HEBCELT: FOLK CAN’T GET ENOUGH OF LAU
Interview Release
Hebridean Celtic Festival
Year of Natural Scotland
- HebCelt date for acclaimed group Lau
- Award-winning folk trio to star at island event
- Stornoway visit part of worldwide tour
Pic caption: - left to right Martin Green, Kris Drever and Aidan O’Rourke
Internationally renowned folk trio Lau are continuing to pick up awards as regularly as they collect new fans.
The group were again voted best band at the Radio 2 Folk Awards this year, the fourth time they have won the coveted title since 2008. Their latest album 'Race The Loser' was also shortlisted for Album Of The Year in the same awards, featured in MOJO magazine and fROOTS Best Albums of 2012 and has been nominated for the Scottish Album Of The Year Award.
“The awards help spread the word”, said Aidan O’Rourke, Lau’s master fiddler from Oban. “The publicity that goes along with them is what helps the most - the radio play, press and online presence.
“But we don't take it too seriously. It's nice to be honoured, but we'd keep doing what we're doing if we weren't.
“The folk scene is so friendly and encouraging that there's very little competitiveness. There is a feel that it's all for a greater good. We're all proud of the state of the folk scene right now.”
Lau, formed in Edinburgh in 2004, combine the talents of Aidan, Orcadian singer-songwriter and guitarist Kris Drever and innovative accordionist Martin Green, from East Anglia and have long established themselves as one of the most sought-after and creative live acts.
They are currently on a world tour which has seen them visit Australia and New Zealand and perform five dates in Japan, with gigs across Europe and North America to follow. A series of festival appearances in the UK this summer will include a return to the Hebridean Celtic Festival which is held in Stornoway in the island of Lewis from 17-20 July.
“We've spent so much time together, and been on tour so often, that being on the road with Lau has become pretty relaxed”, said Aidan. “We have developed a daily gigging routine which makes for fairly easy touring. It's an unusual way of life and takes a bit of getting used to, but it's essential and it's what we do best.”
In Australia and New Zealand the trio were guests of WOMAD (World of Music, Arts and Dance) and at one late night session in New Zealand they played on stage with American singer Abigail Washburn and her band and had a late night jam session with the Cajun Savoy Family band, from Louisiana, and The Soweto Gospel Choir and Hugh Masekela.
”That was a good day”, Aidan enthused. “They're such well-run festivals on great sites, great food and the weather was perfect. All you want in a festival really. With artists from all over the world it was an honour to be representing Scotland.”
In May the band also sold out the 900-seat Union Chapel venue in London six weeks before the gig, another indication of its growing reputation.
Aidan said: “It always feels like our gigs are getting bigger and better. At one point (the Union Chapel concert) seemed like too big a gig for us, so to sell it out six weeks before the show was a sign things are on the up.”
Veterans of the festival circuit at home and abroad, Lau see the outdoor gigs as an ideal way of reaching even wider audiences: “At festivals we can play to many more people than at a typical gig, so you have a chance to make a big impact in a short space of time”, said Aidan.
“There's also the opportunity to steal/borrow other band's fans. People that might not specifically head to one of our gigs may come after seeing us at a festival. We're lucky to get to play a wide range of festivals that cover a broad spectrum of music.”
HebCelt is a particular favourite of Aidan’s with his west coast background: “I have a real love of the Isle of Lewis and have spent a lot of time up there over the years, so I really look forward to playing HebCelt.
“There's something special about being on an island, it makes it feel that the bands and the audience are on an adventure together. The atmosphere in the arena is incredible.”
The HebCelt audience can expect something special: “We've made big efforts to make our live set sound very much like our latest record Race The Loser. We worked with a fantastic American producer (Grammy-nominated Tucker Martine) and he really nurtured our use of technology and electronica which we'd been gradually adding to our set over a few years.
“So we're still essentially a folk trio with fiddle, accordion, guitar and singing but we've experimented with expanding our sonic pallet with loops and effects and we think/hope we've had interesting results.
“The festival set is always different from a typical gig. We only have a short amount of time to present ourselves, rather than our own gig when we might have 90 minutes to play with, so we try to make it as dynamic and exciting as possible in that short time.
So no signs of fading for Lau which was named after an Orcadian word meaning ‘natural light’: “Things have actually got a little bigger than we imagined they might, but we're happy with that, obviously”, Aidan states.
“Five years from now I hope we're still making music that's interesting to us and to our listeners. I think what keeps us excited is that we're always evolving.”
The 18th HebCelt will be headlined by Van Morrison, Capercaillie, Dougie MacLean, the Battlefield Band and the Red Hot Chilli Pipers.
The line-up also includes Karine Polwart, Paddy Callaghan, The Chair, the Travelling Band, Pete Roe, Darrell Scott and Dundee-band Anderson, McGinty, Webster, Ward and Fisher.
For more information contact
John Ross
Lucid PR
01463 724593: 07730 099617
johnross@lucidmessages.com
NOTES TO EDITORS
The 18th HebCelt takes place from 17-20 July, 2013 and will have two main stages on the Castle Green in front of the Lews Castle in Stornoway, as well as performances in An Lanntair and throughout the rural community.
This year the festival has been selected for the third year in succession as one of the top ten UK summer festivals by music magazine Songlines. It emerged victorious as Best Large Festival at the industry-sponsored Scottish Event Awards 2011, in a three-way final with Edinburgh’s Hogmanay and Glasgow’s Celtic Connections.
Visitors from Algeria, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Romania, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand and the US made the journey to Lewis last year, as well as many from across the UK.
The overseas contingent helped swell the ranks of a 120-strong volunteer army that contributed over 3,500 unpaid man hours over the course of the four days.
HebCelt is supported by Creative Scotland, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar and Highlands & Islands Enterprise and injects more than £1.5 million annually into the local economy.
It is regarded by critics, performers and festival-goers as one of the top Celtic music festivals in Europe and has twice won the Best Event of the Year award at the MG Alba Scots Trad Music Awards, which is voted for by the public.
HebCelt has been hailed as one of the UK’s top 50 festivals by the Daily Telegraph and one of the top five by The Scotsman.
View the festival website at www.hebceltfest.com
The festival also has its own YouTube channel, Facebook and Twitter outlets.
http://www.youtube.com/user/hebceltfest
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Hebridean-Celtic-Festival/70400006768?ref=ts
http://twitter.com/#!/hebcelt/
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