Youth dance residency

Friday 27 – Sunday 29 July 10am-3pm each day
Young people will have the chance to develop their contemporary dance technique, learn Rambert repertoire and create a short piece of choreography which will be shared with family and friends on the final day. Open to young people aged 11-17 years with an interest in dance.

Beginners’ contemporary dance classes for adults

Friday 27 July Session 1: 6.30 – 7.30pm / Session 2: 7.30 – 8.30pm
Brand new to dance? Do you want to learn something new with others who have never taken a dance class? These fun classes are aimed at newcomers to dance and all you need is enthusiasm! Suitable for adults (18+)

Family contemporary dance workshop

Saturday 28 July 3.30-5.30pm
A chance for families to discover contemporary dance together, the class will include warm-up games as well as the chance to learn a short piece of fun Rambert repertoire. Suitable for families with children aged 5 and over. No previous experience required.

Please email if you would like to register for places on any one of these three exciting activities and we will forward a registration form: jennydunoonarts@gmail.com

Source: J Saich

The Strathpeffer Pavilion Association AGM is on Wednesday 23 May at 7 pm. Members of the Association should have received official notification but anyone interested in the Pavilion is welcome to attend.

Saturday 26 May at 8 pm, Showaddywaddy – one of the top groups of the 70s and still going strong – they sold out last time and it really was a fun night, you can’t help singing along (and dancing) to their songs! There is likely to be only limited seating at this event. Tickets £17.50 / £16.50 / £6 (school pupils), from all the usual outlets

“Usual outlets” are: online from WeGotTickets.com and TicketWeb.co.uk, TicketWeb’s 24-hour hotline 08444 771000, June’s Card Shop in Dingwall High Street and of course the Pavilion office in person or by ringing 01997 420124 (9 to 6 Monday to Friday).

Friday 1 June at 8 pm, Scottish folk rock band Cal, whose lead singer Michael Callaghan was at one stage shortlisted to replace Donnie Munro with Runrig. This is a standing event and all tickets are £12 from usual outlets

Sunday 3 June from noon to 4 pm, Strathpeffer community Diamond Jubilee Picnic and related events in the Pavilion Gardens (indoors if wet) – bring your own picnic, hot and cold drinks on sale. We’re told that more details of this will be posted on notices around the village nearer the time.

On Friday 8 June at 8 pm, they are delighted to welcome back the brilliant Scottish Ensemble, with a programme of French and Scottish music to celebrate the Auld Alliance – and with Welsh harpist Catrin Finch continuing the Celtic connection! Tickets £10 for all adults, £5 for school pupils, from usual outlets.

Saturday 9 June will be Strathpeffer’s famous Victorian Market from 12 noon to 4 pm, with stalls in the Square and events throughout the village (watch for the official programme, due out soon). Friends of the Pavilion, in conjunction with the Church of Scotland, will be selling teas in the main hall of the Pavilion and are arranging an exhibition of historic photos in the veranda (for which there will be a small charge, payable on the door).

That night, Saturday 9 June, from 8.30 till midnight, the Victorian Strathpeffer Committee are holding a ceilidh in the Pavilion, with local band Highland Ceilidh – talented young musicians, including our good friend Fiona Dalgety of Feis Rois on fiddle and calling the dances. All tickets for this are £8 – there aren’t yet have tickets at the Pavilion but they are available from online ticket sellers WeGotTickets.com and TicketWeb.co.uk. Victorian Strathpeffer plan to put them on sale at various Strathpeffer outlets and the Sports & Model Shop in Dingwall.

They have just been given tickets to sell at the Pavilion for Strathpeffer Golf Club’s fundraising dance  from 8.30 pm to midnight on Saturday 16 June, with Inverness cover band Rant. Tickets are £10 and they are also available from the Golf Club, who are arranging a return bus service on the night from Conon Bridge via Dingwall and Maryburgh at a cost of £3.

Full details of the above and other events are on thewebsite page www.strathpefferpavilion.org/whats-on.asp, including the following new events for which tickets have just gone on sale:

Thursday 21 June at 8 pm concert by students of the Plockton Music School

Friday 20 July at 8 pm – the wonderful Scottish Chamber Orchestra

Wednesday 25 July at 8 pm – the Tannahill Weavers

Thursday 2 August at 8 pm – Strangebird Zirkus in “Ornithology”

Saturday 29 September at 8 pm – top rhythm & blues band Dr. Feelgood

Source: Strathpeffer Pavillion

Hazel studied painting and calligraphy at Newport College of Art, Monmouthshire, before obtaining her Art Teachers Certificate from Leeds University Institute of Education. She taught from 1964 until 1996.

For a good number of years however she has pursued her interest in textiles and has developed a variety of techniques which she uses to create images. The changing colours, shapes, patterns and textures within the landscape and seascape are what attract her, and the abstract qualities within these elements have become dominant in her work.

When producing work Hazel relies mainly on memory, only occasionally referring to sketches or photographic references.

Cyril studied at Sunderland College of Art in the early sixties where he specialised in painting. Having also gained his Art Teachers Certificate from Leeds he taught art and design in secondary schools until he took early retirement in 1993.

The emphasis placed on observational skills during his time at Sunderland has remained important to him and he draws and sketches as a matter of habit. Cyril’s sketchbook studies are the first connection to subjects he may choose to paint and more often than not employ a descriptive approach.

The Northern Highlands, whose moods are so influenced by the changing weather and light which in turn reveal and obscure features, provide a wealth of ideas for work. Although Cyril’s paintings are produced back in the studio where time and thought can be given as to how they may be developed, he prefers it when they exhibit the kind of directness which suggest that they could have been done on location.

2nd June – Hazel Reed will be teaching two workshop classes on Saturday the 2nd of June at an talla solais. Looking at her own work in the exhibition, students will be introduced to working with textiles to produce landscape images. In the morning she will lead a children’s workshop from 10 – 12.30pm and in the afternoon an adults workshop from 1.30 – 4 pm places are given on a first come first served basis, please call an talla solais on 01854 612310 to book a place

6th June – Cyril Reed will give a painting demonstration in the Gallery on Wednesday the 6th of June from 2 – 5 pm, this will be a drop in session, it is free of charge, Cyril will be happy to answer questions on his work and discuss his working process.

Source: an talla solais

IMPRESSIONS, Landscape: painting and textile by  Hazel and Cyril Reed and REACH, new installation by Gill Russell will open on the Friday night from 7 – 9 pm and then open daily 10-4pm and will run until 17 June.

Some related events include:

2nd June – 2 half day textile work shops with Hazel Reed. Childrens’ and adults’ £3 / £5 call to book 01854 612310

6th June – Painting demonstration in gallery with Cyril Reed 2 – 5 pm

16th June – Artist’s Talk – Gill Russell – sugested donation £2.50

Source: an talla solais

The session will feature Findlay Napier (of the Bar Room Mountaineers), Louis Abbott (of Admiral Fallow) and Kim Edgar (Burns Unit), highly regarded as three of Scotland’s finest songwriters who will play through their songs and break them open in unique and inspiring ways that will show their songwriting processes. There will also be informal Q&A at the session to give you a chance to ask the things you would like to ask established songwriters.

INVERNESS, Eden Court – Friday 25th MAY – 7pm – 9pm

All tickets for these events are FREE but you must reserve them at www.musicplus.org.uk/songwriting

Source: Robotone

The money comes from the PRS for Music Foundation, the UK’s leading independent funder of new music across all genres. During a very competitive process, HebCelt was one of just 30 applications approved from the 400 received by the foundation for the latest round of awards.

The festival, now in its 17th year, boasts a unique location and an international reputation for quality and cutting-edge programming.

Last year it established a second stage within its main site in the grounds of Lews Castle in Stornoway in the isle of Lewis. This initiative, supported by the Scotland’s Islands project, hosted performances from artists from other Scottish islands alongside established acts and this year the main site’s operating hours will be extended to provide more performing slots.

The Islands Stage will see a range of artists who are creating new work across the contemporary traditional, bluegrass and indie genres, including Idlewild frontman Roddy Woomble, Washington Irving, Sketch and The Sea Atlas.

The stage will also host Glasgow-based three-piece Muran who earlier this month earned a slot in the bill by winning the festival’s One Step Further initiative to find new talent.

James Hannam, Applications Manager for the PRS for Music Foundation, said: “HebCelt was selected partly due to its strong Gaelic roots and also its ability to attract new audiences and the wide range of folk artists being programmed.”

This year’s festival, which runs from 11-14 July, will be headlined by The Waterboys, The Proclaimers and Kassidy. Last year it attracted an audience of 14,500, 46 per cent of whom were visitors to the area, including festivalgoers from across Europe, the USA and Canada.

Festival Director Caroline MacLennan said: “We are delighted to receive this financial assistance from such a prestigious organisation as the PRS for Music Foundation.

“Supporting and encouraging new talent is one of the key aims of the festival. The second stage programme is primarily aimed at promoting emerging artists, both local and visiting.

“This policy provides opportunities for performers to appear alongside many of their peers, assisting their ongoing artistic development. Equally our distinctive location has the potential to offer new markets to all artists appearing at the festival.”

The PRS for Music Foundation (PRSF) is widely respected as an adventurous and proactive funding body, supporting a wide range of new music activity – from unsigned band showcases to composer residencies, from commissions for new music to experimental live electronica.

Since March 2000 PRSF has given more than £16 million to over 4,500 new music initiatives.

For more information on the PRS for Music Foundation go to www.prsformusicfoundation.com

Source: Hebridean Celtic Festival

First to arrive at the end of this month is Daniel Zalkus, a life drawer from Chicago. www.zalkus.com

He will be closely followed by the winner of The Glenfiddich/Bestcollegeart Emerging Artist of the Year Award, Juhikadevi Bhanjdeo, a young textile artist from India.

July will see the arrival of two painters, Wu Tung-lung from, Taiwan and Jack Newling from London.
www.artslant.com/global/artists/show/194676-wu-tung-lung
www.foldgallery.com/index.php?title=Jack_Newling

They will be joined by another young London artist who continues the programmes relationship with the Royal Academy, Carly Bateup who will be exploring ideas of exchange through Dufftown’s twinned relationship with Mortlach In Canada.

Arriving at the same time will be our first fully fledged Korea artist, Dongwan Kook www.kookdongwan.com/index.html

In mid July Canadian film maker Jillian McDonald takes up her place in Dufftown and will be on the lookout for local extras to play a role in her proposed horror film entitled ‘ The Valley of the Deer’ www.jillianmcdonald.net

 Last to join will be Yuan Yuan, a painter from China www.artnet.com/artists/yuan%20yuan

Residency exhibition schedule will be announced shortly, but in June the gallery will host >> FORWARDTHINKING a group show with 16 young London based artists including former residents Tim Ellis and Blue Firth. Work will also be included by Jack Newling.

William Grant & Sons Ltd
The Glenfiddich Distillery
Dufftown, Banffshire, AB55 4DH

RENOWNED ensemble Mr McFall’s Chamber are well-known for taking their audience on far-reaching  journeys, and their current tour is no exception.

THIS month, four of Scotland’s most prominent traditional composers join them in a showcase of four new commissions celebrating their country’s diversity (more dates will follow later in the year). Hailing from Aberdeenshire, the Black Isle, Caithness and the Argyll coast, the composers have created four very different pieces to honour their respective home grounds, in a performance that melds traditional, jazz and classical influences.

The Four Corners ensemble

The nine musicians work beautifully together, and it is almost surprising that the composers are only guests, and not permanent members of the Chamber. Their contrasting backgrounds complement each other, and attract a variety of audience members who might have been drawn in by the prospect of seeing either Scottish Chamber Orchestra’s Su-a Lee or Lau’s Aidan O’Rourke.

For those who have visited the places portrayed in the performance, the music performs an instant teleportation to the expansive skies and striking landscapes of the piece’s titles. And for those of us who haven’t, the pieces are still equally emotive. Corrina Hewat’s interpretation of the Black Isle effortlessly takes the listener on a trip through her childhood haunts of Cullicudden, Fortrose and Jemimaville, conjuring images of sunny stretches of farmland and coast. James Ross’s composition Flow Country, the endless expanse of peat bog between Caithness and Sutherland, is comparatively dark and ominous.

Four Corners displays just how diverse and pliable traditional Scottish music can be, and the way it can blend readily with a multitude of other sounds and genres. Unfortunately, this is not the kind of Scottish music that most people will have the chance to hear, and most visitors to the country will leave with a fairly narrow idea of what ‘real’ Scottish music ought to sound like. These four compositions are testament to the kind of potential that the genre carries, and the different directions that it can be taken in.

