THE MANX BEAUTY PROJECT TEAM ARE DELIGHTED TO BE PARTNERING WITH CREATIVE PEOPLE TO HELP RAISE OUR PROFILE AND THEIR WORK.
Each of the musicians, artists, crafts people and designers are pasionate about their work and we are delighted to highlight them and put links to their work as they also support what we do.
Isle of Man Musicians
Isla and Tom Callister, Isle of Man musicians are all supporting the project by each donating a tune that can be named by our donors.
Isla Callister
Isla is a Manx Gaelic speaker and fiddle player. Raised on the rich culture and music from the island, Isla has developed her own unique sound that reflects a strong connection to her native language, music and home. This is blended seamlessly together with influences from the prominent Irish session scene on the island, and her mother’s homeland of Scotland.
In 2016, she moved to Scotland to study Traditional Music at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow. Soon after, she joined TRIP, a powerful six-piece band whose music spans the four corners of the Celtic diaspora. They have been successful in taking their music to a global audience and will be releasing their debut album in 2021.
Isla is delighted to be a part of the Manx Beauty Project and looks forward to strengthening its links with the Isle of Man and exploring the story of the people and the boat. She feels a strong personal connection to the project, with her mother hailing from Fife, and having grown up in the old fishing town of Peel in a house that was part of an internment camp during the Second World War. The Manx Beauty and its story feels like a reflection of her own Manx and Scottish heritage.
She is also currently working on ‘Creeaght’ (courage in Manx Gaelic), a composition project exploring the lives and experiences of women who have shaped the history of the Isle of Man. This will be premiered at ‘Yn Chruinnaght’ Festival in 2022.
https://www.islacallister.com/
https://www.facebook.com/islacallistermusic
TRIP Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/TRIPceol
Tomas Callister
Tomas Callister is an award-winning fiddle player from the Isle of Man. He moved to Scotland to study traditional music in Benbecula, in the Outer Hebrides, and is now based in Glasgow at the forefront of the traditional music scene in Scotland.
Tomas, who was a founding member of Ímar, a virtuosic five-piece band that exploded onto the trad scene in 2016, is also well known as a passionate supporter of Manx music as a member of Manx/Scottish genre-busting quartet Mec Lir.
His fiddle playing has taken him across the world to places like Canada, Australia, America and Europe and has been met with critical acclaim. He also tours extensively throughout Germany with the world-renowned Angelo Kelly band.
Some links –
Shetland Musicians
These Shetland musicians are some of the best and most respected contemporary composers of traditional tunes in Scotland. They are all supporting the project by each donating a tune that can be named by our donors.
Peter Wood
Originally from Crawfordjohn in south lanarkshire Peter is a well known piper, accordionist, dance band leader and composer. he has lived in Shetland since 1996 .
His “Tunes fae the Hoose” project where multiple musicians came together online to create a fantastic music went viral. This created a vibrant online community when sharing music and having tunes face to face was impossible.
This project won the Community project of the year at the Scottish Traditional Music Awards in 2020. Peter has won other awards in previous years for his dance band works.
www.facebook.com/peterwoodmusic/
https://www.peterwoodmusic.co.uk/apps/webstore/products/show/8168162
Steven Spence
Steven is one of these phenominal Shetland fiddlers that decided not to go down the route of becoming a professional musician, his day job on Shetland Inter island Ferries. He is respected by all his professional Shetland musician colleagues who will at any chance they can sit down for a tune with him. This inevitably ends up as an amazing fired up session, incredible to watch and even better for those taking part..
His compositions are played and have been recorded by many bands and are taught in fiddle camps all over the world. He has multiple volumes of music books with acompanying CDs, and his son George is following in his footsteps as an accomplished fiddle player. George is now studying at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Jenna Reid
Jenna originally from Quarff in Shetland is one of the best known Shetland fiddlers and composers. She was taught by many of the great Shetland instructors including Willie Hunter. She is currently a member of Blazin’ Fiddles & RANT. and Winner of Scots Trad Music Award Composer of the Year 2019.
Jenna’s fifth solo album ‘Working Hands’ is released now with original compositions and arrangements by Jenna with Mr McFall’s Chamber and Harris Playfair.
Margaret Robertson MBE
Margaret Robertson is an inspirational figure on the Shetland music scene as a fiddler, pianist, teacher and composer. She has also made an impact nationally and internationally with her own music and musicianship as well as in her capacity as organiser of the fiddle element in the Edinburgh Military Tattoo’s Pipers Trail, which has visited Australia, New Zealand, Germany and Norway. She was awarded an MBE for her services to Tradtional Music in the Queens Birthday Honours list in 2020 and has been inducted ito the Traditional music Hall of Fame
Margaret didnt compose her first tune until she was twenty-eight. Many others have followed and have featured on Margaret’s own two albums, and on her extensive discography.
Margaret was taught fiddle by the late champion of Shetland’s fiddle heritage, Tom Anderson and went on to be Shetland’s first Young Traditional fiddler of the year.
