor’s Degree and an Honors  Masters from the Cork School of Music which he completed with the great virtuoso Fabio Zanon. Colin currently travels back and forth to Germany to receive lessons from Tilman Hoppstock.

David Keating

Irish guitarist David Keating was recently awarded a First Class Honours MMus Degree in classical guitar performance at the Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester, where he studied with Craig Ogden. Previously David studied in Dublin with John Feeley and in Cork with Jerry Creedon. He achieved a First Class Honours degree at the CIT Cork School of Music, where he now teaches classical guitar.

David has won many of the important music prizes in Ireland including the John Vallery Memorial Prize in the Irish Freemasons Young Musician of the Year Competition, the CSM Senior Recital Competition (adjudicated by Alan Smale – Former Leader of the RTE National Symphony Orchestra) and in 2013 he was the winner of the Feis Ceoil Cup and Gold Medal for Classical Guitar Performance.

David has attended masterclasses with some of the world’s leading guitarists including Xue Fei Yang, Gary Ryan, William Kanengiser, and Scott Tennant. Following his London debut at Bolivar Hall in November 2013, David was honoured to be invited to perform at a masterclass with the renowned classical guitarist John Williams.

David has performed extensively throughout Ireland and has appeared as a soloist with the Cork Youth Orchestra and Cork Sinfonietta. On April 29th 2013, David gave the world première of Buen Camino, a piece written for him by the Irish composer and pianist John Gibson. During his studies at the RNCM, David gave numerous recitals in the UK receiving extremely enthusiastic responses from both audience and promoters.

Aside from his solo playing, David also has a keen interest in chamber music and is a regular member of the Diversus Guitar Ensemble. Future plans including releasing his debut CD, recitals throughout Ireland and the UK, a collaborative album of original music with Irish guitarist John Boyle, and concerto appearances with orchestra. David acknowledges support from Music Network Ireland.

ABOUT:

Northern Irish experimental folk songwriter and producer Joshua Burnside is something of a regional anomaly. With a brooding, powerful sound echoing artists of places afar and time long gone, his enthralling craft defies local comparison in striving towards an aesthetic as much as visual as it is sonic. Recorded at home in Lisbane, Co. Down, his new single ‘Black Dog Sin’ is the current distillation of his increasingly unmistakable approach; a fragile, yet ultimately commanding, chamber folk sound gloriously underpinned with unique zeal. 

While 2017 wrapped up with Joshua winning the Northern Irish Music Prize , 2018 began with NPR choosing the young folk musician as ‘100 of the artists to watch at this years SXSW festival.

QUOTES:

‘Rumbling, brooding, powerful, magnetic’ – The Irish Times

‘There’s an indefinable quality and charm to Joshua Burnside’s debut’ – The Sunday Times

‘It makes you glad to have a pair of working ears’ – Phil Taggart, BBC Radio 1

‘It is an endless adventure, a record that won’t tire, such is the depth and scope of what you hear’ – Daily Mirror

‘Dynamic and wide ranging in scope but stands as a complete and focused work. The end result is a triumph’ – Chordblossom

VIDEOS:

Powpig released their debut EP ‘Denture Adventure’ in late 2017.

Honest songs for honest people. This is the mission statement of Anna’s Anchor, the brainchild of Limerick born musician Marty Ryan, which was created during the summer of 2014. What began as a solo, indie/emo project taking influences from the likes of American Football, Rites of Spring & Fugazi, has since blossomed into a full band affair that has played over 200 shows across 11 countries with a slew of releases including 2016’s debut album Nautical Miles which was released on Struggletown Records.
Anna’s Anchor’s strong DIY ethic and efforts to push the boundaries of creativity was first put on full display in the national eye with the 2015 release entitled “The Islands”. Anna’s Anchor embarked on an eight week journey visiting eight different islands, performing eight memorable gigs, and writing eight unique songs. This was the challenge that brought Marty to some of the remote and harshest environments of Ireland on a song writing adventure like no other. Combining the adventure of touring off the beaten track with writing, recording and releasing a song about the experience each week, this project gained national acclaim in Ireland.

In September 2016, Anna’s Anchor released its debut LP on Struggletown Records (UK) and Never Meant Records (Ire) to critical acclaim. The 10 highly charged songs bearing immense emotional weight have given Anna’s Anchor the chance to tour the album across Ireland, the U.K,mainland Europe & America. As for 2018, with a new album on the way, the road beckons for Marty and his crew as they travel by land, air and sea to ensure everyone hears this fabulous record.

