Laying the foundations of their future STEVEN BLAKE and RURA I


’M a folkie. There, I’ve said it. I love pipe music, but my fervour for it stems from a wider interest in the many styles of traditional music with roots in the British Isles. That is a very wide spectrum, covering lots of genres including Highland bagpipe, English harmony singing, Bluegrass, Irish Sean Nós or Bothy ballads — to name a diverse few. My first love would be Scottish traditional music, or folk music as it is usually called — it is our folk music after all. It is a vibrant, if somewhat hidden, scene which mostly


PIPING TODAY • 34


exists in back-rooms of pubs, hotels and village halls across the country. However it does get a chance to dust itself off and present to the wider public in the summer months when there are more than 300 folk festivals in all shapes and sizes held across the UK. Until recently, it did not hold much attrac- tion for young people, though the lack of youth is being addressed a little due to the glamour of high-profile events such as Celtic Connec- tions or the Scots Trad Awards — just go to the festival clubs at these events and you will see what I mean. I can only hope that some


of the ‘young things’ partying at these events will stick with the scene to become the CD buyers and audience which keeps the genre alive in years to come. The big-name events can’t take all the


credit though, as improvements in traditional instrument instruction from primary school to degree level have brought youngsters in at the grassroots and provided an educational pathway for their chosen instrument. The fact remains that many of the revered


performers of the folk scene have been around for 20 years or more, and there is not enough


NEW DIRECTIONS


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