© Rowan Macfie, 2012

Links

• Mr McFall’s Chamber

On Wednesday 15th February this Residency ranged a fair distance from the Western Isles. From a waypoint at the School of Scottish Studies, George Square, Edinburgh, I rode shotgun on a road movie to the outskirts of Swansea. We were on the edge of a Celtic sea-route where stories were traded along with produce. This was a family visit and we arrived to news of a sudden death. The sad news led in turn, a few days later, to an inland setting.

Storytellers at Calanais

The Thomas Helwys Baptist Church in Lenton, Nottingham is a strong example of 1960s architecture – exposed brickwork is set with great curving laminated timber beams. There is a feeling of space and calm inside. Across the road are contrasting icons of centuries. There is cluster of high-rise flats, of the same period as the church but now due for demolition. A much older fine brick warehouse with arching windows has been converted to student flats and looks set to be fit for a further century.

The death we had come to mark occurred in one of the bleak towers. The minister knew the man who died and had been a main link to tight circles of a limited world outside. We dealt with the necessary business together and, in the course of our exchange Jenny (the Baptist minister) asked me about my own work. I told her I was now a Reader in Residence in the Hebrides. She told me the church had its own reading group and it met the next day. Could I come and tell a story?

So that is how the stories gleaned from Western Isles Libraries and the School of Scottish Studies archives were told in a district of Nottingham.

Two research students began the discussion. They are writing a joint dissertation, comparing different reading groups. One read a descriptive poem but omitted the title. So it was a riddle. This suggested the story of the wise grieve at Calanais farm (collected and transcribed by Donald Morrison, cooper, Stornoway) . As readers of this blog, listeners to Isles FM and members of a reading group in Stornoway and another in Lenton know, this is one of many stories with a pattern of three. Each element is really a sort of riddle. Now those who have heard it can share that story further.

But I’m going to continue the journey with one more story suggested by the last. Angus Cameron, recorded in Skye in 1958, provided a fine version of another witty tale included in the Morrison manuscript but he also offered another group of three riddles.

George Buchanan was a historical figure but his name has become a timeless byname for the one who wins by wit. But he outstretched himself at least once. He was in the jail, in England and things were not looking great. His reputation was to be tested by the king who made him an offer. Answer three questions correctly and be granted freedom.

But Buchanan did a bit of fancy footwork first. His own brother, known to be a simple fellow, was smuggled in to take the learned man’s place.
So the brother heard the questions and provided his own answers.

How many ladders do you need, to reach the moon?


One – if it’s long enough.

How long will it take a man to go round the world?


Twenty-four hours, if he goes in step with the sun.

The King’s examiner must have been getting anxious then but his last card would have been the ace.
What am I thinking?

I know what you’re thinking all right. You’re thinking I’m George Buchanan. But you’re wrong – I’m his brother, the fool.

For more information about Ian visit his website at www.ianstephen.co.uk

© Ian Stephen, 2012

Come to Moray Art Centre to learn all about seasonal cooking, including:

• Workshops from Community Food Moray
• Making your own healthy pizza in a clay oven
• Tasting local produce
• Learning creative ways to reduce your food waste from Zero Waste Scotland

Earthtime will also be providing lots of fun for the kids, including seasonal seed planting!

For more information – 01309 692426 info@morayartcentre.org  www.morayartcentre.org

Source: Moray Art Centre

This new six-week residency at Orkney’s Pier Arts Centre aims to support and develop the skills of an emerging Scottish or Scotland-based artist working within film and moving image. The residency was developed for artists early in their career who will benefit from a focussed period of development in a stimulating environment outwith their typical studio base.

Twenty-one artists applied for the residency; the panel selected Sarah Forrest. Glasgow School of Art MFA graduate Forrest has exhibited work at Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow; Supplement, London; Glasgow Sculpture Studios; SWG3, Glasgow; Dundee Contemporary Arts and Piet Zwart Institute, Rotterdam.

On receiving the residency, Sarah commented, ‘to be awarded the Margaret Tait Residency is such an exciting opportunity for me at this point in my practice. It will be a pleasure and privilege to spend six weeks in Orkney, where I will have the time, space and support to focus exclusively on creating new work. The work I have proposed to make will be filmed and set in Orkney, taking as its point of departure an individual’s search for a mythical object. This object, however, is stubbornly elusive: it will not be found. The pursuit of this fictitious object will structure my time and approach to the residency, with the resulting work being a new video that documents, however abstractly, the ongoing search.’

The panel praised Forrest’s thoughtful and subtle proposal. Andrew Parkinson, Curator at Pier Arts Centre and member of the selection panel commented, ‘Sarah’s work is quiet, well crafted and beautifully shot and I look forward very much to seeing her work made in Orkney.’

Corinne Orton of Glasgow Film Festival added ‘We are really excited to be launching this new residency with the help of our partners and were very impressed by the quality of applications we received. The panel felt strongly that Sarah’s application shone through and we are thrilled to be able to assist her in developing her craft. We hope her summer in Orkney will be inspiring and insightful.’

The resulting work from the residency will have exhibition opportunities with Glasgow Film Festival and Pier Arts Centre, and will be additionally supported by LUX, the London–based UK agency for the support and promotion of artists working with the moving image.

Source: Glasgow Film Festival

The latest theatre production from Right Lines will be a fast moving four-hander comedy that examines the issue of migration to and from the Highlands on local, national and intergalactic levels! We ask the questions – why do people come, why do people stay and why do they go? Furthermore, what exactly does it mean to be a local?

Following a one-off UFO experience, Jack has been pursuing his passion for all things extraterrestrial for years. He has joined an online community of fellow enthusiasts and they have given him the task of building an Intergalactic Communicator to establish Contact. Only his day job as a garage mechanic in a remote Highland village and the influence of his level-headed daughter Mhairi have prevented him from spending all his time reaching out to commune with life beyond the stars.

Mhairi has kept the business going, just, but now the planets are perfectly aligned and the day of the Big Test is approaching…

Into Jack’s world happens Felicity, moving to the area to escape a marriage and establish a Healing Centre. Her city-slicker son Darren plans to stay only long enough to drop his mother off before racing back to the South in his extremely expensive sports car.

However, the car breaks down outside the garage at exactly the same time as Jack realises the long-awaited final component for his Communicator device doesn’t fit. He needs to find a replacement part quickly to finish his machine… and where on earth can he find it?

As the lives of these four individuals collide, is this a calamity or good fortune for all concerned. Or both? And what are those strange lights in the night sky…?

From These Parts will feature a very strong cast: Ron Emslie, Vari Sylvester, Helen Mackay and Ewan Donald. The Director is Ian Grieve, Set Design by Mike Taylor and Michael Start and the Writers are Euan Martin and Dave Smith.

“We are very fortunate to have the services of Ron Emslie once again. He has worked with Right Lines on several shows including Who Bares Wins, Watching Bluebottles and Whisky Kisses. In fact, it was through Whisky Kisses that Director Ian Grieve met Ron and promptly cast him in the lead role of Willy Loman in the highly-acclaimed Perth Theatre production of Death of a Salesman in 2011. Coincidentally, Vari and Ewan were also in Death of a Salesman and From These Parts is the first time they have all been reunited with Ian Grieve since then.”

Helen Mackay from Caithness makes up the acting contingent. Helen has also worked with Right Lines previously in The Accidental Death of an Accordionist and alongside Ron Emslie in the online radio comedy Morrison’s Van which is still available to download on the Northings website.

From These Parts is funded by the Northern Scottish Touring Fund and will tour to venues across the Highlands & Islands and North-East of Scotland in June 2012.

For this production, we are collaborating with two new artists on Set Design. We enlisted Tain artist Mike Taylor whose work ranges from the most detailed trompe l’oeil to full-scale murals on the side of the Greenpeace Rainbow Warrior. Through connections in the Moray Arts community, Euan met up with Michael Start from The House of Automata in Kinloss. Michael is a world expert on horology and Automata and he was the expert advisor to Martin Scorsese on the recent Oscar-winning Hollywood movie “Hugo”.

“As the main character in our play is building an Intergalactic Communicator, I thought Michael would be the ideal person to help us design and build this essential centre-piece to our production. Despite a very busy schedule, including a major contribution to the Daniel Radcliffe film “The Woman in Black” and appearances at the Brit Awards and on Britain’s Got Talent with his Flea Circus, Michael agreed to work with us. Having an advisor to an Oscar-winning movie is a fantastic addition to our Creative Team, as well as a great career move for Michael, obviously!”

Right Lines Productions will tour From These Parts in the Highlands, North-East and Western Isles between 16th – 30th June 2012.

For further information, please contact Euan Martin at euan@rightlines.net  or visit the following websites:

Right Lines – www.rightlines.net

NSTF – www.nxne.info

Northings – www.northings.com

House of Automata – www.automatomania.co.uk

Euan Martin, Right Lines Productions www.rightlines.net 07540 049865.

Source: Right Lines Productions

As the project nears completion, 16 pupils from the local Primary School will be taking a walk up the hill to the Stables tomorrow (Wednesday 16 May 2012) at 9.30 for a workshop with the leading Stone Letter Carver in the UK – Richard Kindersley. In recent years Richard has undertaken many of the principal commissions for letter carving in the UK – to name but three, the Royal Museum in Edinburgh, the new Supreme Court and the Battle of Britain Memorial which was unveiled in Green Park, London last year.

The aim of the project was to increase the skill set of Scottish craftsmen, be they existing stone masons or those who are considering embarking on this career, with a view to increasing the pool of talent that is available in the Highlands.

Richard has been working for 2 weeks with his 9 apprentices who come from all over Scotland to learn the traditional craft of stone letter carving. One of the apprentices said ‘This is such a terrific opportunity. Richard is a wonderful teacher and I’ve learned so much over the last 2 weeks which I’ll be able to use in my career.’

This newly created path will also greatly improve access to the building to those with limited mobility and the Cromarty Arts Trust is grateful to the Highland Council, Awards for All, Black Isle Development Fund, Clan Urquhart and the Cromarty Common Good Fund for supporting this project.

The project runs all this week until 5pm on Friday 18 May with a school visit from 9.30-10.30 on Wednesday morning.

Source: Cromarty Arts Trust

Run by Voluntary Arts Scotland, Make a Splash! is an information and training event aimed at any organisation which takes part in the arts for the love of it, and would like more people to join them.

Make a Splash! takes place at High School, Sgoil Lionacleit,

Linaclate, Benbecula, Western Isles, HS7 5PJ on Monday 11 June AND The Woodlands Centre, Castle Grounds, Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, HS2 0XP on Tuesday 12 June.  Both from 6.30 – 8.30pm. Please join us at 6pm for

a free buffet. To book your free place please visit

www.vascotland.org.uk/makeasplash

Source: Voluntary Arts Scotland

The workshop will be run by local artist Claire Harkess and is aimed at adults of all abilities from beginner to more advanced. It will run from 10.30am to 3.30pm and will use the museum’s collections for inspiration.

Advance booking is essential for the workshop as places are limited. All materials are included in the £20 fee.

For more information, and to obtain a booking form, please call Perth Museum and Art Gallery on 01738 632488.

Source: Perth & Kinross Council

Few husband-wife musical duos provide audiences with such a complete entertainment package as do Stacey Earle & Mark Stuart.

Based out of Tennessee, Earle and Stuart draw from blues, pop, country, rock, and more in their heartfelt music. The years of touring the Folk/Americana circuit (playing 170 concerts a year) and their combined experience formally in brother Steve’s “The Dukes”, have given them a knack for reaching out to the audience in an intimate “come in to my living room” fashion. So much so they reached out and enlisted the help of The House Concert Hub and Flyinshoes Review members and asked, if they could literally come into their living room for some dates on this mammoth tour. Heres what they had to say about the response. They tour in support of their brand new album, “ Dedication”.

They started the whole 50 date tour here in Scotland on April the 4th at The Rio Cafe for a Supper Celebration, with a lucky 30 fans in the most intimate surroundings possible, The Medicine Show was there here is the podcast.   They have added a North East date to their already busy Schedule – see House Concert website for details.

