Celtic Connections

Poets like Aonghas Mac an Tsaoghair publish in Edinburgh, while folk singers such as Ioan MacLeòid bring Gaelic songs to world festivals.

The annual Celtic Connections festival in Glasgow also showcases Gaelic musicians alongside other Celtic traditions, thereby embedding the language within a wider musical network that resonates with diverse audiences.

These cultural outputs play an essential role in maintaining a sense of identity for contemporary Gaelic speakers.

Today, platforms such as BBC Alba provide daily television content in Gaelic, while radio stations like Radio nan Gàidheal broadcast news, dramas, and music that cater to both seasoned and new listeners.

What a super album that is.

Chris Drever and Chris Stout from Live at the Kelvin Grove, Celtic Connections, 2025 album, and two Chris Drever tracks, and there'll be two more later on.

Firstly, Change, then Sunday.

Now, very sadly, Dolly Parton left us in the last week.

Strong men go Rockets fly I'll always leave the

light on I'll always leave the light on Though no one's home music music

A really super, albeit short, album from Chris Drever and Chris Stout, live at the Kelvin Grove Celtic Connections in 2025.

And you heard two more Chris Drever tracks, Scapa Flow 1919 and I'll Always Leave the Light On.

Because I have, like, so many ideas.

Like, obviously, you've got Celtic Connections on in January.

So, like, I want to do, like, themed seasons.

So, like, for January, I could do, like, a music season where I speak to creative musicians.

I've already got a number on my list, like, loads on my list.

And, like, Celtic Connections could sponsor the season.

And I actually have a

friend who works in Celtic Connections and she has done for years and knows loads of people in Celtic Connections.

like yeah all summer and so it's been hectic I

feel like you're very much downplaying things here because you're downplaying the Mercury Prize and you're saying you know oh we just played the Barras you actually curated your own sold out show at the Barras which is a pretty big deal I would say as part of Celtic Connections right?

Yeah, that was, and that was like a really cool, you know, I think growing up playing in Scotland, I'd always like, I moved to Glasgow when I was 16.

I'm from Dumfries and I went to the RCS when I was 16.

But I had this urge to do something different.

And I saw Eamon Coyne and Chris Drever at Celtic Connections, two o'clock in the morning at the festival club.

And I was like, I want to do that.

That's really fun.

do cool shit.

And at the same time, that same day, I saw a big picture in the concert hall in Frankfurt.

at Celtic Connections and it was two American guitar players and they're just sitting on stage and they're thrown back laughing at the two guitars.

You know, because Brock McGuire was really serious.

In a woman's shirt and apron, or they'll rig you out for sea.

Following Blows the Bell, you heard Sam Carter performing Barrack Street at Celtic Connections this year.

And it comes from an album called Sam Carter Sings Nick Jones, live at Celtic Connections.

And he's performing this Nick Jones show at Shrewsbury Folk Festival, which is something I'm definitely going along to see.

Here's something by an actor I've not heard of before, but again, they're performing at the festival.

rather than something that has already matured or been around for a long time.

And just to be concrete about it, we had a very successful event in January, a festival called Celtic Connections, which is a great artistic, musical, performative festival.

But we did something there called Power Shift.

which was a mix of genres, experts, improvisers, musicians, futurists, ceilidh dancing, all manner of different things jumbling together to help people think about this question of democratising energy and energising democracy that's happening in the renewables area in Scotland.