Beverley Folk Festival Presents: CALAN

'A storming juggernaut of cool-Cymru-with-attitude power-folk with a jaw-dropping repertoire’ Folk Wales

CALAN are a multi award-winning Welsh folk band comprising of five virtuoso musicians formed after they met at a folk music course in Sweden. They won international acclaim at the world-renowned Inter-Celtic Festival in Lorient, France, where they would eventually become the first Welsh ensemble to win the coveted International Band Trophy. In April 2019, they were voted Best Band at the inaugural Wales Folk Awards.
Calan are: Bethan Rhiannon (accordion, vocals, clog dancing); Patrick Rimes (fiddle, Welsh bagpipes); Angharad Jenkins (fiddle); Sam Humphreys (guitar); and Shelley Musker-Turner (harp).

Since they were formed the band has played to audiences numbering from 40 at a garden fete to 26,000 at Fairport Convention’s Cropredy Festival in Oxfordshire, but perhaps the most visible was their televised performance from a packed Royal Albert Hall alongside Sir Bryn Terfel and Sting.

Folk Wales magazine calls Calan “A storming juggernaut of cool-Cymru-with-attitude power-folk with a jaw-dropping repertoire...you can’t help but marvel at their astounding musicianship.” While the respected American quarterly music review Magnet adds: “Calan (are) a new generation of ambassadors...raising the international profile of traditional Welsh music.”

The band have so far released six albums (Bling, Jonah, Dinas, Solomon, Deg and A Calan Christmas in Wales) plus the EP Giggly. Their sixth album is called Kistvaen which is an old Welsh word for a tomb. And that’s kind of what they do-excavate tombs, find old tunes and bring them back to life for the 21st century.