Stacey Earle acknowledges all our help with booking this tour:

“Mark and I would like to thank everybody on the House Concert Hub especially Rob Ellen for all the help filling our open dates on our upcoming UK/EURO 2012 Tour. We are now sitting at 50 shows in 60 days. Everyone was quick to help and offer dates, it was a challenge getting all the dates and Geographic’s coordinated but with the kind patience of everybody it all fell in place better than we could ever imaging or hoped for. Again THANK YALL ! From the bottom of hearts! The HUB is a true gift. And Rob you are pretty DARN special yourself. We look forward to meeting everyone when we arrive for our first show in Glasgow at the Rio Cafe April 4 2012.  Luuuuuuv, Stacey Earle and Mark Stuart”

“Shucks!” Rob Ellen.

Sara Petite on Tour

For Doghouse Rose, Sara left San Diego to record in Nashville with Eddie Gore; there are a few well-known names amongst the large cast of players (Kenny Vaughan on electric guitar, Harry Stinson from The Dukes on harmony vocals, amongst others) but Sara’s the star. She writes really good, melody-rich songs and she sings them in a distinctive voice that seems to spring from a happy soul. The sense of fun is always there, even in the more reflective and serious songs – as if being aware of the downbeat moments is just further confirmation of how good it is to be alive.

With the very fine drumming of William Ellis driving things along, there’s a lot of electric guitar (sometimes twangy, sometimes pure rock) being woven around Sara’s voice and it’s the spirit of her music that matters rather than any one player’s ego trip. All bar one of these thirteen songs is an original, with the one cover being Harlan Howard’s He Called Me Baby. Perhaps nothing quite tops the opening song, Magnolia; Sara’s vocal is unleashed and flying and the galloping interplay of guitars and dobro is guaranteed to put a smile on your face. It’s probably the highlight of the album for me, but the quality is high throughout, with a nice balance between the quieter numbers and the full tilt exuberance that she does so well. Overall this album probably just about tops its predecessor but I have to say that the song that still knocks me out is Dead Man Walking from Lead the Parade, a song that I reckon Steve Earle would be proud to call his own. Anyway, make sure you get to see her if she’s anywhere close over the next month or so and she’ll chase the last of those winter blues away for you.

Sara is playing three dates on the tour with The Medicine Show. Rob will be recording the Full Enchilada Glasgow Show for broadcast on The Medicine Show.

Source: Rob Ellen

THE TALL SHIPS are back in Ullapool, or it seems that way, thanks to an exhibition called LK243 Undersail at An Talla Solais, which evokes the 2011 race from Waterford in Ireland all the way to Halmstad in Sweden.

THE SHIPS called in at Ullapool, and this exhibition traces the path of one of them, through the record created by Imi Maufe, who was on board vessel LK243 as artist in residence during the voyage.

Artist Imi Maufe on board ship

At the heart of the exhibition is a neat little wooden ‘bunk box’, designed to fit into a tiny berth, but instead of the trinkets and personal belongings you might expect to be in it, it is filled with badges, wooden ‘postcards’, little notebooks, and a miniature video screen. The entire exhibition is designed to be housed in this box, or, as in this case, for some of its contents to explode out onto the walls of a gallery.

The wall pieces include screenprinted images, mostly simple but effective evocations of the view out of a porthole, with bold colour and line capturing key moments cartoon-style. There are also bunk curtains, and both these and the screenprints feature four word phrases, which come from the journey record.

Each hour, the position of the boat was plotted, and coupled with a four word phrase for each, this forms the record. Taken together they are evocative and amusing. A few examples will give a flavour: ‘Early Morning Island Sillhouettes’, ‘Dophins Jump Through Rainbows’, ‘Eerie Screaming Bird Sound’, ‘Dodging Tankers In Dark’, ‘Fun With Foreign Languages’, ‘Drawing Maps On Beach’,'Hourly Chart Position Charted’, ‘Oldest Boat For Now’ and ‘Increasing Uncertainty From Thursday’.

LK243 Under Sail

Participants in the journey and observers have been invited, as fellow travellers, to draw pictures of boats, or record memories of other sea voyages and these are included in the log. This gives a flavour of the thronging masses of people who collectively make up the Tall Ships Race.

The video, some sections of which could make you seasick, is mostly footage of the sail, plus showing how the artist printed positions on wooden postcards, then hurled them into the sea at various stages of the journey. Miraculously some of these have been found, returned to the artist and added to the exhibition. Taken all together it’s a rich picture that gives a real sense of a sea voyage enjoyed by a host of maritime people.

An Leabhar Mor

The second part of the exhibition is also a touring show of words, but this one has been on a worldwide voyage that has lasted many years. An Leabhar Mor na Gaidhlig (The Great Book of Gaelic) has, as its title suggests, a book at its centre. It is one of my favourite books, a vast and colourful celebration of Gaelic poetry, from Scotland and Ireland, from the earliest known written verses to new work by living bards. It is appropriate that its visit to Ullapool should coincide with the book festival which always pays such creative respect to the mother tongue of this corner of the world.

Yet An Leabhar Mor is much more than a book of poetry. Each poem is printed in both its original Gaelic and in translation, and in addition it is given a full page of illustration. Each of these illustrations is created through collaboration between a calligrapher and an artist, and many of the resulting pieces are little masterpieces of visual art. The exhibition allows these works to be seen at full scale, thus really enhancing the experience of the book’. Although the reproductions are excellent, the texture and full impact of some of the pieces is only possible by seeing them framed on a wall.

It is surprising that many of the pieces selected for the exhibition are monochrome, because the overall impact of the book is that is richly colourful.

Some of my favourites include Stan Clementsmith’s marvellous tree/people image illustrating Uilleam Neill’s poem ‘De a Thug Ort Sgriobhach sa Ghaidhlig?’(What compelled you to write in Gaelic?). The lines include ‘Oh horo, won’t I be joyful / speaking to each tree that’s there’, and the tree image conveys all that joy, along with the beautifully calligraphied words, ‘Bridhinn ris gach craoibh a thi’innte’. For a Gaelic learner, such accessible combinations of word and image are gratifying.

Tree-related calligraphy by Reitlin Murphy also graces Iain Joyce’s intriguing coloured lithograph for Claocho (Transfigured) by Cathal O’Searcaigh, in which he is ‘getting ready to become a tree.’ And again, in Norman Shaw’s dense etching for Iain MacGillEathain’s ‘Am Bard an Canada’, who is ‘alone in this gloomy woodland’.

There is much in this exhibition to make you ponder about the way the languages and artforms of these islands can reach out to each other across the boundaries of politics and discipline. This is most powerfully shown by Doug Cocker’s austere, severe, drawing of a building, responding to Liam O’Muirthile’s poem ‘Tairseacha’ (Threshholds). The calligraphy, by Aisling O’Beirn, highlights the challenges of crossing boundaries, making the worlds strange by laying them out in artificially even groups of five letters, with X to mark the end of one word and the start of another. Thus Einne Amuigh Thar Tairseacha? becomes the unintelligible EINNE.XAMUI.GHXTH. ARXTA.IRSEA.CHA?X

My favourite piece of all, though, enhanced by a reading of the poem by Aonghas MacNeacail, is a brilliant response by Frances Walker to Ian Chrichton Smith’s poem ‘Aig a Chladh’ (At the Cemetary), about the burial of ‘my neighbour lying under the bee / that is humming among sweet flowers.’ The picture shows a congregation of black-hatted and clothed people making their way past a forest of white graves. Beyond, in a pulse of colour made even more powerful by the lack of other colour in the exhibition, shimmers the silvery-blue sea, across which all these words and images have journeyed.

© Mandy Haggith, 2012

Links

• An Talla Solais
• An Leabhar Mor
• Mandy Haggith
• Mandy Haggith’s Blog

Vicky Featherstone was the inaugural Artistic Director and Chief Executive of the National Theatre of Scotland and, since taking up appointment in November 2004, has steered the Company to enormous artistic, critical and audience acclaim. She passes on to her successor a company in excellent creative and financial shape.

The Board of the National Theatre of Scotland will begin the recruitment of a new Artistic Director immediately.

Richard Findlay, Chairman of the National Theatre of Scotland said:

“Vicky has done a fantastic job during her time here with many a great success built around a strong team. She will be sorely missed, not just by us, but by the entire Scottish theatre community. We wish her well in her new job.”

Vicky Featherstone, Artistic Director of the National Theatre of Scotland commented:

“It was with a complex mixture of real sadness and joy that I told the National Theatre of Scotland’s Chairman Richard Findlay about being offered my new job as Artistic Director of the Royal Court Theatre in London. It was the Royal Court which first opened my eyes to the possibilities of theatre and playwrights when I worked there early in my career and it was this passion which led me to Scotland, chasing the brilliance of, amongst so many others, David Greig, David Harrower, Zinnie Harris, Greg Burke and Douglas Maxwell. I thank you all.

“For it is a life-changing experience to be the person to set up a new national theatre. As I have said many times, the National Theatre of Scotland is part of a continuum of theatre. All we have done and are doing within the Company is made possible by the richness of Scotland – its people, its geography, its brilliant complexity.

“And there are so many stories yet to tell, so many artists yet to tell them and so many people yet to be thrilled by what theatre is. It is an honour beyond words to have played a part in setting up something which is so great. It is a privilege to have seen the astonishing team at the National Theatre of Scotland grow into something fearless and dynamic. All I hope is that what we have created is something with enough importance, with enough care and with enough passion to last the future.”

Source: National Theatre of Scotland

It’s the result of a rare collaboration between two extraordinary talents from the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides: award-winning poet, novelist and playwright Kevin MacNeil and acclaimed singer-songwriter Willie Campbell. The two have brought their unique gifts together to produce an album that is raw, tender, funny and uplifting all at the same time.

MacNeil’s poems (it’s just wrong to call them lyrics, even on an album) leap across the spectrum of human emotion, from male anguish over an abortion on the gorgeous, unflinching Every Month, to wry, dark-edged hope in Optimist Drowns in Half-filled Bath. It’s all spun together with Campbell’s yearning tunes, his distinctive soaring voice providing melodic refrains on each track. Visible From Space will strike a chord with everyone who’s failed, loved, hoped, despaired, and survived to see the funny side.

But don’t just take our word for it. Local Man Ruins Everything (MacNeil and Campbell’s first collaboration) was Single of the Week in The Guardian and The List (where it was described as ‘tragically heartbreaking and brilliantly uplifting’) and also on Steve Lamacq’s 6 Music show. The duo have, over the years, built up a cult following – so we’re delighted to be able to announce the release of their long-anticipated debut album, on 12 May.

This is the fourth release on An Lanntair record label, which aims to promote artists and material from the Western Isles of Scotland. Release date is 12^th May 2012, and the recording will also be available on itunes

www.lanntair.com

Source: An Lanntair

AS THE Lovin’ Spoonful’s John Sebastian once observed, reflecting on the travelling musician’s lifestyle, “If you ever wonder why we ride the carousel/We do it for the stories we can tell.”

WHILE “rollercoaster” might be a closer analogy for the Shetland Folk Festival, its worldwide reputation as a source of all-time great, frequently fantastical stories is second to none.

Treacherous Orchestra (photo Somhairle MacDonald)

During this year’s 32nd event, for instance, one couple of first-time visitors found themselves so blown away by the whole experience that he ended up proposing – successfully – amid the sublimely beautiful setting of St Ninian’s Isle, in one of the fleeting sunny intervals that punctuated the weekend’s snow showers. As word swiftly spread on the festival’s uncannily expeditious grapevine, the newly-engaged pair were presented with a bottle of champagne by their B&B hosts, and congratulated from the stage – then cheered by 800 people – at the closing concert on Sunday. If ever a troth was propitiously plighted, this is surely it.

Then there was the somewhat sorrier tale of a certain Glaswegian flautist, who – along with many of his fellow performers – had started the party immediately upon boarding the overnight ferry from Aberdeen. Having continued it more or less uninterrupted for nearly 36 hours, he was eventually spotted around 4am wandering the streets of Lerwick, utterly clueless as to where he was staying, by the local constabulary, who picked him up not once but twice, and delivered him not to the cells but back to the Festival Club, where one of the long-suffering volunteer organisers was sure to get him home safely.

The story behind Mànran’s fiddler and piper Ewen Henderson playing in the thick of Saturday’s mammoth late-night Festival Club session wearing a (literal) penguin suit was traceable to a borrowed Up Helly Aa costume, courtesy of his hosts: bandmate Gary Innes was also spotted in full Viking regalia. The reason why a (male, bearded) member of US old-time revivalists The Hot Seats took the stage at the final-night party in an extravagantly frilled lilac bridesmaid’s dress, however, remained a mystery. As did the exact identity of whoever deemed it a good idea for three members of the Treacherous Orchestra to take a wheelie-bin ride down Lerwick’s main street one morning – though the real comedy came when they attempted to climb out. . .

