Description
Fiddle player Alastair Savage was born and raised in Ardrossan, on the Ayrshire coast. His early inspiration came at his Father’s knee, where the sound of the accordian introduced him to the traditional music of his homeland. He studied fiddle and guitar as a child, playing both traditional and classical music, before heading to Douglas Academy Music School in his mid teens to study classical violin more intensely. Alongside this, he was also the winner of The Land O’Burns Scots Fiddle Competition. He then went on to study at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and the Royal Academy of Music in London, before returning northwards to join the BBC Scottish Symhony Orchestra. Alastair always kept in touch with his trad roots whilst studying, playing reguarly in ceilidh bands and other folk groups.
Alastair is still a member of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, but also works regularly with other groups throughout the country, both as a chamber musician and as a traditional fiddle player. He was one of the principal players in the True North Orchestra for the 2010 Celtic Connections festival, and is also a familiar face to audiences of the Scottish Ensemble and chamber group Daniel’s Beard.
As a traditional player, he has broadcast on BBC Radio Scotland and BBC Radio 3 and as a composer, his music has been used by BBC Alba.
Alastair and the band have 2 albums to their name already, featuring predominantly Alastair’s music.
Secrets From The Kitty is Alastair’s third CD.
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The Scotsman –
THIS third album of compositions from fiddler Alastair Savage, who inhabits both folk and classical worlds, combines some spectacular fireworks with a feel for sweet melancholy. His accomplished fiddling is ably complemented by his regular sidemen, double-bassist Iain Crawford and Euan Drysdale on piano and on a bluesy acoustic guitar which breaks out in the hoedown of Winter Blue and the hard-driving One of Those Weeks set.
Occasionally I felt I was listening to fiddle pyrotechnics rather than tunes that will stick, but I particularly enjoyed A Vanishing Way of Life, with its mysterious fiddle harmonics and elegiac piano and fiddle suggesting the soundtrack of a sad film, before a high-tension percussive bridge leads into an explosion of energy in One Chance to Celebrate. Savage also plays with great soul in the resonant double-stopping of Alright With You and duets beautifully with piano in the plaintive Evening Song.
Jim Gilchrist
The Scotsman 25/06/2012