About this event
Growing up immersed within a Folk music background in Edinburgh, Kate Young has emerged as one Scotland’s most innovative composers and musicians. She is driven by the exploration of new sounds found in traditional musics around the globe, which feed into her compositional world. As a musician, Kate combines voice with fiddle-playing techniques to conjure intriguing soundscapes as she navigates her way across musical genres.
A recipient of the prestigious Paul Hamlyn Award for Composers 2018, Kate has also toured globally with bands such as Moulettes, (Eliza Carthy MBE) Carthy, Hardy, Farrell & Young, Kathryn Tickell & The Darkening , Hannah James’s JigDoll Ensemble. In 2015-16 she collaborated with ten folk musicians from Scotland and England, all women, for Songs of Separation, a record which gained ‘Album of the Year’ at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Award in 2017.
Over the last five years she has developed her interests in British plant lore and folktales, learning directly from books and then weaving information into her songs and compositions as a means to perpetuate and empower traditions at high risk of being lost. She completed a significant commission for Celtic Connections’s New Voices and wrote a suite of pieces around the theme of the natural world.
“A wayward soundscape, whose eldritch tonalities, eerie harmonies and restive rhythmic layers skilfully skirted the familiar and orthodox” The Scotsman
Support Act – Alicia Edelweiss
Alicia Edelweiss is a Vienna-based singer, storyteller and accordionist whose music blends folk, cabaret, and chamber-pop into something utterly unique. Both whimsical and raw, her songs explore vulnerability, surrealism, and the everyday absurd, often delivered with theatrical flair and a poet’s honesty.
Formerly a street musician, Alicia now tours internationally, captivating audiences with her distinctive voice, expressive performances, and unexpected instrumentation. Her critically praised album Furie is a deeply personal, darkly magical journey through emotional intensity and offbeat beauty.
Expect the unexpected – from playful accordion-driven melodies to lyrical reflections that feel both intimate and fantastical.
