North American Folk Music and Dance Alliance
Background and context
Malinky
The North American Folk Music and Dance Alliance conference takes place in Memphis, Tennessee from 21 - 25 February 2007.
Since 1989 the North American Folk Music and Dance Alliance has worked on behalf of the folk music and dance industry. The organisation tackles issues important to the folk arts community through advocacy, strategic partnerships, and an annual international conference.
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The Folk Alliance has 2,400 members worldwide, with its goal to ‘increase access to needed resources for our members, and to expand to the breadth of the folk music and dance experience for the general public.’ |
They work at an international level so that members in the field can do their work in their local areas more efficiently, with wider impact, and more profitably, with a stronger voice at both grassroots and international levels.
Conference
The Folk Alliance’s annual conference takes place in February each year and is one of the five largest music conferences in North America. Record companies, agents, publishers, promoters, managers, music support services, manufacturers and artists from all over the world have the opportunity to meet, network and showcase at the event.
Festival
The Folk Alliance International Music and Dance Festival also takes place during the conference, on Saturday 24 February. Over 150 international artists performing in such genres as Folk, Roots, Celtic, Country, Klezmer, Aboriginal, Gospel and Gypsy will perform under one roof at the Festival. Scottish acts appearing at the Festival include Bodega, Emily Smith, Laura McGhee and Session A9.
The Scottish Arts Council is supporting Malinky to enable them to showcase at this year’s Folk Alliance. The band first emerged at the Celtic Connections festival in 1999 when they won the Danny Kyle Open Stage award. Their song-centred repertoire combines an array of vocal talent with a highly distinctive instrumental palette in fresh arrangements of both traditional and contemporary material.
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The original line-up included Karine Polwart and Leo McCann, and now consists of Fiona Hunter (singer and cellist), Ewan MacPherson (mandolin, guitar, banjo, jew’s harp and vocals), Steve Byrne (vocals, bouzouki, cittern and guitar), Jon Bews (fiddle) and Mark Dunlop (whistles, bodhrán, vocals and uilleann pipes). |
Between the five of them, there is a wealth of diverse interest and backgrounds from the Angus and Ulster regions, Scandinavian music and the Scottish travellers tradition.
Malinky have released three albums, Last Leaves (2000), 3 Ravens (2004), The Unseen Hours (2005), with a fourth album due to be recorded in 2007. They started the year performing at Celtic Connections, alongside Swedish quartet Ranarim and Black Isle fiddler Lauren MacColl, as part of the Showcase Scotland programme.
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