All Together Now: Rachel Sermanni, The Maes, Kris Drever, Cahalen Morrison, Trent Freeman & Duncan Lyall

Experience the musical fruits of Celtic Connections' first artist residency. Coming together for five days of creative incubation during the festival, Rachel Sermanni, Cahalen Morrison, Kris Drever, The Maes, Duncan Lyall and Trent Freeman will present new collaborative pieces and reimaginings of their existing works. The residency has been designed to provide them with the space to nudge the soft edges of their comfort zones and feed their creativity amongst the musical hustle and bustle of the festival.

Rachel Sermanni brims with dreamy indie-folk pop that speaks of the struggle and desire to Flow, to love, to live, to feel. Australian sisters The Maes bring modern folk to life with lush harmonies and acoustic mastery on guitar, mandolin, fiddle and banjo. Kris Drever is an award-winning Scottish folk singer, guitarist, songwriter and producer, whose latest album Doing This For Love explores “meditations on the unglamorous, 4am alarm clocks, ungrateful shifts, the quiet sacrifices made for love.”

Originally hailing from the high desert of Northern New Mexico, Cahalen Morrison is well known for his singular turn of phrase and curiously poignant songs. Canadian multi-instrumentalist Trent Freeman is best known as a fiery fiddle player in The Fretless, as well as from his collaborations with Pharis & Jason Romero and Allison de Groot. Helping to pull it all together is Scottish bassist and producer Duncan Lyall, member of the GRIT orchestra, Croft No. Five and Kate Rusby's band.

This project has been made possible by the generous donations of the festival's supporters, helping us to provide space for artistic collaboration during Celtic Connections and allowing artists to build relationships and explore new creative connections at the festival.