Manran

At the heart of such legendary shenanigans – abetted this year by the festival’s favourite dining establishment, the Harbour Café, opening its doors as soon as the club finally closed, and as ever by locals’ amazing willingness to open their homes round the clock to invading hordes of musicians, whether for bed, board or yet more tunes – is Shetland performers’ and audiences’ likewise insatiable appetite for the music.

The 2012 programme comprised 26 main concerts around the islands, more than a third of them outside Lerwick, with performers dispatched as far afield as Skerries (pop. 54), a three-hour return ferry crossing from the Shetland mainland. Most shows featured five acts each, and almost all were sold out. Up to four more bands each night then played scheduled slots both upstairs and downstairs at the club, while impromptu sessions sprang up in all corners of the building, uniting players from different line-ups, countries and genres, always with a liberal sprinkling of formidably talented locals.

It’s all fuel to the fire of Shetland’s uniquely inspiring ambience within which – thanks also to the international calibre of each year’s bill – performers almost invariably up their game to the max when it comes to the actual gigs, regardless of after-hours antics. Not only do the professionals put each other fruitfully on their mettle, they’re further spurred to excel themselves by the likes of Shetland singer-songwriter Sheila Henderson, who, had she hailed from Nashville or its cultural environs, would long since have had A&R men beating a path to her door.

As it is, though, usually only fellow islanders are lucky enough to hear her richly dulcet, country-folk voice and engrossing choice of material, here including both adroitly crafted, radio-friendly originals and diverse covers, from the big honky-tonk licks of ‘Send It Out’ to a wonderfully smoky, sultry version of Patsy Cline’s ‘Never No More’. The A&R people would surely have snapped up her four-piece band, too, which featured some serious electric guitar work from Brian Nicolson, together with fiddle, bass, drums and sweetly-layered backing vocals.

Lori Watson's Rule of Thumb

Also on Saturday night’s line-up in Mossbank, a wending 45-minute bus ride north of Lerwick, and home to many workers at the Sullom Voe oil terminal, were two contrasting exemplars of the current Scottish/Celtic scene, firstly the Borders-born fiddler and singer Lori Watson and her Rule of Three combo, with brother Innes on guitar and accordionist John Somerville. The deceptive simplicity and spacious arrangements of their largely traditional-style set conversely amplified the skill, subtlety and imagination involved, in both the fiddle and vocals’ blend of elegance and fervour, and the silky, sparkling finesse of its accompaniment, while guest appearances on some numbers from double bassist Duncan Lyall and fellow fiddler Aidan O’Rourke kept faith with the collaborative Shetland spirit.

While Lyall and Innes Watson had already played the night before as members of the Treacherous Orchestra, who delivered a suitably triumphant, all-guns-blazing performance before an 800-strong crowd sat Lerwick’s Clickimin Centre, O’Rourke closed the show at Mossbank with his newest band project Kan, partnering him with Irish flute and whistle genius Brian Finnegan, guitarist Ian Stephenson and drummer Jim Goodwin. Ambitiously complex and freewheeling, their nonetheless viscerally compelling sound was an endlessly mercurial synthesis of melody and rhythm.

Kan (photo Louis de Carlo)

Similarly revealing a wealth of fresh possibilities within folk-based instrumental music – albeit with brilliantly different results – were the Nordic/northern English quintet Baltic Crossing, also featuring Stephenson on guitar, together with Northumbrian piper Andy May, Danish fiddler Kristian Bugge, and two Finnish cousins, Esko and Antti Järvelä, on fiddle, viola, double bass and mandolin. Their superbly executed, ebulliently dynamic union of distinct north European traditions, within which the pipes’ liquid brightness vibrantly catalysed the dense mesh of strings, was allied with hugely effervescent onstage energy, ranking them among this year’s most fêted Shetland first-timers.

Other noteworthy debutants were Cape Breton combo Sprag Session, who did a terrific job warming up for the Treacherous Orchestra as well as two gigs outside Lerwick, and a memorably extended slot during the Festival Club finale. Boldly charting new frontiers for their native fiddle-led traditions, with frontman Colin Grant flanked by banjo, piano, bouzouki, guitar, bass and drums, they cooked up another exhilarating instrumental storm, a fiery mix of rootsy tunes with rock, funk, trance and reggae.

No less pyrotechnic was the acoustic quartet assembled by progressive banjo star Alison Brown – making her fourth Shetland appearance – combining the dream-team talents of US fiddle phenomenon Casey Driessen, Irish guitar supremo John Doyle, and Brown’s bassist husband Garry West. With jaw-dropping solo workouts interspersed by dazzling ensemble passages, the resulting sound abundantly lived up to the sum of its parts. And with Brown having also brought along her two young children for the trip – all the way from Nashville – her presence at the festival further underlined the deep affection in which it’s held by musicians far and wide.

© Sue Wilson, 2012

Links

• Shetland Folk Festival

North Rock regularly exhibits the work of local (Shetland based) artists , national and international artists and makers. The gallery is pleased to be able to provide an opportunity for designer makers to shine in the spotlight of Craft and Design Month 2012 as participants in its ‘Breeze’ exhibition, running from 5th May to Mid September 2012.

Work from a selection of local makers including Jeanette Nowak (Hjarta), Jayne Kelly, Julie Williamson and Cheryl Jamieson (Glansin Glass) will be on show alongside makers from further a field such as Claire McVinnie and Sue Gregor. ‘Breeze’ will also showcase the work of local artists including Ruth Brownlee, June Redman, Mary Shearer and Mike Finnie.

Suzanne from North Rock says: “We are supporting Craft and Design Month as we recognise that people are increasingly interested in owning unique or limited edition pieces crafted by talented designers and makers. We are in the fortunate position to be able to showcase the work of some of these talented makers to Shetland residents and Visitors”

Craft and Design Month is a ‘not for profit’ initiative launched by craft&design magazine. Craft and Design Month was first launched in 2011. It’s resounding success in it’s inaugural year was entirely the result of hundreds of people working together to promote the amazing creative talent that we have in the UK.

Links:

North Rock Gallery Website: www.northrockgallery.co.uk
The Craft and Design Month website is www.craftanddesignmonth.net

Of the 202 productions considered for nomination, 123 were eligible for Best New Play and 36 were created for children and young people.  A total of 23 shows have reached the final nominations stage and the winners will be announced at the CATS Awards ceremony on Sunday 10th June, 2012 at Glasgow’s Tron Theatre.

BEST NEW PLAY nominations, sponsored by W&P Longreach–Theatre Insurance Brokers include David Harrower, A Slow Air, Tron Theatre Company; Kieran Hurley, BEATS, Arches; Ronan O’Donnell, Angels, A Play, a Pie and a Pint; Andrew O’Hagan, Vicky Featherstone, John Tiffany, Paul Flynn, Deborah Orr and Ruth Wishart,  Enquirer, National Theatre of Scotland and London Review of Books.

The National Theatre of Scotland has emerged as the leader in this year’s Critics’ Awards for Theatre in Scotland nominations, shortlisted twelve times in no less than nine of the ten Awards categories.  Dundee Rep and the Citizens Theatre Company have plenty to celebrate both have five nominations.  Companies receiving nominations for the first time include Bard in the Botanics, Frozen Charlotte, Shona Reppe Puppets, Theatre Jezebel and Untitled Projects.

The BEST FEMALE PERFORMANCE category will be hard fought as Maureen Beattie (Sister Ursula, 27, National Theatre of Scotland and the Royal Lyceum Theatre), Sally Reid (Mona, Days of Wine and Roses, Theatre Jezebel and the Tron Theatre Company), Ann Louise Ross (Mill Laverello, Further than the Furthest Thing, Dundee Rep Theatre) and Susan Vidler (Young Woman, Knives in Hens, National Theatre of Scotland) compete for the coveted title.

The competition for BEST MALE PERFORMANCE is no less fierce as Stuart Bowman (Watching the Detective, A Play, a Pie and a Pint), Stephen Clyde (Bottom, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Bard in the Botanics), Stephen Kennedy (Edward, Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me, Perth Theatre) and Michael Nardone (John Morrison, Men Should Weep, National Theatre of Scotland) wait to find out who this year’s victor will be.

Joyce McMillan, co-convener, CATS said: “This year’s CATS nominations celebrate a dazzling range of work, created by more than 20 companies across Scottish theatre.  The list emphasises the growing creative impact of the National Theatre of Scotland, both through its own distinctive work and in co-productions with other companies; it also celebrates the continuing high achievement of Dundee Rep, and a fine start to Dominic Hill’s directorship at the Citizens Theatre.

“And through nominations for events like the National Theatre of Scotland’s Five Minute Theatre, Untitled’s Salon Project and Magnetic North’s Pass the Spoon, it also reflects the exciting ways in which theatre is changing, with artists exploring the myriad possibilities of online technology, and boldly venturing into the borderlands between theatre and installation, theatre and music, theatre and visual art.”

To mark the CATS 10th anniversary year, a new discretionary award known as The CATS WHISKERS, will be given in recognition of an outstanding contribution to theatre in Scotland that isn’t already reflected in the other awards.  The winner will be announced on Monday 4th June, 2012.

CATS co-convenor, Mark Fisher said: “As this is the 10th edition of the CATS awards, we felt it was time to celebrate those contributions to theatre in Scotland that go beyond the scope of our existing awards. The CATS Whiskers Award is our way of giving an extra round of applause to the most remarkable achievements.”

In another exciting addition to CATS’ respected group of sponsors, BBC Scotland Radio Drama has entered into a three year relationship with the awards.  BBC Scotland Radio Drama, based in Glasgow, delivers over 60 hours of programme commissions every year to four BBC radio networks – Radio Scotland, Radio 4, Radio 4 Extra and Radio 3.

Bruce Young, Editor, Radio Drama, BBC Scotland said:  “BBC Scotland Radio Drama is delighted to support the Critics’ Awards for Theatre in Scotland.

“We’re both looking to identify and celebrate Scottish talent, and I hope this agreement with CATS will help us to share the best work of actors and writers in Scotland with the radio drama audience throughout the UK.”

Now in its tenth year, the CATS celebrate the actors, directors, playwrights and other artists who have made the most thrilling contributions to the industry.

Any piece of professional theatre substantially produced in Scotland in the twelve months from May to April (the natural break in the theatre year) is eligible. This year’s ceremony will be held for first time at the Tron Theatre, Glasgow on Sunday 10th June at 3.00pm.

Andy Arnold, Artistic Director, Tron Theatre said: “We’re delighted that the Tron has been chosen as the host venue for this year’s CATS Awards, not only for the opportunity to be part of such a glittering event in the cultural calendar; but also to see some of the finest creative talents in Scottish theatre today being recognised for their work.”

The event is open to members of the public and offers a unique opportunity for audiences to come together with the cream of the Scottish theatre community to celebrate the contribution that work produced in Scotland makes to the cultural life of the country.

Tickets cost £15 (including live entertainment, entry to the awards ceremony, a pre and post show glass of fizz and light refreshments) and can be purchased through the Tron Theatre, box office.

For further information on the CATS and full list of nominations, visit: www.criticsawards.theatrescotland.com

Source: CATS

Their new production By the Seat of Your Pants is a hilarious, slapstick venture into the world of three men and a chair! Nothing to be done and nothing to do. Fritz, Franz and Rudy sit and wait. Expectation! Hope! Boredom! Delight! Not to take things sitting down, they put their best feet forward to make the grade and avoid a kick in the pants. A fast, visual, funny show in a clown style for children aged 7+ and their families. Lasts 60 mins

“…sequence after sequence of inspired comedy… a torrent of creativity, and a profound playfulness… the kids are literally skipping with pleasure, as they run out of the theatre, yelling “Dad! We’ve had a great time!”  Joyce McMillan, The Scotsman ****

Sat 19th May, 4pm, £7/£6 concs/£5 U16’s

Tickets available from Phoenix Stores 01309 690110 and online at www.wegottickets.com/UniversalHall

Source: Universal Hall

Directed by SCO Associate Artist Alexander Janiczek, the Orchestra performs Mozart’s Symphony No 21, written when the composer was aged 16, and Symphony No 39, one of his great, last symphonies. The SCO’s Principal Horn Alec Frank-Gemmill is soloist in the Horn Concerto No 4 in E-flat. Rondo in B-flat completes the evening.

