Over the past ten years Ross Ainslie, Jim Murray, Dónal O’Connor and Jack Talty have been at the forefront of highly creative Scottish and Irish music-making – as players, composers, arrangers, accompanists, producers and record label owners. Their individual talents as working musicians have seen them initiate hundreds of thoughtful and innovative projects, and the set list on this tour will include a Music Network commission from all four performers, their virtuosity and profound understanding of the music underpinning any daring off-piste exploration they might undertake.

Add to that a sharp intelligence and gentle curiosity about where this music sits in the world, how it relates to the world outside and you have a quartet of artists who have made a massive contribution to music in both local and international arenas. Thrilling, soulful, sincere and highly communicative, theirs is a music of people and place, of stillness, of confluence and of us.

Ross Ainslie, pipes/whistles
Jim Murray, guitar
Dónal O’Connor, fiddle
Jack Talty, concertina