Travelling Folk

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BBC Radio Scotland's flagship folk music programme.

BBC Radio Scotland's flagship folk programme and brings you the very best of today's music and song.

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Travelling Folk: Gaelic Songwriting & Lisa O'Neill

Gaelic Songwriting & Lisa O'Neill

BBC Radio Scotland - Travelling Folk, Gaelic Songwriting & Lisa O'Neill

Gillebrìde MacMillan on contemporary Gaelic songwriting & a new album from Lisa O'Neill.

Gillebrìde MacMillan on his new series exploring contemporary Gaelic songwriting & Anna meets Lisa O'Neill on tour to chat about her new album All Of This Is Chance.

Gaelic songs have been composed for over 1000 years. Indeed some of these earliest songs are still sung at ceilidhs and gatherings to this day. However, this unbroken chain of Gaelic song composition almost came to an end in the 1970s and 1980s. The decline of the Gaelic house ceilidhs and the decline of traditional poets meant that Gaelic songs were few and far between. However, in recent years there has been a revival of new and contemporary Gaelic songwriting. Known as the Outlander bard and language coach, Gillebrìde MacMillan is a renowned songwriter and lecturer in Gaelic Song at The University of Glasgow.  In a new 10 part series on BBC Radio nan Gàidheal, Gillebrìde explores contemporary Gaelic song compositions. He joins Anna to chat about what's coming up on the series.

A raconteur in the truest sense of the word, Lisa O’Neill is a five time BBC Folk Award nominee and her previous album "Heard a Long Gone Song" was named The Guardian’s 2019 Folk Album of the Year. Bringing her to a new audience, her adaptation of Bob Dylan’s "All the Tired Horses" soundtracked the final scene of epic TV drama Peaky Blinders. Her new album, "All of This Is Chance" is a portrait of an artist in love with nature, but one perplexed by the ever-expanding gulf between it and modern society. Amidst two sold out shows in Edinburgh, Anna caught up with Lisa backstage to delve into the album.

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