The past two months have been totally brilliant for the band and we feel incredibly privileged to be able to play our music across the globe. In March we had a great three weeks in Australia/New Zealand – a few Koalas, lovely coffee & food, good shows, good pals and we got to spend a couple of days making music with members of the amazing Black Arm Band, Horomona Horo and Bobby Singh. It was a very inspiring experience!
On our way home we stopped off in Doha, Qatar. We played in the beautiful Alrayyan Theatre in the Souq Waqif (See above picture) and we were joined on stage for a few tunes with a fantastic local musician – Mohamed Al Saegh. Very enjoyable few days, very hot, some dust storms, went on a boat and bought some spices!
The climate was about to dramatically change when we headed west to Newfoundland and the East Coast Music Awards, St. Johns. After a couple of delayed flights (28 hours, door to door) we were hit with the bracing dry cold of the Canadian east coast but met with a really warm welcome at the festival. It turned into a great weekend of music and great craic with our pals Ross & Jarlath and got us excited for a return visit this summer (Full details of this will released soon).
May/June Tour
We’re now getting geared up for our next tour which kicks off this May. We start with a show at Labadoux Festival, Belgium before kicking off the UK leg the following weekend. All the tour dates are below. Hope we can catch you along the road!
We have just returned from an amazing tour of Austria with the Maeve Mackinnon Trio where we were incredibly well looked after by our host Dietmar Haslinger (Weltenklang productions) & brilliant sound master/driver Martin Zetner. Great gigs, crowds, food, drink; we love this place. Here’s a few photos from our gig in Katau (courtesy of Diana Horvath) - Scottish Colours.
Australia/New Zealand
Now it’s time for us to repack the bags in preparation for our return to Australia & New Zealand this November. We’ll be taking in three shows in Australia (as well as some workshops, keep your eyes peeled for more info…) before hopping over to NZ for some more gigs, culminating in St. Andrews night in Dunedin! To celebrate the trip will also be releasing our track ‘Scotland’s Winter’ as a single (on STEM Music/Planet Records). Hope to see you at one of the shows, and please spread the word if you can! Check out the dates here.
We are delighted to announce we will be performing at Celtic Connections 2015 alongside our friend, Maori traditional bearer and fellow ‘Boomerang’ collaborator Horomona Horo as well as sharing the bill with the great Alan Kelly Gang. Our show takes place at the Old Fruitmarket on the 22nd of January. We are really looking forward to the festival. Tickets can be purchased here.
Martyn Bennett Prize
On October 14th our bass player James Lindsay was awarded first place in this years Martyn Bennett Prize for Traditional Music Composition. His piece ‘Hebridean Terrace Seamount’ was selected amongst five other beautiful pieces which were performed at the Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh. You can hear all five piece here:
Dublin Marathon
Megan is taking part in the Dublin Marathon this weekend to raise money for Chest, Heart & Stroke Scotland. She would really appreciate your support and there’s still time to donate, so head over here:
Well, what an amazing summer that was; Sark, Italy, Moonbeams, Ely, Warwick, BOOMERANG (Lewis & Glasgow), Bø¸ Norway, Kelvingrove Bandstand, Warwick, Balloch (with the great Ceilidh trailers!), Knoydart Games, Live on BBC Radio 3 & Culture Studio @ Pacific Quay, Sidmouth & Mull of Kintyre Fest. It’s been quite a couple of months for the band and we are incredibly grateful to everyone that has been a part of our summer tour. We’re getting a bit of down time at the moment so we thought we’d send you a wee update with the news.
@ Kelvingrove Bandstand Glasgow for Festival 2014
Boomerang
Photo by Leila Angus @ Brighter Still
It was a pleasure to welcome the Boomerang crew on to our home soil this July. The trip started on the isle of Lewis where we spent a few days together at the Black House village, Gearrannan, before our performance at the Hebridean Celtic Festival. It was brilliant to allow our friends from New Zealand and Australia to experience a bit of real island life as well as showing them the local sights (see us at the Calanais stones above!). The gig itself was amazing fun and the response was just fantastic.
We then headed south to join the party at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games. It was an eventful and challenging week in the city for us, but we pulled through the hardships and put on 3 great shows culminating with our big performance at Glasgow Green for Festival 2014. With the conclusion of that final show came to end an amazing journey that we have been on since the start of the year. So much has been learned and a much greater understanding of one another’s cultures has been gained, but most of all we have made close friends with people from the other side of the world who we may never have encountered had it not been for this project.
