Week 12
240321 (#2130)
Spring Sounds

According to the old saying, March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. We breeze into the season with music to ease our way.

Week 13

240328 (#2131)
Americana Celts

The Piedmont Blues and Old Time music of Americans Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, and Aunt Samantha Bumgarner were all early influences on Scottish singers and guitarists including Archie Fisher, John Martyn, and Bert Jansch. The blended sound has evolved further in “Celtgrass” and “I-grass” Irish fusion bands like JigJam and We Banjo 3.

Week 14
240404 (#2132)
Take Flight
As birds migrate in the spring and fall, so do songs and tunes travel far afield and find their way back home again. Fiona Ritchie explores tunes inspired by bird flight and the movement of music with Tim Cummings, Pete Sutherland, Brad Kolodner, Laurie Lewis, Jean Redpath and more. 

Week 15
240411 (#2133)
New Sounds
New music is as much of a springtime certainty as fresh buds on the trees. It’s time to get out among it all and listen to recordings recently acquired, downloaded, and re-discovered.

Week 16
240418 (#2134)
Sea and Air
This week we feature music from fiddler Duncan Chisholm inspired by a remote Scottish beach, and from Karine Polwart's Wind Resistance.

Week 17
240425 (#2135)
Tríona
One of Ireland’s leading interpreters of folk and traditional music, Tríona Ní Dhomhnaill is also a composer and songwriter of international renown. We mark her 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award at the RTÉ Radio 1 Folk Awards with a review of her influential career spanning more than fifty years in Skara Brae, The Bothy Band, Touchstone, Relativity, Nightnoise, and T With the Maggies.

Week 18
240502 (#2136)
Celtic Compilation I
Head, heart, river and rose - Fiona Ritchie picks her way through a random assortment of themes in a selection of music from artists including Luka Bloom, Elephant Sessions, The Unwanted and Underhill Rose.

Week 19
240509 (#2137)
Celtic Compilation II
We pick our way through another loose assortment of themes with music from artists including Skipinnish, Suzy Bogguss, and Dick Gaughan from his “Harvard Tapes”.

Week 20
240516 (#2138)
Quarter Days
Following the rhythms of the agricultural year in days gone by, four days marked the main divisions of the year: Candlemas, Whitsun, Lammas, and Martinmas. Many traditional folk songs and tunes were set against these seasonal shifts.  We’ll explore a few and feature duo Gavin Marwick (fiddle) and Aaron Jones (cittern) from their Quarter Days project of new music.

Week 21
240523 (#2139)
Enduring Ballads
This week, discover colourful characters and dramatic events in the narratives of traditional, broadside, and contemporary ballads.

Week 22
240530 (#2140)
Trails and Sails
From Irish cowboys on the plains to the Orkney men in Hudson Bay, we unpick the Celtic roots of North American folk music with Skip Gorman, Graham Rorie and more.

Week 23
240606 (#2141)
Beginnings
June 4 1983 marked the first national radio broadcast of The Thistle & Shamrock.  Fiona Ritchie reviews the playlists of these first shows and asks: what else was happening at the time, in music and beyond? 

Week 24
240613 (#2142)
Yeats in Song
The poetry of W.B.Yeats (1865-1939) embraces nature, art, mysticism, politics, love, and death. The collection “I Am of Ireland - Yeats in Song” sets Yeats poems to music by Raymond Driver and features many of today’s finest Irish singers including Cathy Jordan, Eleanor Shanley, and John Doyle.

Week 25
240620 (#2143)
Encore
More music from an assortment of artists featured on New Releases shows.

Week 26
240627 (#2144)
American Folk Songbook
Join Fiona Ritchie at the Swannanoa Gathering’s Traditional Song Week with her guest, the multi-million selling Country Music recording artist Suzy Bogguss. The singer songwriter chats about the roots of American song, how her music has evolved, and shows the live audience why she was such a favourite in her many appearances through the years on A Prairie Home Companion.