Festival of music

Celtic Connections is a breeding ground for new talent. Helene Dunbar reports

Thirteen years ago, a Celtic music festival was launched in Glasgow to fill a hole in the Royal Concert Hall's winter schedule.

Glasgow in January is typically a cold and grey place and there wasn't much happening in the city's post-Christmas period so it was hoped that the festival would provide a diversion for locals and tourists alike.

Although some doubted whether visitors would willingly subject themselves to the Glasgow winter, that first Celtic Connections festival brought 32,000 people to the Royal Concert Hall. In the years since, the festival has grown into a staple of the international festival music scene, seeing more than 100,000 music lovers flock to some 300 shows held in 10 of the city's venues.

Not only has the number of visitors grown though. The music has branched out as well from its focus on purely Scottish traditional to include roots and world music from Ireland, North America Spain, Cape Breton, and all points in between.

Over the years, the list of the festival's participating artists reads like a musical who's who: Joan Baez, Bob Geldof, Capercaillie, Kate Rusby, Sinead O'Connor, Alison Krauss, Shane MacGowan, Runrig, Eddi Reader, Evelyn Glennie, Carlos Nunez, Dougie MacLean, Billy Bragg, Beth Neilsen Chapman, Mariza, and perennial favorites, New York's Cherish the Ladies and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Named Celtic Connection's International Group of the Year in 1996, the five-piece Cherish the Ladies will be playing their 11th festival...

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• By : Helene Dunbar
• In : Best of Scotland
• Issue : 24
• Page : 43
• Words : 719