Her recorded output includes albums from the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, for which Margaret was asked to put together – she thought at the time – a one-off Shetland fiddle ensemble to join the massed pipe bands in 2014. Through energetic fundraising a ninety-seven-strong ensemble took part and Margaret now draws on and administrates a pool of over two hundred fiddlers of all ages to fulfil the Pipers Trail engagements.
Margaret has been involved with the Manx Beauty Project 2018 and is key to the development of the music side and working with young musicians.
Other makers and businesses supporting the Project
ALL THINGS ARBOR
Catherine Geldard is a wood worker and jewellery maker originally from the Shetland Islands but now living in Newcastle. She works exclusively with foraged and reclaimed wood. Walking a line between geometric and natural lines, Catherine lets the wood dictate the shape of the work highlighting the natural beauty of the foraged wood and celebrating the flaws that tell the story of each reclaimed piece.
Catherine has been making jewellery with wood rescued from the Manx Beauty and so these unique gifts help us recycle even the smallest part of the boat and help raise funds for its restoration.
The jewellery is on sterling silver chains with sterling silver fittings.
www.etsy.com/uk/shop/allthingsarbor
Catriona Brown and the “Shroom Shelter”
The Manx Beauty project focusses on the sustainability of wooden boat building and restoration. We will plant trees to replace all wood we use and to create materials for the future as well help adddress climate change. While investigating this we realised that for such an ecologically great thing to do there was the massive anomaly in that with each sapling planted a plastic tree guard was used. We were delighted to be put in touch with a young visionary designer who had plans to address this incongruity
Catriona Brown is a recent graduate who studied her Masters in Product Design Engineering at the Glasgow School of Art. She is passionate about sustainable design and this inspired her final year project: Shroom Shelter.”
“The Shroom Shelter is a mycelium tree shelter designed to offer a plastic-free alternative for tree planting. Current tree shelters are made from plastic and are often abandoned, polluting the landscape with plastic litter. Mycelium is the root-like fibres of fungi and is fully-compostable. This removes the need for shelter collection, eliminating the risk of plastic pollution.”
When we spoke to Catriona her product was only at design and development stage.
The Manx Beauty Project will plant a minimum of 300 oak trees. We will guarantee a tree is planted for every £30 donated to our crowd funder. From that £30, £5 will go to Catriona to help develop her Shroom Shelters ,and when our seedlings are ready to be planted out we will have eco freindly Shroom Shetlers to protect them
The Manx Beauty Project is delighted to partner with Catriona in the hope that we can help encourage this exciting new business and help bring the Shroom Shelter’s designers dreams to fruition and in the process held address the issue of plastic tree guards.
East Neuk Salt Company
The East Neuk Salt Co. is a family owned business on the cusp of opening. They will be Scotland’s largest producer of hand harvested artisan sea salt crystals .
Based in St Monans, Darren Peattie is reviving an industry set up in the late 18th c by the Anstruther family and is very much rooted in tradition.
ENSC is donating a significant batch of Salt to our project to be labelled Manx Beauty Salt to help us raise funds. Both projects are proud of our local heritage and wish to make a diffence in our community by making our heritage relevant to the contemporary community. We are proud to partner with this exciting new venture.
Crail Pottery
Crail Pottery was established in 1965 by Stephen and Carol Grieve. Today it is run by their daughter Sarah, son Ben and Ben’s wife Jane.
They produce a diverse range of stoneware, terracotta planters, raku and bright hand painted earthenware. Every hand crafted piece is thrown on the wheel, decorated, glazed and fired in their workshops and has it’s own unique character.
All Crail pottery’s pots are “Hand made in Scotland” by the Grieve family.
The Manx Beauty Project is working with Ben Greive to developing complimentary products. For the crowdfunder we are offering their gorgeous Salt Pigs along with our East Neuk Salt Co – Manx Beauty Salt
East Neuk Candle Co
East Neuk Candle Co. draws inspiration from the unique landscape of the area by blending fragrances with essential oils to create unique scent experiences in their candles.
They have been developing a special Manx Beauty 2021 fragrance and we are delighted to be partnering in creating this new product celebrating a great East Neuk Business and Our heritage project
Hand-poured in the East Neuk of Fife, all East Neuk Candle Co. candles and wax melts are made with eco-friendly rapeseed wax, are vegan-friendly and cruelty free
Creating products that are eco-conscious, efficient and green is incredibly important to East Neuk Candle Co., which is why the vast majority of their packaging is 100% recyclable.
East Neuk Kilnhouse
Kilnhouse is a family run business located in St Monans, specialising in premium artisan smoked seafood products..
The fish boxes they are supplying to us are
- 1 x Pair Kipper Fillets
- 1 x Pair Whole Kippers
- 1 x Pair Hot Smoked Peppered Mackerel
- 1 x Pair Hot Smoked Plain Mackerel
- 1 x Pair Hot Smoked Trout
- 2 x Smoked Haddock Fillets
- 2 x 175g Mussel (when available)
- 2 x Hot Smoked Salmon (150g approx)
- 1 x 125g Smoked Salmon Sliced
- 1 x Pack of Local Homemade Oat Cakes