Alexander Janiczek has a close relationship with the SCO, having held the position of Leader with the Orchestra from 1999 to 2002. He has continued to be invited back as director and soloist on tours throughout Scotland and Europe, and in the recording studio.  He is the director on four CDs of music by Mozart which the SCO has recorded for Linn Records, and on a forthcoming release of Weber Wind Concertos. Janiczek was appointed Associate Artist with the Orchestra in December 2011.

Rising star Alec Frank-Gemmill is Principal Horn of the SCO and recently received rave reviews for his performances of Ligeti’s Hamburg Concerto during the Orchestra’s 2011/12 Season.

The Orchestra’s last appearance at Glenmoriston Millennium Hall was in the summer of 2004 and in July 2011, SCO Strings gave a hugely successful concert with violinist Isabelle van Keulen at the Craigmonie Centre in Drumnadrochit. This performance in Invermoriston forms part of the Orchestra’s 34th year of summer touring, and is also performed in Dunblane and Findhorn on 14 and 15 June. The SCO will also give concerts in Fortrose (SCO Strings, 22 June), Boat of Garten (SCO Wind & Brass, 22 June) Ullapool (SCO Strings, 23 June), Strathpeffer (SCO, 20 July) and Kingussie (SCO, 21 July).

The Scottish Chamber Orchestra receives funding from the Scottish Government. The Orchestra’s programme of summer touring is generously supported by the Misses Barrie Charitable Trust.

Source: Scottish Chamber Orchestra

The tour will begin at Grassington Festival on June 23rd with the final performances at Scone Palace in Scotland on August 25th and 26th.

Showcasing the kind of thrilling action made famous by street dance troupes like ‘Diversity’, film scenes such as the opening of ‘Casino Royale’,  genre defining programmes like ‘Jump London’ (http://bit.ly/HV56XM) and the BBC’s remarkable ‘Rush Hour’ sequence (http://bit.ly/qHqPr) , the show uses exhilarating music, eye-popping staging and stunning choreography to create a spectacle for all the family.

Featuring Creative Director and triple Guinness World Record holder Sam Parham (Pirates of the Caribbean 4, Harry Potter, Woman In Black), the show tells the story of Jake, a homeless teenager who teaches himself Free Running.  A successful open audition as a film stunt extra gives Jake his big break, but as punishing schedule filming action scenes get underway he realises how much he still has to learn from the likes of stunt coordinator and martial arts expert Scarlett – played jointly by Guinness world record holder Chloe Bruce (Harry Potter, Clash of the Titans 2)  and sister Grace Bruce (Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows).  When filming is thrown into crisis, Jake is faced with the biggest challenge of his life, both personally and professionally.

This is the first Free Running theatrical tour to be staged in the UK, which will bring together some of the leading performers in the art.  Free Running or Parkour has exploded in popularity over the past few years, with more than 500,000 videos currently on YouTube.  It is also set to feature in the 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony.  Representing great value for money, audiences at the shows will be  able to take in the fantastic surroundings, visit the homes and grounds and enjoy a picnic before the show.  There will also be workshops at selected venues, where adults and children have a once in a lifetime opportunity to try out some moves for themselves under the expert guidance of the world-renowned cast!

The show is fully interactive, with audience members becoming part of the production as ‘extras’ in the filming scenes and at other times able to get close up to the action and see the incredible moves first-hand.  It is the first production of its kind, combining classical music with contemporary beats to reflect the changing scenes, fusing street-dance with Free Running, choreography with improvisation and the heritage backdrops of the houses with the most exciting street-style action. (see a preview video here: http://bit.ly/HYALq6).

Speaking about the tour, producer Susannah Daley said: “Free Running is one of the most exciting extreme sports around at the moment.  It will feature in the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony and is being promoted as an official sport by the Mayor of London.  These athletes are remarkable and audiences of all ages will be able to enjoy their agility, strength and athleticism in an exhilarating show in fantastic settings.  Whether you’re young or old, this show has something for everyone and is a great way to entertain the kids during the summer holidays.”

Source: Freerunning@

ALLAN MacDonald’s latest body of work, The Silence and the Storm, together with new work by Lynn McGregor, inspire contemplation of the human eye perceiving the Northern landscape.

THE pairing of these two artists is surprisingly dynamic, and the stylistic contrast between them heightens awareness of their unique qualities in terms of paint handling and composition.

Allan MacDonald - An Oak Withstands, Tree of Light and Shadows

Since his commanding solo show Until The Day Break at Kilmorack in August 2010. Allan MacDonald’s work has continued to evolve. Imminent (Oil on Canvas) illustrates beautifully the artist’s direct response to nature in a shifting expanse of cloud over a low sea, deeper shadows illuminated by light and a signature patch of blue above.

Within the sky a myriad of nuanced greys reflect an expanded palette, contributing to the feeling of movement and life within the work. It is the inner life of MacDonald’s landscapes that elevates them beyond expectations of the genre, driven by his engagement with paint and the natural environment.

The profound subtlety found in Imminent is further distilled in An Oak Withstands, Tree of Light and Shadows, appropriately hung in the architectural centre of the gallery space where the altar would have once stood. Monumental and supremely delicate in its many layers of pigment and gestural marks, it is a visionary work which has its place in a distinctly Northern Romantic tradition, an image of man and God in nature.

The oak at the centre of the composition is immediately figurative in presence. The range of colour within the work is extraordinary and every mark on the canvas strives towards light. This sense of illumination through light and shadow is at the thematic core of the work, across the trunk the shadow of branches can be seen; signs of growth and age, knowledge and inevitable decay that define the human condition.

The entire composition is wholly unified and the eye is quietly drawn into the work by an interplay of colour, light and form that is ethereal. An Oak Withstands, Tree of Light and Shadows is aspirational and mesmerising, a beautifully measured composition that embodies ideas of strength and fragility.

Allan MacDonald - As The Voice of Many Waters

If An Oak Withstands, Tree Of Light and Shadows is a prayer, then As The Voice Of Many Waters (Oil on Board) is a work of exuberant praise. The vibrancy of MacDonald’s brushwork in this image of waves hitting the headland has its own rhythm and intensity; a scraped surface of white foam, receding field of blue and mist of salt spray filling the senses of the viewer entirely as we stand on shore and precipice.

This adept handling of the medium is also reflected in North Coast Headland (Oil on Canvas) in its bold division of the canvas in form and light, a solid mass of headland articulated by resonant brushstrokes and flashes of green, pink orange and yellow emerging in sky and land. The semi-abstract treatment of the subject conveys the moment experienced with immediacy by both artist and viewer.

Allan MacDonald - North Coast Headland

The Sun Rises, It Goes Down (Oil on canvas) is another good example with its freer brush work, the sun and its reflection glowing orange, white canvas allowed to shine through in a way that feels like a dual hymn to nature and to painting. And The Moon Turned Red (Oil on Board) pushes this idea further still, a thick ground of impasto, light beginning to glimmer across the encrusted surface.

There are many highlights to be savoured here; the fluidity and grace of Winter Nocturne, the glorious promise of light and serenity of The Sun Rises, Winter Solstice, the choreography of air, earth and water in Sea Shadow and the turbulent sweep of waves and shoreline in Storm Coast, extraordinarily realised on an intimate scale. Like the work of Canadian artist Tom Thomson which continues to inspire the artist, MacDonald consistently redefines our interpretation of the Northern landscape and our place within it.

Lynn McGregor - Island Trees

Lynn McGregor’s works in acrylic on board demonstrate her ability to balance elements of spontaneity and structure within her semi-abstract compositions. Island Trees is a good example, a strong image created in sweeping strokes and blocks of colour with a reduced palette of blue, purple, green and grey. The fluidity of under painting and the finer texture of brush and drawn marks are retained in many of McGregor’s works, contrasting with geometric form and the characteristically flattened paint texture of acrylics.

Lynn McGregor - Sweeping Fields

In Sweeping Fields this reduction of the landscape feels like a marriage of design and instinct, the curvature of the horizon calligraphic in its simplicity. Broad, flat gestural strokes work beautifully in counterpoint with bold concentrations of hue, the composition held convincingly by the artist’s understanding of plastic elements. The landscape is suggested and felt rather than seen.

Between The Lochs brings unexpected luminescence to McGregor’s handling of pigment in layers of blues, grey and brown. The imaginative concentration of colour is achieved in subtle layers within a bold formal composition. On closer inspection brushstrokes become visible; yellow and green washes of under-painting that bring a quality of iridescence to planes of form and horizontal bands evocative of the landscape. Initially it is colour that compellingly draws the eye into the work, then the artist’s skill in composition that invites further contemplation.

Lynn McGregor - Shore Growth

Shore Growth displays an interesting variation of surface textures including sections of decalcomania and rectangular clouds of enclosed brushstrokes. In contrast the looser overall handling of works such as Three Shores and Spring Seaweed are less convincing. Arguably McGregor’s strongest works in the exhibition are those where formal design and instinctual mark carry equal visual and associative weight. Anchored exemplifies this approach in the single drawn line defining the headland, bold planes of form, fluid sweep of brushstrokes and pure assured blues of the artist’s chosen palette; the immediate response of drawn and painted marks are tempered by formal elements of design to create a finely balanced composition.

While the hanging of this two-handed show is episodic in terms of each artist’s individual statement, it succeeds in encouraging a dialogue between the two artist’s work, heightening appreciation of the unique qualities of each. This is inspiring work defined by each artist’s investment in their chosen discipline and their passionate engagement with the natural environment.

© Georgina Coburn, 2012

Links

• Kilmorack Gallery

But of course Hamish had parallel careers as a translator and collector of folklore as well as a poet and writer of a small number of songs which can range from the scurrilous exercise of wit to the enormous scale of the Freedom Come All Ye. I was guided through the archival systems by Cathlin Macaulay and before long there was a reference in my hand which related to a recording made by said Mr Henderson. It related perfectly to a play I’ve got under construction – but not the direct subject of last week’s research.

A shoal of stories. Sir E Scott School.

It’s very like fishing. I was soon into a shoal. Most of the stories held in the archive are summarized in short paragraphs which themselves are fine examples of storytelling. You can then access the oral recording, originally on reel-to-reel machines and now also available as digital files on computer. And who should I meet at the fishing but Deirdre not of the sorrows – the MacMahone woman who organized a wonderful recreation of Gaelic psalm singing over the waters of Loch Erisort, last May.

Deirdre was looking to the north coast of Scotland for authentic links to recorded material. I was seeking versions of key stories in the Morrison manuscript – transcriptions of oral tales made in the 1800s.

Here are some findings:

I have already retold, in these columns, Morrison’s version of the story of the wise factor from Skye and the loss of a cow and boat. In 1958 Angus Cameron from Skye recorded exactly that story for the School of Scottish Studies. It is astonishing how similar even the sketched detail is. But even the English synopsis of this Gaelic recording provides a name for the wise factor.

Morrison records a strong version of the sinking of the galleon at Tobermory, linked to a tale of intrigue and the legend of Lady’s Rock, off Lismore. In 1953, Calum Maclean recorded one Captain D MacCormick describe a tradition which contains a detail of this gunpowder plot.

The story of the three knots which can control the wind ranges around the coasts of Scotland, east, north and west. Morrison lists one which describes the visit of a crew from Heisker, off North Uist to Lewis. In 1962 D A Macdonald recorded Donald Maclellan from Tigharry tell a version which runs very close. Now the Morrison manuscript was not republished until 1975 so the evidence points to an unbroken telling of seminal stories over several centuries. More of these stories later.

For more information about Ian visit his website at www.ianstephen.co.uk

© Ian Stephen, 2012

The renewed Gaelic Plan 2012-15 sets out HIE’s aims and ambitions for Gaelic over the next three years and details how these will be achieved through specific actions. It builds on the progress made in the organisation’s first plan which covered the period from 2009-12.

Members of the public can now read the draft Plan at www.hie.co.uk/gaelicplanconsultation  and take part in the consultation until Friday 15 June. The final version will be presented for consideration by Bòrd na Gàidhlig by 29 June.

Supporting Gaelic is at the heart of HIE’s remit for economic and social development in the Highlands and Islands. An important element of the Plan is a commitment to capitalise on the significant opportunities arising from the language’s potential contribution in helping to drive economic growth in the HIE area.

Support from HIE has helped create and sustain the impact of numerous organisations which enable Gaelic to flourish – from partner agencies such as Comunn na Gàidhlig and An Comunn Gaidhealach, to the University of the Highlands and Islands through Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, to Fèisean nan Gàidheal and others.

