BIOGRAPHY

NIGEL SHAW

Nigel Shaw is a long-established composer and musician whose journey with music began over 25 years ago. He is a wood carver and traditional flute-maker, making many of the instruments with which he performs and records. The inspiration for most of his music stems from the spirit of the land, with its cycles of power, mystery and gentle beauty. In the creation of his albums Nigel uses many ancient instruments including handmade wooden and clay flutes, traditional whistles and recorders, smallpipes, dulcimer, psaltery, Eastern European overtone flutes (including fujara and koncovka), many types of drum (including djembe, cahon and darabuka) and percussion. He combines these with sound recordings gathered from nature and contemporary musical instruments such as piano, harmonium and synthesisers, in a powerful fusion of ancient and new to create his unique landscapes of sound and soul-filled melodies as well as the dynamic tribal rhythms of his dance music.

For many years he has been handcrafting flutes using woods indigenous to Britain, such as yew, holly, thorn, ash and oak. He carves large wooden masks and totems inspired by the wild landscape. His most ambitious project to date has been the building of a large ceremonial Neolithic-style roundhouse, constructed from granite, oak trees and rye grass thatch. This sacred house, and a series of flutes carved from thirteen trees native to this land, sit at the heart of his album DARTMOOR ROUNDHOUSE, a cycle of flute songs recorded at night around the hearth fire.

He has produced a renowned and diverse collection of recordings from the best-selling improvised meditation album THE RIVER, to the classical voice and exquisite lament of REQUIEM: WELL OF SOULS. His work also encompasses wilder strands of dance music with the bands RIVEN and GLOBAL, including the exotic dub/reggae improvisations of his most recent band DUBBLEHEAD. In recent years Nigel has initiated and produced some unique and exciting sacred world music projects, such as the triad of Japanese/Tarascan/English flute players BAMBOO CEDAR OAK, the extraordinary album ANCESTORS based around forgotten songs of tribal people from the Siberian Arctic, and the project EXILE which draws on many world and ancient folk music influences to create a cross-cultural experience of the deep bond between the human spirit and the land that is called home.

CAROLYN HILLYER

Carolyn Hillyer is a composer of strong beautiful songs and raw compelling chants, and a powerful performer in concert. She sings of ancient spirit and hidden memory, of ancestral roots and the deep experience of women in the weaving of courageous life paths. She has released 12 albums to date, both solo projects and creative collaborations with Nigel Shaw. Carolyn is also a drum-maker, creating traditional frame drums from skins and other materials sourced both on Dartmoor and during her journeys to the Arctic. She makes many of the instruments that she uses in concert including red deer, horse, reindeer, elk, salmon, horned, paddle, death and other ceremonial drums.

She is an artist, painting life-size images of archetypal and mythological women; the sacred landscape in human form. Her paintings are exhibited within installations that celebrate the deep magic and integrity of the ancestral land. Her most recent work ASHES AND EARTH, creates a jounrey through four guardian women into the silent lands, a terrain of solitude and silence, death and restoration, hope and the illumination of memory. Carolyn writes powerful mythic stories that expand on the symbolism in her paintings and songs, some of which have been published as collections and source books both within the UK and Europe.

For 14 years Carolyn has been leading an ever-evolving programme of workshop journeys based around the themes of her work. They range from large inclusive celebrations of ancestry and pagan spirit, to longer intensive weekends for women at her farm on Dartmoor that establish an environment in which women can be supported and inspired in the exploration of their own sacred landscape and spiritual creativity.

Songs from albums such as WEATHERED EDGE and HOUSE OF THE WEAVERS have become classics in chanting groups and dancing circles. CAVE OF ELDERS represents a departure from the rich and complex lyrics of her other work, being an improvised series of wordless songs; the most recent DRUM SONGS FROM THE HEATHEN HILLS concentrates on the powerful union of voice and drum. Her work with the bands RIVEN and GLOBAL, as well as her creative collaboration with Nigel in the ANCESTORS and EXILE projects, demonstrates a wilder unleashed approach to both voice and lyrics.

DARTMOOR

Dartmoor is an area of wild moorland in southwest England, a mist-veiled landscape of hidden valleys and bare tors where the stone circles and settlements of ancient people exist at the fringes of present time. Nigel and Carolyn have worked on Dartmoor for over 17 years, living with their family in an ancient longhouse at the centre of the moor. They draw much inspiration for their work from the primordial landscape that surrounds them and in recent years both their music and art have been creatively influenced by their travels and work alongside musicians and instrument makers in other cultures and lands, encompassing northern ice, desert sands, island mountains and western seas.

Carolyn and Nigel are internationally known musicians and have performed concerts in many countries including Japan, USA, Russia, Australia, the Arctic, the Baltic States, Jamaica and Central America as well as throughout Europe and the UK. Every few years they organise RIVENSTONE, a unique and intimate festival of sacred world music and ancestral roots held on their farm in Dartmoor.

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