*** Check out the photos ***

DISTIL 5 will take place at the Mill Hotel, New Lanark from the 28th - 31st October 2004.

Participants

Norman Chalmers is a photographer, writer, music critic, teacher (Feisean, RSAMD and Sabhal Mor Ostaig) and musician who has worked since the 1970s to incorporate Scottish traditional music in radio, TV and live theatre. A former member of Ossian and the Easy Club, he is a founder member of Jock Tamson's Bairns and the Cauld Blast Orchestra, and contributed to programmes as diverse as BBC's Odyssey oral history radio series and TVs Rab C Nesbitt, and Scottish theatre companies from Communicado, Wildcat, Eden Court and Royal Lyceum to Mull's Little Theatre.

Christine Hanson, originally from Edmonton, Canada, studied classical cello, but has established herself in the pop-jazz and traditional music genres, working with among others Michael Marra, Rod Paterson and Bruce MacGregor of Blazin Fiddles. She has also worked in theatre and teaches cello at music camps in North America.

Catriona MacDonald began playing fiddle as a child in Shetland under the tutelage of Tom Anderson, and later went on to study voice at the Royal College of Music. After graduation she decided to concentrate on traditional music, and in 1991 was a winner of the Radio Two Young Tradition Award.

Projects have included a duo with accordionist Ian Lowthian, a trio with David Milligan and Conrad Ivitski (both former Distil participants), String Sisters, which involved fiddlers from Ireland, the US, Cape Breton and Norway, and currently Blazin Fiddles. Teaching commitments include the Traditional Music degree course at Newcastle University.

Catriona McKay studied pedal harp, Celtic harp and electro-acoustic composition at RSAMD, and did postgraduate studies at the Royal Northern College of Music. She is a member of Fiddlers Bid, and of the Orquestra Scotland Brasil project. Last year leading electro-acoustic composer Alistair MacDonald composed a piece for Catriona, 'The Salutation' for clarsach and electro acoustic sounds, and in April 2004 she premiered a specially commissioned piece by Scottish composer Eddie McGuire (who tutored on Distil 1) for clarsach and organ at Edinburgh Harp Festival.
Claire Mann is a former All-Ireland champion on flute, whistle and fiddle. She has performed with Tabache (with Aidan O'Rourke), Craobh Rua, and is currently flute and whistle tutor at RSAMD. Her first solo CD was recently released.

Claire Mann is a former All-Ireland champion on flute, whistle and fiddle. She has performed with Tabache (with Aidan O’Rourke), Craobh Rua, and is currently flute and whistle tutor at RSAMD. Her first solo CD was released in 2001.

Aidan O'Rourke from Argyll plays with Blazin Fiddles and Sunhoney, and is an experienced session player with over 40 albums to his credit. He has composed music for Dundee Rep, and his New Voices piece 'Sirius', which was premiered at Celtic Connections last year, is due for release on CD in 2005. He was also commissioned to write a piece, 'Mantra Alba', for the appearance of the Dalai Lama in Dunfermline earlier this year.

Jennifer Port (clarsach, oboe and voice) is from Golspie in Sutherland and studied at RSAMD. Her New Voices commission, 'Silver Lining' was first performed at Celtic Connections earlier this year. High profile gigs include playing at Madonna and Guy Ritchie's wedding at Skibo Castle in 2000.

Chris Stout, from Shetland, studied violin at RSAMD, and also completed a masters degree there in electro-acoustic composition. One of his electro-acoustic pieces was a New Voices commission for Celtic Connections. Chris is a founder member of Fiddlers Bid and tours regularly with Salsa Celtica. Other recent projects include Double Helix, a folk/jazz collaboration with Alastair Anderson (Distil 4), Tom Bancroft (Distil 2) and others, and Orquestra Scotland Brasil. Shetland and Scandinavian music are a key element in Chris's work and can be heard on his solo album released earlier this year.

Workshop Leaders

Sally Beamish studied viola at the Royal Northern College of Music and in Italy. Her early career was centred on the viola (notably with the Raphael Ensemble and the London Sinfonietta). On moving to Scotland in 1989 she co-founded the Chamber Group of Scotland with Robert Irvine and James McMillan, after which her career as a composer started to flourish. Her work includes two symphonies, concertos for violin, viola, cello, oboe, and saxophone (The Imagined Sound of Sun on Stone), percussion, flute and trumpet.

She has also written for children, amateur string groups, and in 2002 worked with author Janice Galloway on an opera based on the life of Mary Shelley, of Frankenstein fame.
She is a past winner of SAC's Creative Scotland award, which enabled her to write her oratorio, Knotgrass Elegy, which featured Tommy Smith as soloist. She has also written extensively for film and television (including Writing Scotland, currently being shown on BBC2).

Mihály Borbély studied classical clarinet and jazz saxophone at the Bartók Conservatory and the Liszt Academy of Music in Hungary and subsequently worked in different musical styles from folk and world music to jazz and contemporary music. He was originally trained on clarinet and alto saxophone, but later took up the soprano and tenor saxes as well as folk instruments like tárogató, folk flutes, kaval, dvojnice, fujara, ocarina, bombarde and zurna.

He is a member of the famous Hungarian folk band Vujicsics (founded in 1974), leads his own jazz bands, is a soloist with the international world music group Vents d'Est (East Wind) and has also performed and recorded with musicians such as legendary jazz flautist Herbie Mann, John Wetton (King Crimson, Asia) and Trilok Gurtu.

Teaching is a very important element of his musical philosophy. He has been teaching since 1979 and until 2000 was head of the Jazz Department at the Liszt Academy.

John Kenny is a multi-faceted performer. As a trombonist his interests include contemporary solo repertoire, modern jazz and early music. After studying at the Royal Academy of Music, John worked as an actor/musician with the Bubble Theatre in London in 1981 then made his debut as soloist in the Purcell Room in 1982. He has since given recitals and broadcasts worldwide, both as a soloist and with ensembles. In 1993 he became the first person in modern times to play the Carnyx, Scotland's 2,000 year old Celtic Boar-headed horn (developed with John Purser, a tutor at Distil 3). He now performs and lectures regularly with the instrument. He is also co-founder and co-director of Carnyx & Company (voice/trombone/electronics - music theatre), TNT Music Theatre Company, Scot Free (improvising composers ensemble) and the early music group His Ain Draucht Trumpets.

He is a professor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, lecturer at Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart, and in 1993 was elected Associate of the Royal Academy of Music.