The renewed Gaelic Plan aims to further develop and enhance the role that Gaelic identity and culture plays in creating vibrant, resilient communities and sustainable economic growth.

HIE values Gaelic and promotes its use within the organisation. By providing its services, information, resources and opportunities in the medium of Gaelic, the agency intends to serve Gaelic-speaking customers in their own language.

The draft Gaelic Plan for HIE looks to promote the Gaelic identity of the Highlands and Islands and demonstrate equal respect to both Gaelic and English – a key element of the legislation protecting the language and the rights of its speakers.

HIE is required by the Scottish Government to draft and implement a plan which contributes to securing a sustainable future for the language.

Source: HIE communications team

On Monday 4th June, families are being invited to enjoy a great day out by bringing a picnic and joining in the Jubilee Day celebrations in the Palace grounds, with live music on the lawns and Jubilee-themed cakes and goodies on the menu. Special Jubilee Afternoon Teas will also be served in the Palace Restaurant.

To get the party started, there’ll be a colourful competition for the best Jubilee celebration outfit with a bottle of champagne for the winner – so start digging around in your wardrobe for some red, white and blue now!

The grounds will be open from 9.30am – 5pm, with live music performances from Alba Brass from 1pm – 3pm. Grounds only admission fee – £5.80 adults, £4.00 children, £5.15 concessions.

The weekend of 16th – 17th June sees the Jubilee Forest Festival take place in a marquee in the Palace grounds.

Visitors will be able to enjoy a weaving demonstration by the nationally acclaimed willow sculptor Trevor Leat , see a mobile sawmill in action, view exhibitions by woodturners, craftworkers, wood sculptors and furniture-makers, take part in children’s activities including face painting, and tuck into a BBQ and other ‘al fresco’ dining options.

The Festival takes place from 10am – 4pm each day. Grounds only admission fee – £5.80 adults, £4.00 children, £5.15 concessions. To celebrate Father’s Day, there’ll be free entry for dads all weekend!

Source: Tourism and Leisure Solutions

Transformers-style musical robots in Shetland. Robert Burns-inspired installations and gigantic toppling sculpture in Ayrshire. A four-part dance cycle inspired by myth in Dumfries and Galloway, a huge outdoor theatre takeover of Falkirk!s new park-space, and a festival of fire on the streets of Fraserburgh. Welcome to Roofless, Scotland’s biggest, most ambitious new outdoor arts programme, designed to engage directly with tens of thousands of people in communities across the country.

In its first incarnation this year, Roofless, working closely with partners from each region as well as artists from across Scotland, the UK and Europe, will create five large-scale, spectacular, outdoor arts events (everything from interactive sculpture to pyrotechnic theatre), happening within communities.

Although each project is distinctly different and rooted in the local history and culture of its region, they will all come about through a series of participation events and workshops, various community groups working with professional artists towards a spectacular finale.

Roofless also aims to build up a network of like-minded artists and producers involved in public art across the country. Many of the areas we’re working with are those identified in 2008′s Taking Part report as the least likely to engage with art events, whether due to economic disadvantage or, in more rural areas, geographical spread. As Roofless will also run across accessible digital and social media platforms, we hope to connect communities across Scotland and the world on an even larger scale.

Andrew Dixon, head of Creative Scotland commented: “The Year of Creative Scotland will raise the roof with this visionary programme of outdoor events across Scotland. UZ Arts has an international reputation for iconic street arts projects that engage with local participants and reach new audiences.”

Neil Butler, the Director of UZ Arts and Roofless said: “Roofless has attracted the very best national and international artists from all art forms who are interested in collaborating with the public , unlocking the creativity found in our communities.”

AYRSHIRE: BURNS BRIGHTLY 31 May- 3rd June 2012

A series of projects taking inspiration from the democratic ideals of the Scottish Enlightenment – that moment when the light switched on – and the inspiration it had on Robert Burns. As part of the Burns An’ A’ That Festival, Roofless artists including Jane Pitt, Alan Bissett and Diane Torr will run interactive workshops and talks, bringing the spirit of Enlightenent debate back to Ayrshire. Three Beacons will dominate the festival’s closing party: French artist Olivier Grossetête will work with over 400 schoolchildren on the construction of a gigantic cardboard tower in Ayr’s Wellington Square Gardens (the public are invited to help tear it down); film-maker Ruth Carslaw and sound artist Guy Veale are creating installation and soundscape experiences for the square too.

Partners: South Ayrshire Council, Burns An’ A’ That

DUMFRIES AND GALLOWAY: HALLS OF FAME

7th-9th & 14th-16th September 2012

Town halls in Ecclefechan, Moniaive and Gatehouse of Fleet will be transformed into an interactive art installation: fairytale castles,  dreamscapes and theatre sets, while a team of professional artists and community groups use music and dance to tell a series of local myths and legends. A “virtual” town hall in Dumfries will be the culmination of this event.

Partners: Dumfries and Galloway Council and the Holywood Trust

SHETLAND: ENGINE TUNING August 2012

Artist Sumit Sarkar will create a giant “condor! constructed entirely from the parts of one LandRover. The huge robotic musical bird (inspired in part by the film and toy series Transformers!) will emerge from a trailer which will travel to rural locations in Shetland during August 2012 where it will receive and record “gifts of music” from the communities it visits. The various recordings will be turned into a musical performance by local sound artists, culminating in a celebration of music, performance, and film in Lerwick at the end of August. After this, the bird will take the sounds of Shetland on tour, around other Roofless events and Europe.

Partner: Shetland Arts

ABERDEENSHIRE: MAELSTROM 2nd November 2012

Maelstrom is a fireworks parade throughout the streets of Fraserburgh, forged through a youth regeneration project in which over 1000 local young people create mobile sculptural works, street theatre and circus pieces based on local stories for the parade. Modo have already run three successful projects in the area, creating a positive, socially-inclusive community focus around Bonfire Night. This year, the parade will be themed around local legends of the Kinnaird Head lighthouse.

Partners: Modo, Shell, The Reaching Out Project, Aberdeenshire Council, Community Planning Partners

FALKIRK: HELIX Spring-Summer 2013

Roofless will connect the communities around Falkirk and Grangemouth by animating the new Helix park space between the towns, working with artists to encourage people to get to know their new central park. In the months leading up to leading up to the Helix launch, an ongoing workshop programme aims to get the whole community, and particularly young people, involved.

Partners :Falkirk Community Trust, The Helix Trust, British Waterways

For more information visit www.roofless.org.uk 

Source: Roofless

Stromness Hometown has created a new oral history of the town bringing together voices of the past and those of today. The entertaining soundscape told by people of Stromness and some weel kent voices from the past will accompany visitors on their walk from the pier head to the cannon beyond the Museum. There are eight stops – places where you can sit on a bench, or lean on a wall, and listen to voices from then and now

Over a quarter of a century ago, two local men, Ian MacInnes and Eric Flett, walked from the north to the south of the town recording their conversation for a Radio Orkney programme ‘Hometown’. A quarter of a century before that, Ernest Marwick set down a wealth of recordings in his sound archive between 1960 and 1975. Both these rich resources, held at Orkney Library and Archive, have been drawn from in this new Stromness Hometown project.

Now new interviews include May Stockan talking about bakeries, Captain Willie Mackay on board the Hamanvoe, Lifeboat man Stewart Taylor, shopkeepers in the town, George Sinclair on fishing, Ella Duncan reminiscing about the first Shopping Week, and a boat load of Bevans interviewed in the harbour!

Young people lead you on the journey with Stromness Academy pupils Bea Watson and Jake Watson providing links between the interviews, and Stromness Primary pupil Erik Park guiding you between stops.

The ambitious project started in Summer 2011 with workshops – new interviews were recorded with Stromness people, archive recordings were listened to, and lots of people dropped by. Young people learnt interviewing and editing skills. What started as a young people’s project soon involved people of all ages.

Music has been generously provided by composers and musicians from Stromness Academy pupils and the Wrigley Sisters as well as music recordings from Orkney Library and Archive.

The Stromness Hometown audio will be available on players that people can pick up and drop back at Stromness Museum and the Pier Arts. It can also be downloaded on to your own device at www.visit orkney.com/stromness or you can download it at the museum, the Pier Arts Centre or the visitor centre at the ferry terminal.

A DVD combining the audio journey with images of artefacts form Stromness Museum will be sent to schools, accommodation providers in the town and libraries. The journey can be taken in your armchair as you virtually walk the street.

Stromness Hometown has also resulted in a fascinating photography project by Cary Welling, who has rephotographed the street scenes from the Stromness Museum book Stromness in Late 19th Century Photographs. A folder of the ‘then and now’ images is at the museum. Project participant Alasdair Flett recently collected a Saltire Award from Voluntary Action Orkney for contribution to the project. Stromness Academy pupil Alasdair interviewed over 25 people. His interviews have generated a contemporary oral history of the town. Local artist Diana Leslie created a new map of the town for the leaflet, designed by local Cary Welling.

Project co-ordinator Rebecca Marr said ‘ It has been a remarkable project to be involved with, the result has been bigger than we ever imagined a year ago. I think the community participation in this project has created a valuable and creative store of stories of the town. And it’s been a whole lot of fun.’

Mark Jenkins was editor on the project, he said ‘the editing process has been fantastic. Access to great resources in the Orkney Archive along with new material and music really makes the project something different. Being able to listen to these stories in the actual location is very powerful. As well as being informative there’s also a strong narrative, and while there are serious points within the audio journey, a lot of the content is very humorous’.

Kathleen Ireland, president of Stromness Museum, said ‘Everyone from the Stromness Museum is delighted with the audio tour and accompanying DVD.

The mix of voices, interviews from the Hometown project and the Orkney Library Sound Archive evokes a wander through the street accompanied by knowledgeable generations of Stromnessians telling their own stories. We expect that the Museum and the shops and galleries along the street will all benefit from increased custom as visitors realise how much there is to do and see along the whole length of our Hometown street.

Behind the scenes the Museum Curator, custodians and volunteers made invaluable contributions to this snapshot of Stromness present and past and are, as always, willing to share their knowledge with visitors who discover one of the finest museums in the country in Stromness’s southend.’

The project is funded by LEADER and Stromness THI.

The open day on Saturday 12 May at Stromness Museum runs all day from 11am – 4pm.

For further details contact: Rebecca Marr 850459 rebecca.marr@btinternet.com

Source: R Marr

The project, titled Sublime, is funded by Creative Scotland and will see the appointed artists, Stephen Hurrel and Mark Lyken, working in Cromarty over the summer. They will make new work for Inverness that also links in with this year’s British Science Festival, which is hosted by the University of Aberdeen.

The Lighthouse Field Station is part of Aberdeen University and has developed an internationally recognised research programme studying the seals, dolphins and other marine wildlife in order to understand how natural and man-made changes in the environment influence these populations.

Professor Paul Thompson, Director of the Lighthouse Field Station, explained: ‘We are always seeking new ways to increase awareness of the marine environment and disseminate our findings. This collaboration with IOTA is an exciting opportunity for us to hear other perspectives on our work, and to explore how art might help us reach a wide audience.’

Susan Christie from IOTA, an arts organisation dedicated to engaging the public and bringing contemporary art to the Highlands, said: ‘These residencies aim to examine parallels between marine mammal and human senses, in particular how sound and light within the physical spaces we inhabit, whether it be natural or man-made, affect behaviour patterns.’

The artists were selected from a national open call in which IOTA received an amazingly high number of quality applications. Both artists will be giving a talk on Thursday 10th May, 6pm at the Lighthouse Field Station to show some of their past works and explore local connections for the new commissions.

Stephen Hurrel has produced installations and exhibitions throughout the UK and abroad in a broad range of media. Exploring various forms of interactivity and relationships between art, site and people, he use research and dialogue as a starting point as well as new technology which can help us access the ‘unseen’ and ‘unheard’ aspects of our environment. Last year Stephen was selected for Cape Farewell’s Scottish Islands Expedition connecting with research scientists whilst sailing from Mallaig to Skye, Canna, Mingulay, Barra and South Uist to meet representatives of each island to discuss sustainability, environmental erosion, cultural and historical conservation.

Mark Lyken is an artist and musician, his paintings explore worlds within worlds and chemical universes at a microscopic level. Mark was involved in a previous IOTA project last December when he and other Team Recoat members painted cars in the Old Town Rose Street car park (pictured below). His debut album “Bit Rot” is out now on Gamma Proforma.

