Sue Wilson

DESPITE the seemingly disparate subjects of this year’s New Voices commissions at Celtic Connections – with Hamish Napier rejoicing in the river Spey, Ewan Robertson reimagining an extreme triathlon, and now singer/fiddler Kate Young (aka Kate in the Kettle) reappraising the medicinal traditions of plants – they unite in an underlying lament for humanity’s increasingly perilous alienation from nature, and a plea for reconciliation.

The River, Hamish Napier's composition for Celtic Connections’ New Voices series, was partly inspired by the Spey: specifically the mile-long stretch that flows past the folk musician’s childhood home, where his classically-trained mother first taught him to love music, and his father to love nature, history and the outdoors.