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The Untold

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The Untold: Songs of the Bothy Balladeer

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21/11/2016

Songs of the Bothy Balladeer

BBC Radio 4 - The Untold, Songs of the Bothy Balladeer

Can Doric folk singer Rachel win a place at Scotland's revered Royal Conservatoire?

17-year-old Rachel has sung the Doric 'Bothy Ballads' of her native north-east Scotland since the age of 4. Can she win a place to study music at Glasgow's revered Conservatoire?

17-year old Rachel Carstairs speaks and sings in Doric. It's a dialect not commonly used outside Rachel's native north-east Scotland, but she has grown up unusually steeped in local folk traditions. 

She started singing the area's unique traditional farm-worker's songs, known as 'Bothy Ballads', aged just 4, when she entered a music festival competition. 

This is why her music teachers now see her as an exciting 'tradition bearer'; with the potential to be a leading voice in the Scottish folk scene's next generation.

But before that can happen, she has just 15-minutes to impress an audition panel at the world renowned Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. 

Will she take her place at Scottish traditional music's top table? 

Producer: Dave Howard.

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