This is a significant project for Mark, as he explains: ‘My work as an artist and musician have up until now been presented separately, the Sublime project gives me the opportunity to bring all of the strands of my work together and create a new body of work far outside of my comfort zones. My work draws from scientific data which up until now this has always been second hand, the opportunity to collect and collaborate with biologist at the top of their game is priceless.’

Artists’ Talk // Thursday 10 May // 6 – 7.30pm // FREE

Venue: Lighthouse Field Station // George Street // Cromarty // IV11 8YL

An informal evening with newly arrived artists Stephen Hurrel and Mark Lyken, this discussion event will show some of their past works and explore local connections for the new commissions. After work drinks and fabulous pizza from Sutor Creek served.

RSVP // kirstenbody@hotmail.com // 01463 724383  www.invernessoldtownart.com

Source: IOTA

Members of the public are invited to join the artist at an informal viewing of the exhibition on Saturday 12 May 2012 at 3pm.

The exhibition is held in conjunction with two concurrent Dingwall exhibitions at the Cairn Gallery, Pittenweem and at St. Andrews University. An illustrated publication covering the work shown at all three venues has been published by the School of Art History at St Andrews University, with essays by three of their distinguished art historians, Natalie Adamson, Tom Normand and Alistair Rider.

Edinburgh-based Dingwall studied at the Edinburgh College of Art and taught there before moving to the United States, where he lived and worked for twenty years. He returned to Scotland to paint full-time in 2003.

Individual exhibitions include the Mayor Gallery London, Graeme Murray Gallery, Edinburgh, Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh, Peter Noser Galerie, Zurich, Katherina Rich Perlow Gallery, New York, Knoedler, New York, Museum of Contemporary Art, Cleveland, USA, Castelluccio della Foce, Siena and in 1997 at the Pier Arts Centre.

Dingwall’s work is represented in many public collections including the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, Saatchi Collection, London, Arts Council of Great Britain, Cleveland Museum of Art, USA, and The British Council.

The Pier Arts Centre is open Tuesday – Saturday 10.30am – 5.00pm. Admission is free.

The Pier Arts Centre
Victoria Street
Stromness
Orkney
www.pierartscentre.com

Filmmaker Mark Jenkins was appointed artist-in-residence last year through a venture funded by the Scapa Flow Landscape Partnership Scheme (SFLPS) and coordinated by the Pier Arts Centre. A short film, The Imaginary Worlds of Scapa Flow, is nearing completion and the Stromness filmmaker is inviting members of the public to view work in progress at the Pier Arts Centre next week when he sets up a temporary editing suite in the Centre’s reference library.

Imaginary Worlds centres around the landscape and buildings of Scapa Flow and explores themes of escapism and longing. A film-script using extracts from memoirs and interviews with soldiers, sailors and local people who lived through both wars, has been developed by Mark Jenkins into a 30 minute screenplay. While Scapa Flow endured significant, violent attacks and formed the central core of ‘Fortress Orkney’, boredom among the troops was a major factor. Entertainments including music, dance, drama and sports were important in maintaining order as well morale.

Mark Jenkins commented, “The residency has been a really exciting opportunity for me. The starting point was working from wartime memoirs and documented events that happened in Orkney during the two world wars. What interested me was not the often seen portrait of wartime Orkney as a desolate corner of the earth, rather the more positive and fond recollections. A strong theme that began to emerge was one of escapism.”

The film poetically explores make-believe worlds with local actors playing the part of the men and women who found themselves in Orkney during a time of war. Various locations around Scapa Flow have been used including Hoxa Head and the Cromarty Hall in St Margaret’s Hope.

Mark Jenkins added, “Once the characters were fleshed out I began casting. I found instant enthusiasm from the South Ronaldsay drama group at the Cromarty Hall. For the interior scenes the Cromarty Hall was just perfect. Shooting in a place that was actually used for cinema and theatre, during wartime, made it especially poignant.”

Making the film has so far involved a crew of 13 people and 10 actors playing 17 characters. Members of the public are now being invited to view the editing of the film. Mark will set up an editing suite in the reference library at the Pier Arts Centre from Tuesday 15 – Saturday 19 May and visitors are welcome to drop in between 10.30am and 5pm to see the process up close.

Mark Jenkins has worked on many films over more than twenty years. His credits include editing the BAFTA Scotland Award winning Ma Bar in 2009 and Peter in Radioland voted Best International Short Film at Glasgow Film Festival in 2010. More recently he created a short film on the life and work of Sylvia Wishart as well as series of film portraits of various characters in Hoy.

Andrew Parkinson, Curator at the Pier Arts Centre said, “Scapa Flow holds a deep fascination for many people and its cultural history has been well documented in books, films and photographs in the past. Mark’s fresh approach to this archive of material will help bring to life aspects of the Flow’s rich history and I very much look forward to seeing the completed film. We are keen to make the editorial process available to as many people as possible and hope that folks will drop in to talk to Mark about his work.”

The film is due to be finished later in the summer and a special screening is being arranged to present the work to the public.

The Pier Arts Centre is open Tuesday – Saturday 10.30am – 5.00pm. Admission is free.

The Pier Arts Centre
Victoria Street
Stromness
Orkney
www.pierartscentre.com

Are you ready to Crowdfund?

HI-Arts, the cultural development agency for the Highlands and Islands, is visiting Argyll in May to deliver a series of Crowdfunding workshops and 1-2-1 sessions for professionals and individuals working in the cultural, creative and heritage sectors. On the 29th and 30th of May the team will visit Oban and Dunoon to offer specialist advice and support in the areas of Crafts, Visual Arts, Heritage, Music, Writing, Marketing and Audience Development.

What is Crowdfunding?

Crowdfunding is a modern, online and interactive way to raise funds for your projects and activities directly from the public – or the Crowd. With the advent of Crowdfunding we can now turn our audiences into supporters and funders, by collecting multiple small donations online and offering unique incentives to encourage giving. Not only can you raise funds to get your project off the ground but you can also start to create a ‘buzz’ around it before you start.

The Crowdfunding workshop will cover all the aspects you will need to create, implement and market your project. The workshop is suitable for all individuals, organisations and professionals who work within the cultural, creative, heritage and arts sector.

1-2-1 Sessions

Join colleagues and fellow creative people, meet HI-Arts staff to discuss your professional development, your future plans and get advice on a wide range of topics – tea and coffee provided. There is the opportunity to book a 1-2-1 meeting with Audience Development Manager, Sian Jamieson; Talent Development Manager, Craft, Pamela Conacher; Project Development Manager, John Saich and Talent Development Manager, Writing, Peter Urpeth.

Where will the Hit Team be?

Tuesday 29th May 2012: Oban – Corran Halls

• 10am – 1pm Crowdfunding Workshop
• 10am – 1pm 1-2-1 sessions
• 1pm – 3.30pm HISEZ Networking Lunch www.hisez.co.uk
• 2pm – 4pm 1-2-1 sessions

Wednesday 30th May 2012: Dunoon – Dunoon Burgh Hall

• 10am – 1pm Crowdfunding Workshop
• 10am – 1pm 1-2-1 sessions
• 2pm – 4pm 1-2-1 sessions

Booking information

To Book your place with the Hit Team please click on the appropriate link to our event registration (you can book for both the Crowdfunding workshop and 1-2-1 sessions).

Book your place in Oban here (http://www.eventbrite.com/event/3422975211)

Book your place in Dunoon here (http://www.eventbrite.com/event/3423067487)

For more information about the event and for booking information please visit

http://hi-arts.co.uk/services/business-development/hiarts-hit-team-visits-argyll-this-may/

If you have any queries regarding these events then please feel free to contact Avril at HI-Arts on avril@hi-arts.co.uk or call 01463 720886.

Source: HI-Arts

MARK Lomax’s latest exhibition, Discarded Thoughts, successfully expands his practice in its engagement with new materials and techniques, presenting a very fluid relationship between sculptural, painterly and conceptual elements.

SINCE the artist’s last solo show, Ephemera at Inchmore Gallery in July 2008, Lomax’s work has continued to evolve, combining a variety of disciplines in his exploration of altered maps and books. While this latest body of work is thematically consistent, it strides out into new territory in terms of scale and materials, feeling somewhat contained by the current exhibition space.

Mark Lomax, The Underlying Substance of things as opposed to their Attributes

Discarded Thoughts (printed paper, paint, filler and glue), a linear series of 16 crumpled forms or ideas, is a pure marriage of process and object. It is also the starting point for an exhibition that moves progressively from the embryonic concealment of these closed forms to reveal the inner life of human imaginings dormant or forgotten. Intricate layers of paper, filler, pigment and glue are built and excavated on a ground of shaped aluminium metal, fragments of human consolation through text and diagram breaking through the surface.

This fluid consciousness is characteristic of an artist that consistently reflects the human condition not in terms of absolutes but the elusive nature of knowledge. This shifting reality is visualised and experienced in Lomax’s choice and handling of materials. The artist’s use of collaged text and drawn images from discarded encyclopedias and reference books are combined with successive layers of evocative texture.

The presence of this found material is perhaps an interesting reference to a tactile tradition of inherited knowledge increasingly absent in a digital age. Surfaces are coated, scratched and filled, blurring the distinction between drawn, found and organic marks. Form is shaped from malleable light-weight metal, with the later addition of thin washes of acrylic paint. This stain of pigment cleverly accentuates the contours of form in each work and provides often delicate patination of the surface, inviting a variety of interior readings.

Mark Lomax, A Minor Role in Something More Important

In Monocline,for example the colouration feels delicately leached rather than applied, creating a subtly varied and nuanced emotive surface, while in The Underlying Substance of Things As Opposed to Their Attributes painting enhances the dynamism and rhythm of the whole composition. This expressive and painterly quality is particularly evident in The Belief That Things Can Change. Here subtle tonal gradations and abstracted geometric forms are overlaid on fragments of text and thought. The choice of text book with its “rational functions”, “complex functions as transmissions”, equations and exercises is strangely emotive, revealing a methodology of scientific thought with hope at its core. The artist colours our reading of this layered material in form and hue, together with the chosen title as potent triggers of association.

Elevation of The Incidental is equally humane in its abstract visualisation of human knowledge and memory emerging from beneath the surface. Two beautiful smaller scale framed constructions, Polynominals and Illustrated Point (Printed paper, paint and filler on recycled metal) reach out of the frame, physically and psychologically, begging closer inspection.

The impermanent material of paper immortalised in metal, the texture of the background evocative of a found site in grain, line and mark are combined with techniques of collage, assemblage, painting and sculpture to produce a highly ambiguous sculptural objects. The structure and detail of these works are finely executed, while the manner of display demands consideration of discarded or incomplete elements of human thought and aspiration.

A Minor Role In Something More Important feels very much like an idea unfurled in its arc-like form, the contrast between its shiny metallic interior and corroded outer surface reflecting the artist actively pushing the boundaries of his own technique.

Mark Lomax, The True Nature of Being

The potential for larger scale “painted sculptures and sculpted paintings” is certainly suggested by this show, together with the possibility of such work being seen in a variety of different contexts, including outdoors. The True Nature of Being (Industrial Mixed Media) is a good example; a hung piece that looms off the wall as an eternal question into the viewer’s physical and imaginative space, equally effective outdoors as a floating sculpture. Seen in the current exhibition, this work is richly evocative of human origins, with its yellow ochre and charcoal-like pigmentation as if marked by fire and ritual. A central white elliptical form like a piece of found prehistoric art or graffiti is mysterious and provocative. The inner life of the work creative process visualised as an elusive and essential quest for completion and perhaps even redemption.

Lomax’s work is stimulatingly cryptic and immediately tactile in its cross-disciplinary approach. There is something quietly subversive about this work which is appealing in a world of contemporary art addicted to the screamingly obvious. Driven by the artist’s exploration of new techniques and materials this latest exhibition displays exciting signs of evolution that will no doubt contribute to further distillation of the artist’s visual language in future exhibitions.

© Georgina Coburn, 2012

Links

• Discarded Thoughts
• Inchmore Gallery

MOST of us think of parkour being performed on expansive cityscapes and buildings; not under the roof of the local village hall.

BRIGHT Night International and Glasgow Parkour Coaching’s latest production shows just how versatile this dynamic genre can be.

Wee Jamp

Wee Jamp melds parkour, circus theatre, acrobatics and dance to create a family friendly show which packs the venue. Spectators sit at the edge of a street scene complete with a bus stop – they’re dancing, in a public place, have they carried out a risk assessment? Aside from creating a striking visual image, this innovative set multitasks as both a platform for stunts and a premise for the story.

