HEBCELT: GIRLS ONE STEP FURTHER DOWN ROAD TO STARDOM
News Release
Hebridean Celtic Festival
Year of Natural Scotland
- Quartet win HebCelt talent contest
- Festival main stage beckons for talented Gria
- Further success for newly-formed group
Pic Caption: Gria are (left to right) Lana Elaine, Louise Bichan, Ceitlin LR Smith and Gemma Telfer
A young female quartet who played their first gig only in February have won a coveted stage slot at one of this summer’s top Scottish music festivals.
Gria secured the sought-after spot in the main arena at the award-winning Hebridean Celtic Festival after winning a talent competition to find the stars of tomorrow.
The Glasgow-based group were voted the best of 17 high quality entries for HebCelt’s One Step Further contest which was open to any young band or performer, aged between 18 and 25, playing a genre of music that reflects the general programming of the event.
Gria will now find themselves performing at the festival which runs from 17-20 July in Stornoway and will be headlined by Van Morrison, Dougie MacLean, Capercaillie, The Battlefield Band and the Red Hot Chilli Pipers.
The girls - singer Ceitlin LR Smith, from Lewis; fiddler Louise Bichan, from Orkney; pianist Lana Elaine, from Shetland, and accordionist Gemma Telfer, from Northumberland - will showcase their mix of traditional and contemporary music when they perform live on Saturday, 20 July on the Island Stage. They will also receive £250 towards expenses.
The festival, which is celebrating its 18th anniversary this year, attracted an international audience of over 14,000 in 2012 and ticket sales this year are well ahead of target.
Ceitlin, 20, originally from Ness, said: “We were shocked to hear we had won the contest, being such a newly formed band, but we were over the moon about it.
“I've always wanted to play at HebCelt, being a local. We hope it'll get our name out there a bit more and give more people the opportunity to hear our music.”
The One Step Further contest was backed by acclaimed singer Julie Fowlis who was given one of her first opportunities to sing solo at a festival when she performed at HebCelt in 2003. She has since gone on to international stardom and sang on the soundtrack of the Oscar-winning Disney Pixar animated film Brave.
One of the first inductees to the HebCelt Hall of Fame and an ambassador for the event, Julie said: “Winning the One Step Further contest is a great achievement for a group that only started playing together in February, although the musicians are already experienced performers.
“Playing the main arena at HebCelt will provide them with a wonderful stage to bring their beautiful music to a much wider audience and I am sure they will use the experience to go on to even greater things in future. I wish them all the best.”
HebCelt festival director, Caroline MacLennan, added: “Gria are a very young band but their musicians are extremely accomplished performers. The quality of their playing shone through in their entry and the judges were very impressed with their collective sound.
“The festival prides itself on helping to bring young talent from throughout the Celtic nations to a wider audience and hopefully this opportunity to play on the main stage will help Gria go on to great things in the music industry.”
Gria, who take their name from an adaptation of Grian, the Gaelic word for sun, got together at the end of last year. Ceitlin, Gemma and Lana attend the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland (formally known as the Royal Academy of Music and Drama) together. Louise, a graduate of the Glasgow School of Art, also played with Lana in a band called Dalamist.
Their first gig together was at Celtic Connections in February when they won the Danny Kyle Open Stage award and last month they played for the Scottish Government at Edinburgh Castle at a dinner for European chief officers.
In August they will play abroad for the first time as a band when they take part in the Festival Interceltique in Lorient, France, and they have gigs lined up supporting Manran and Treacherous Orchestra at the Glenfiddich Distillery, as well as the Orkney Folk Festival and St Magnus Festival also in Orkney.
The group have also been recording with plans to release an EP in the summer and their first album by the end of this year or early 2014.
The HebCelt line-up also includes Karine Polwart, Darrell Scott, Pete Roe, Paddy Callaghan, and local artists Iain Morrison, The Boy who Trapped the Sun and Face the West, as well as Dundee’s Anderson, McGinty, Webster, Ward & Fisher; Lau, voted ‘Best Group’ at this year’s Radio Two Folk Awards; Orcadian eight-piece The Chair; The Hot Seats, from Virginia; Manchester outfit The Travelling Band; Welsh band Rusty Shackle; Fatherson, The Dirty Beggars and Donald MacDonald & The Islands, from Glasgow, and Rose Parade, a four-piece from Ayr.
For further information contact
John Ross
Lucid PR
01463 724593; 07730 099617
johnross@lucidmessages.com
NOTES TO EDITORS
The 18th HebCelt takes place between 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.
The festival 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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