“There’s something inherently beautiful about the work ethic of Anna’s Anchor.” – Already Heard.com
“There’s something very special about ‘Nautical Miles’. The songs come to life at each turn, and the labour of love that Ryan has poured into Anna’s Anchor shines through.” Punktastic.com

In 2008, the core trio that make up Woven Skull began gathering together in the home of two of the members, set deep in the bogs and forests of County Leitrim: an empty, sparse area in the northwest of Ireland known for its myths of banshees and tales of lake monsters. Several years experimenting with combinations of instrumentation, kitchen utensils, seashells, footsteps, chimes, recordings of cats purring and frogs mating led to their current sound which combines densely propulsive guitar, distorted mandola and endless cyclical rhythms. Woven Skull strip and scrape what they can out of minimal instrumentation to teeter on the brink of total sonic meltdown creating engulfing, raw primal drones and damaged rock manoeuvres; the result of which has often been described as the traditional music of a self-imagined land. This sound draws on the influences of the combined backgrounds of the trio with Aonghus (guitar) and Willie (percussion) born and bred in Dublin and Natalia (mandola) born in Ukraine and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. Beaten through strings and blasted through amplifiers in a live setting, the group (whose members can swell from 3 to 4 or 6 or 10) meld repetitions that spiral through each other to create multiple layers of beautiful but harsh entrapments.

Along the way Woven skull have collaborated with such artists as Daniel Higgs, Mike Gangloff, Neil Campbell, Core of the Coalman and Paul leBrecque among others. Many of these collaborations have been documented on limited cassette and cdr releases.
They have also played on line ups alongside Richard Dawson, Six Organs of Admittance, Eternal Tapestry, Circuit Des Yeux and Liturgy to name but a few.
The band tour extensively, embarking on at least two tours of the UK, Ireland and main-land Europe annually alongside a number one-off festival dates.

PRESS
“Woven Skull’s edge comes from their ability to rock without rocking, squeezing unexpected sounds from their relatively minimal setup (they don’t appear to do much when it comes to effects pedals). Woven Skull always manage to feel their way into some dead trippy corners”-The Quietus

“the trio skitter confidently in a roving trance across loose ragas, spliced field recordings and a range of exotic wind and percussion, creating an atmosphere that nicely cushions sections of more intensive kosmiche meditation”-Decoder magazine

“the band recall the ramshackle anthems of Exuma and the spirited improv of Six Organs Of Admittance, suggesting that without furious discipline they can make very beautiful sounds. It’s within them to make pretty music, but for the most part Lair Of The Glowing Bantling sounds like it’s shaking itself from nightmare to existence.”-Norman Records

“Maybe it’s because Woven Skull have recorded stuff in dark haunted woods and the attics of abandoned houses that has lent them such an otherworldly air. Or maybe it’s because they’ve spent years experimenting with recordings of cats purring and frogs mating that have given them their edge, but whatever it is they’ve piqued interest far beyond Ireland. Using mandolins, guitars and drums, their latest album is a trip in every sense of the world, taking listeners on a wild ride into some polyrhythmic pastures”
-The Crack magazine

“ it’s so beautiful it makes my withered old heart soar. I love these people and I love their music and the world is just immeasurably better for having Woven Skull in it.”
-Narc magazine

“Ireland’s Woven Skull are another level of magnificent blasted noise altogether, through distorted guitar, stripped-down drum kit, mandola and viola lock into a discordant mantra with an eastern edge, building and building and building some more, until you’re swept up in something truly transcendental………It’s absolutely fucking incredible, folk music at it’s most irregular, from the demonic mandola solo that flashed in and out of a wall of feedback, to the best drum solo ever played on just a floor tom and a cymbal.”
-Nightshift magazine

The Céilí Allstars are an exciting four piece traditional Irish music band.
They formed from a group of friends playing the session trail in Cork city in the late nineties. Their musical style includes shades of Sliabh Luachra – where they originate from – combined with generous sprinklings of folk and country.

They’ve played residencies in Cork’s legendary folk venues the Lobby Bar, Cork and DeBarra’s in Clonakilty. They’re also at home on bigger stages playing at festivals in Ireland, Holland, Italy, Russia and Australia.