Festival musicians nominated for awards

Young traditional musicians from the Aberdeen International Youth Festival are in the running for a host of prestigious awards.

Daniel Thorpe, from Inverurie, is in final round of the BBC Radio Scotland Young Traditional Musician Award 2009, having made it through the semi finals in Coulter last month.

Daniel has been involved in the Aberdeen International Youth Festival for 8 years, taking part in their Traditional Music School and then becoming a member of the Festival’s Trad Big Band, Ceòl Mòr. Daniel was also chosen by the AIYF to represent the North East at the International Festival for Emerging Artists in London. Daniel was involved with many groups including the Garioch Fiddlers and studied traditional music in Plockton before graduating with honours from the RSAMD. He is now performing with ceilidh band 'Heuch' and his own trio, Tyskie, which he formed with fellow students at RSAMD.

Bodega, the young, five piece band who taught on the Festival’s summer school this year, have been nominated for “Up and Coming Artist of the Year” at the Scots Trad Music Awards . Members of the band were originally pupils at the Splore, before graduating to Ceòl Mòr and now teaching on the course.

Bodega won the BBC Radio2 Young Folk Band award for 2005/06 and have since gone on to release two CDs. Bodega are: Gillian Chalmers (from Fraserburgh), pipes and whistle; Ross Couper, fiddle; Tia Files, acoustic and bass guitar; Norrie MacIver accordion, guitar, djembe, vocals; and June Naylor clarsach and piano.

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The Splore (Monday 27 July - Friday 31 July) is a week long trad music summer school held as part of AIYF. The Splore offers classes in fiddle, whistle, guitar and percussion for students aged 12 - 16, with tutors from leading young trad bands.

Ceòl Mòr is the Aberdeen International Youth Festival's young traditional big band, made up of some of the most most promising young musicians from Scotland and overseas.
They perform original and innovative arrangements of traditional Scottish songs and music as well as original work exploring the margins between traditional music, jazz and contemporary classical music. They perform at the AIYF, and have guested at the Trad Music Awards, the Arts & Business Awards and at Celtic Connections.