A massive thanks needs to go our producers Lisa, Emere & Rhoda who without their unique vision and vigour this project would never have happened, Bob Buchan for his amazing pr work on the project, Iain Thomson & Tim Matthews for making us sound good as well as lugging our gear all over the country, Drew & team at Womad NZ and Caroline & team at Heb Celt for believing in the project, everyone at Festival 2014, Jenny, Jone & everyone that supported the project!
Songlines essential scottish albums
This month Songlines Magazine have featured us in their 10 essential scottish albums. We feel very honoured to be in amongst such amazing music and even more so to be placed alongside one of our heroes Martyn Bennett. If theres any of these records you haven’t heard yet, get your lugs around them!!
7th Scottish Colours Tour
Later this month we are headed out to Austria to jump in the van for the 7th Scottish Colours tour. We are sharing the bill with the brilliant Maeve Mackinnon Trio and will be appearing all over Austria, Switzerland and Italy. It’s been a few years since we last took part in this great tour and we are delighted to be heading back out for the music and schnitzel.
More info: www.weltenklang.at
Down Under November
This November we will be heading back to Australia & New Zealand for a short run of shows. Final details are coming together and we will have an announcement for you soon. Please keep an eye on our Facebook and Twitter for up to the minute info!
After a great tour in May and a few weeks down time in June we are feeling ready to get stuck in to the summer of festivals and commonwealth games action. Our first stop is Sark Folk Festival which takes place on the beautiful channel island of Sark and runs from 4-6th July. We first visited a few years back and thoroughly enjoyed the incredible night sky, horse & cart taxi service and the plentiful lobster. Hope to see a few of you there! Following this we take a short hop over to Trento, Italy for a show on the 7th @ Centro Servizi Culturali S. Chiara and on our return home we will be taking in a few more shows leading up to the Commonwealth Games, see the list below!
Breabach @ The Drouthy Cobbler, Elgin Photo by Dan Sim
Boomerang & Glasgow Commonwealth Games 2014
This summer we are honoured to welcome our friends from Australia and New Zealand to Scotland where we will be performing with Boomerang for the first time on home soil. Alongside Moana and the Tribe, Horomona Horo (New Zealand), Shellie Morris, Casey Donovan, Aaron Burarrwanga and Djakapurra Munyarryun (Australia) we will be taking this exciting collaboration to the Heb Celt Fest in Stornoway on 17th July and then returning for a run of shows in Glasgow. 23rd July in Queens Park, 24th at the Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony Party, Old Fruitmarket and on the 25th we play a free outdoor show in Glasgow Green.
Songlines
Songlines magazine are running a great feature on Boomerang in this months edition. They’ve also included us in the ‘best world music albums of the last 6 months’: “widely regarded as one of the finest scottish folk bands; Breabach deliver a beautifully mature and rich mix of subtle musicianship.” Thanks guys!
Hello everyone, hope you had a lovely Easter break.
Just a quick update to let you all know we are safely home from a fantastic 5 week adventure in Australia and New Zealand!
It was a really exciting adventure with sell out shows and festival appearances which included a return visit to Port Fairy and first time performances in Brunswick, Hobart, Womadelaide & Womad Nz. As well as this we also spent time taking in workshops and meeting and playing with local musicians wherever we went.
Workshop in Melbourne with the fantastic Melbourne Scottish Fiddle Club
On March 7th we released our album ‘Ùrlar’ on Australian label Stem Music and a week later it climbed into and finished at no. 33 in the official Nz Album Charts!
The Boomerang Project, in which we are teamed with Maori and Aboriginal artists in a celebration of indigenous culture, is growing from strength to strength. We premiered our show on the stunning mainstage, the TSB Bowl, at Womad Nz and then went on to an open air performance at the Sydney Opera House for the Homeground Festival. Both shows were incredible experiences and our thanks go to the Womad and Opera House teams respectively for their fantastic hospitality.
Making great friendships and catching up with friends and family along the way is always very special, this time even more so as we met Megan’s brand new niece Christina for the first time!
As always a huge amount of thanks must go to everyone working behind the scenes to make these tours possible, we are very grateful to you all. What an adventure and great privilege.
Breabach UK Tour April/May 2014
So now, a couple of weeks off and then we are back out on tour around the UK. Hope you can make one of the shows!
Photo by Leila Angus @ Brighter Still
