Congratulations to RadioGH who have been nominated in Trad Music in the Media sponsored by Sabhal Mòr Ostaig in the MG ALBA Scots Trad Music Awards 2020. Vote here! Vote now!
We asked Ewan Galloway & Derek Hamilton of RadioGH the following questions.
Tell us about yourself
RadioGH was set up in April 2019 with licences from PRS and PPL to be the new home of The Scottish Shindig. The Scottish Shindig, as of next June, will be 10 years old having started at TD1 Radio. It is a live 2 hr programme of traditional Scottish Dance Music and song presented by the site owners, Ewan & Derek. It didn’t take long for RadioGH to expand into a 24hr 7 day a week Scottish Traditional Music station with the addition of two new presenters and several new programmes broadcast weekly, with repeats at various times to suit a worldwide audience… Early on in the current Covid pandemic we decided to do lunchtime live request shows and these have proved extremely popular worldwide. The Daily Ceilidh airs at 1-2pm Tuesday – Friday each week. RadioGH now has 17 different programmes (either 2hr or 1hr in length) each week presented by 13 presenters. All of this output is free for every listener and is a labour of love on the part of everyone involved in presenting these programmes. Our aim is to bring the best in Traditional Scottish Dance Music and song to as wide an audience as possible. RadioGH is a non-profit making station and aims to keep our traditional music alive and flourishing.
Why are you involved in Scottish music?
All of our presenters within RadioGH have an interest in Scottish Traditional music. A number of the presenters are musicians in their own right and play a number of instruments related to Scottish music. We have a great passion for our type of music and feel that we can use our station to promote it to a wider audience
Any particular career highlights?
Derek and Ewan have had many highlights over their musical career. Derek toured as a keyboard player with Dermot O’ Brien for a number of years and his most recent career highlight was setting up RadioGH. He always wanted to create a radio station and jumped at the chance when Ewan had to find a new home for The Scottish Shindig. Ewan has really enjoyed his time playing music. He has had many great opportunities, which include playing for the BBC Countryfile team, playing on one of the golden ticket trains for the opening of the Border railway line as well as playing abroad for RSCDS. His highlight through radio was being able to work hard to put together, with Derek, a virtual Shetland Accordion and Fiddle festival this year. This live festival was sadly cancelled due to the pandemic but both presenters worked very hard to achieve a great virtual festival that was viewed worldwide putting the Shetland Festival on the map as a place to go to next year. Putting all this together has got RadioGH to where it is today, nominated for a trad award.
What are your plans for the future?
RadioGH is always expanding and looking for new ideas, shows and presenters. We currently are planning to extend our schedule of programmes to include specialist piping and folk music programmes. We would also like to introduce some live interview shows with various musicians and guests to give them a further platform to showcase their musical interests. Once restrictions are lifted we look forward to organising a great live show for the 10 year anniversary of the Scottish Shindig, Creating a mini Shetland Festival for February time and working with all our presenters to make RadioGH the place to go for Scottish dance, music and song, every day, all day.
Read more about RadioGH
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thescottishshindig
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/radioGHstudio
The MG ALBA Scots Trad Music Awards, Na Trads 2020, will be broadcast on BBC ALBA on 12th December 2020 at 9pm where the award winners will be announced along with specially recorded music performances. During the day on Saturday the 12th, you will be able to watch from 1pm til 9pm a day of live Scottish trad music including Kinnaris Quintet, Dallahan, Inyal, Paul McKenna Band, Ryan Young and Jenn Butterworth and many more here https://youtu.be/amByvVzxl5E. Keep up to date with all the latest information by joining the Hands Up for Trad newsletter at https://handsup.link/Newsletter or use the hashtags #natrads #HUFTonline.
If you would like to support Hands Up for Trad in their work with Scottish trad music and musicians please consider supporting our Patreon campaign. We have 3 tiers starting at $1 a month and everything helps support us in our work. Read more at www.patreon.com/handsupfortrad