Danny Diamond is a fiddle player, composer, researcher, and recording engineer based in Dublin, whose music is rooted in the melodies and metres of Irish traditional music, but has absorbed wider influences from Nordic and American folk to baroque and electronic music. He plays with the Nordic-Irish band, Slow Moving Clouds (who performed the music in Michael Keegan-Dolan’s sold-out Swan Lake / Loch na hEala run during Dublin Theatre Festival 2016) and traditional band, Mórga. His 2014 solo album, Fiddle Music, and 2016 duo fiddle album, NORTH (with Conor Caldwell), have both been widely acclaimed. Danny is currently working on a follow-up solo project which combines new and traditional music with live loops and analog electronics.

Cuar
Cuar is a new, distinctly Irish chamber music trio led by Neil Ó Loclainn on double bass and flute, with Aoife Ní Bhriain on fiddle, and Matthew Berrill on clarinets. Cuar explores Irish traditional music within the framework of contemporary composition and improvisation. Citing influences as varied as Tommy Potts, Tony MacMahon, sean-nós singing and uilleann pipe music, on the one hand; and Carnatic music, Morton Feldman, and Bela Bartok, on the other; Neil’s compositions and the group’s performances are as much about meditation, collaboration and love as they are about a particular tradition or style. Individually, the members are among the most accomplished of their generation on their instruments, performing with some of Ireland’s leading ensembles, including Crash Ensemble, Ensemble Ériu, and the Irish Memory Orchestra, as well as pursuing their own musical careers and projects. Cuar are preparing to record their first album on the Raelach Records label in 2017.