A precise sequence of events is something that some contemporary performances lack, losing younger viewers who are used to watching narratives. Wee Jamp tells an ambitious tale – the lives of four friends from childhood to old age – and holds the audience rapt, switching seamlessly between hilarious and sombre moments of school, first love and the world of work.

This ‘Skins with somersaults’ premise allows the story to develop without straying into the realm of sentimentality; events are told at such as a pace that they remain profound without becoming cloying. While some might find the amount of mime necessary to craft these scenes grating, the choreography remains fresh, and each sequence is greeted by enthusiastic applause from the younger audience.

This connection with spectators is key to the show’s success as a production. Instead of feeling exclusive to the performers, there’s a real sense of inclusion in what they are doing on stage, as if their back-flips, jumps and splits are all things that could be executed in a playground. The performance finishes with an announcement that anyone who wants to try parkour can join the dancers for an impromptu workshop. The stage instantly fills with children.

Fortunately, the tour dates mostly include smaller venues, which will hopefully reach more young people across the Highlands. Events like these need to be brought out of Inverness and into smaller communities who need the sense of possibility that this kind of performance can bring.

© Rowan Macfie, 2012

Links

• North By North East
• Bright Night International

Philip Hughes’s work is based mainly on landscape with a special interest in remote areas and archaeology. He has had over forty solo exhibitions, including many with public galleries in the UK, France, Mexico and Australia. He was chairman of the Trustees of the National Gallery, London from 1996 – 2000, and was appointed CBE in 1982.

This day long course on Saturday June 9th from 10.30 – 4.30pm will involve drawing outdoors is a unique opportunity to develop your drawing skills under the guidance of a world class artist.

The cost is £45 payable in advance and numbers will be strictly limited so early booking is advisable. A packed lunch will be provided but please bring your own drinks. Boards will be provided but bring your own large sheets of paper and lots of soft pencils, charcoal, conte and any other materials for this unique drawing session.

Email us at info@cromartyartstrust.org.uk or phone 01381 600354 to reserve your place or for more information.

Source: Cromarty Arts Trust

Inverness Wednesday 6 June 2012
Inverness Thursday 7 June 2012
Stornoway 11 and 12 June 2012
Lerwick 14 and 15 June 2012
Kirkwall 18 and 19 June 2012

These event are free of charge to companies in the HIE area.

Please complete your online booking by clicking on the relevant links below. Please complete your booking by 31 May 2012. If you have any queries please contact Avril Souter at HI-Arts on avril@hi-arts.co.uk

INVERNESS: Wednesday 6 June 2012
Mercure Hotel (formerly known as the Ramada Jarvis), Inverness
(Mercure Senate Suite Conference Room 4)
13.00 – 16.30

Business of PR & Styling – Fashion/Crafts

Speakers:

Lauren Martin is a Director of Blow PR, one of the UK’s leading fashion PR companies she has vast expertise on how traditional promotion and the fashion industry itself is evolving in the UK and internationally, she also has great experience of working with and nurturing a wide range of designers.

Reemé Idris stages catwalk shows, is a well-regarded stylist and a trends researcher.

Register here for the Business of PR & Styling event on 6 June here: http://invernessbusinessofprandstyling.eventbrite.co.uk

INVERNESS: Thursday 7 June 2012
Mercure Hotel (formerly known as the Ramada Jarvis), Inverness
(Mercure Senate Suite Conference Room 4)
09.30 – 17.00.

Anne Ritchie and Anne Ferguson will deliver a trend and colour workshop, designed specifically for design, textile and fashion companies.

The trend presentations for Autumn/Winter 2013/14 by Anne Ritchie will discuss:

• Interior, retail and lifestyle trends
• Colour, design and product trends for textiles, fashion and accessories

Following a networking lunch, Anne Ferguson will hold a colour workshop:

Hands-on adventurous exploration of colour with a specific focus on colour ranges featured in the trends presentation and how the trends can be best applied to your individual company needs

Anne Ritchie will be available for 1-2-1 consultations during the afternoon. If you would like to have a 30 minute appointment with Anne please register your interest on-line.

Register here for Inverness Trend event and/or 1-2-1 consultation on 7 June here: http://invernesstrendworkshopsjune.eventbrite.co.uk/

STORNOWAY: 11 & 12 JUNE 2012

Monday 11 June at the Oak Suite, Cabarfeidh Hotel, Stornoway.
Registration and coffee at 09.30 – finish at 17.00

Anne Ritchie and Anne Ferguson will deliver a trend and colour workshop, designed specifically for design, textile and fashion companies.

Trend presentations for Autumn/Winter 2013/14 by Anne Ritchie

• Interior, retail and lifestyle trends
• Colour, design and product trends for textiles, fashion and accessories

Following a networking lunch, Anne Ferguson will hold a colour workshop:

Hands-on adventurous exploration of colour with a specific focus on colour ranges featured in the trends presentation and how the trends can be best applied to your individual company needs.

Tuesday 12 June, HIE Offices, St James Street, Stornoway

Anne Ritchie will be available for 1-2-1 consultations. If you would like to have a 60 minute appointment with Anne please register your interest on-line.

Register here for Stornoway events: http://stornowaytrendworkshopsjune.eventbrite.co.uk

LERWICK : 14 & 15 JUNE 2012

Thursday 14 June at the Shetland Museum (Auditorium), Lerwick.
Registration and coffee at 09.30 – finish at 17.00.

Anne Ritchie and Anne Ferguson will deliver a trend and colour workshop, designed specifically for design, textile and fashion companies.

Trend presentations for Autumn/Winter 2013/14 by Anne Ritchie

• Interior, retail and lifestyle trends
• Colour, design and product trends for textiles, fashion and accessories

Following a networking lunch, Anne Ferguson will hold a colour workshop:

Hands-on adventurous exploration of colour with a specific focus on colour ranges featured in the trends presentation and how the trends can be best applied to your individual company needs

Friday 15 June, Interview Room, Solarhus, 3 North Ness Business Park, Lerwick

Anne Ritchie will be available for 1-2-1 consultations. If you would like to have a 60 minute appointment with Anne please register your interest on-line

Register here for Lerwick events: http://lerwicktrendworkshopsjune.eventbrite.co.uk

KIRKWALL: 18 & 19 JUNE 2012

Monday 18 June, Kirkwall & St Ola Town Hall, Broad Street, Kirkwall, KW15 1DH
Registration and coffee at 09.30 – finish at 17.00.

Anne Ritchie and Anne Ferguson will deliver a trend and colour workshop, designed specifically for design, textile and fashion companies.

Trend presentations for Autumn/Winter 2013/14 by Anne Ritchie

• Interior, retail and lifestyle trends
• Colour, design and product trends for textiles, fashion and accessories

Following a networking lunch, Anne Ferguson will hold a colour workshop:

Hands-on adventurous exploration of colour with a specific focus on colour ranges featured in the trends presentation and how the trends can be best applied to your individual company needs.

Tuesday 19 June, HIE Offices, 14 Queen Street, Kirkwall

Anne Ritchie will be available for 1-2-1 consultations. If you would like to have a 60 minute appointment with Anne please register your interest on-line.

Register here for Kirkwall events: http://kirkwalltrendworkshopsjune.eventbrite.co.uk

Speaker Profiles

Anne Ritchie has over 30 years of experience in the textiles, creative and design industries. She has carried out extensive work for Scottish Textiles and UK Fashion Exports delivering design and trend presentations and promotional events. Anne has extensive knowledge and understanding of the international fashion and design industries, and has previously worked for leading brand names in design and product development roles. She advises widely on design, products and trends to the UK and international clients.

Anne Ferguson is an artist, designer and educator with over 20 years of teaching experience in The Glasgow School of Art Textile Department. From 2003 Anne has delivered education projects at all levels from pre-school upwards in a variety of subjects and media. Throughout this period she has regularly exhibited her own work in Stained Glass and Textiles. Anne is passionate about colour and pattern and enjoys sharing this enthusiasm with others.

Source: HI-Arts Craft Development

The plan was to use a seminal traditional story (transcribed by one Donald Morrison, cooper by trade) as a starting point. Then explore how the theme of crossing open water is echoed in other books. I borrowed two titles from a themed display, on stands you meet as you enter the library. Kevin Patterson’s The Water In Between and Richard Deakin’s Waterlog. Patterson’s book took a hold of me and other correspondence and accounts which had seemed so important were set aside.

It’s an account of a voyage in open ocean – the Pacific in this case – undertaken for traditional reasons. The author had been unlucky in love. So has his companion who happily does know how to sail and navigate. By the end of the adventure so does Patterson. But his urgent impulse to sail his small ship home to Western Canada is at least equal to the restless desire that made him leave it.

At another level, this gripping read is also an analysis of travel writing, not only journeys by sea. He writes well on Theroux and Chatwin. But he can turn the same wry and sharp wit on his own quests.

Deakin’s book is a different type of journey. It follows a concept – suggested by a John Cheever story which also resulted in the movie The Swimmer (starring Burt Lancaster). But this is a swimmer’s journey through Britain rather than the 8 miles home from a party on Long Island. (That’s the other Long Island, the one across the pond.)

Of course he can’t swim from one length of the joined-up countries to the other. It’s more an investigation into the localized places where there is swimming without chlorine. There’s a fair bit of wit and Deakin approaches swimming the way some would poaching. He has a war of words with the gamekeepers who would keep exclusive chalk stream waters for the trout and their pursuers. He finds eccentric clubs of people who hold to traditions of leaping into cold or partly-heated waters but all in the outdoors, in salt or fresh water. He even attempts to find a fabled pool in underground caverns. And there is a build-up towards the goal of swimming the Corrievreckan gulf. That’s where Orwell nearly drowned, almost carried into the dangerous area in a small boat. That would have left 1984 unfinished.

A young man called Bill Dunn helped Orwell run the small farm on Jura. He went on to marry Orwell’s sister. He also swam the Gulf of Corrievreckan, despite losing a leg during the war. Deakin failed to find the right conditions for that swim and it’s not easy to see how it would be crucial to this book anyway. It’s really a devotee’s hymn to surviving untamed places and activities and noncomformists, in a merrier England and a small section of Wales.

When it came to the night of the event in Stornoway Library, we did indeed begin many journeys as participants described books which were suggested by Morrison’s account of a crossing to St Kilda, when a gannet’s beak pierced the hull of an open boat. We made skeletal versions of the stories as a short series of text messages. Because that’s what a story is – a clear backbone with the flesh fixed to the frame.
 Here are versions from one group:

Open boat sails from Harris to St.Kilda

Good weather with Factor’s wife onboard

Sea full of herring sky full of gannets
A huge THUMP stuns boat
Half way there

Gannet beak breaches hull
Crew leave dead bird stuck in boat
Wind picks up coming in fast
Islanders catch boat and see beak WOW!

and the story in a still shorter form:

Boat Bird Beak Bloody Hell Beach

St.Kildans welcome boat kept afloat by a gannet’s beak

Then one person made the excellent suggestion of extending our planned reading to the inner terrain of journeys in the mind. She proposed Janice Galloway’s The Trick is To Keep Breathing as our next adventure and volunteered to introduce it next meeting on.

But I’d like to end by referring to another approach to documenting adventures. Three experienced sea kayakers have gathered their experience and that of other members of a close community into a seminal guide-book. The Outer Hebrides is subtitled “Sea Kayaking around the Isles and St Kilda” and is by Mike Sullivan, Robert Emmott and Tim Pickering. It was first published in 2010 by Pesda Press. (www.pesdapress.com).

This book differs from all of the above in that has a very clear and specific purpose. It’s a pilot book for those who use the most practical and elegant small craft of all – the kayak. These slim vessels enable people to go where no other mariner could go in any other type of vessel. So the details of tested routes along the coastline of the whole span of the Outer Hebrides are shared in crisp detail. A clear outline of a chart detail is backed up with a tight explanation of the route – the gains and the dangers.

Many years of combined experience have also yielded a strong stock of sharp photographs. Some of these have a practical purpose in showing the look of the land which is symbolized on the chart. But some are like a lyrical counterpoint to the text.
There are also stories of water-breaking crossings; a description of the basking shark; a summary of practical pieces of safety advice and other well-written examples of sea-kyaking lore which make the book of interest to those who are not planning to paddle anywhere at all.

This is an exemplary publication – a well-made, well laid-out durable manual and more.

For more information about Ian visit his website at www.ianstephen.co.uk

© Ian Stephen, 2012