Stornoway

Stornoway lit up 2010 with their thrilling debut Beachcomber’s Windowsill, the culmination of a five-year journey with its starting point in a Freshers Week meeting at Oxford University. Hailed from the rooftops for its melodic magnificence and imaginative arrangements, the album reached the UK Top-15, which achieved Gold status, leading to world tours, festival appearances, and a sold-out show at London’s Somerset House. Stornoway songs are uplifting, heartfelt, dashingly melodic, but the songs are just the start. This is a band that runs on curiosity. Producing their own records, they take a bespoke approach to each track. With a wonderfully diverse range of instrumentation and an unmistakable joy in the creative process, every one of their songs is given a very beautiful and carefully considered place to live – musically and geographically, with recording locations including campervans, wind-buffeted barns, chapels and community centres. With support from Alice Boyd Alice Boyd is a South London-based musician, sound artist and audio producer, weaving song and sound art to explore our connection with the natural world and the landscapes we call home. Alice brings a solo set that moves between folk, ambient and experimental sound, using layered vocals, synths, live looping and her own field recordings collected across the UK and beyond. Inspired by her BBC Radio 4 documentary Shifting Soundscapes, where she revisits locations recorded by audio naturalist Martyn Stewart (The Listening Planet) 50 years ago, Alice reflects on the sounds lost and found over the last half century. Alice’s music and sound work has been featured across BBC Radio 3, 4 & 6, and presented at venues including the Barbican Conservatory, Kings Place and the Eden Project’s Rainforest Biome. Alongside her musical releases, she creates soundscapes for radio, film, podcasts and installations, with collaborators including the BBC, RSPB, Ffern, Kew’s Wakehurst and EarthPercent. Her set has been developed with support from Britten Pears Arts and Arts Council England. Venue: Auditorium, Exeter Phoenix