Thanks to the following for being players and friends of the Carolan guitar.
Tim Edey
Tim is an award-winning multi-instrumentalist, singer and composer who has toured and recorded with the Chrieftens, Christie Moore, Sharon Shannon, Natalie MacMaster, Altan, Capercaillie, Brendan Power, Michael McGoldrick, Session A9, Wolfstone, Lunasa and Mary Black to name but a few. If this isn’t enough, he was also named BBC Radio Two’s Musician of the Year in 2012. You can find out more about Tim’s music at his website. Tim played a beautiful rendition of ‘Give Me Your Hand’ (‘Tabhair dom do Lámh’ in Irish) on Carolan during his recent gig at Southwell where he appeared with collaborator Ben Trott of the Albion Band.
Click here to visit Tom’s website.
Click here to watch a video of Tim playing Carolan.
Remi Harris
Described by none other than John Etheridge as “a tremendously gifted young player” Remi Harris is widely regarded as one of the UK’s Top Gypsy Jazz Jazz Guitarist. He has toured the UK, Australia and France as well as performing at Buckingham Palace and Live on BBC Radio 2.
Remi played Carolan when he stopped by the Mixed Reality Lab on his way to headline at the first Beeston Jazz Festival. He recorded three lovely tunes for us and shared his memories of his own guitars, vividly recounting every dent, scratch and area of wear and tear, how they came about and how they reflect his own personal journey with each of his guitars.
Click here to visit Remi’s website.
Click here to watch a video of Remi playing Carolan.
Lulo Reinhardt
Lulo Reinhardt
Lulu Reinhardt is a leading proponent of Gypsy music and has been wowing audiences worldwide with his virtuoso guitar playing and innovative compositions that crossover with jazz, latin and even celtic music. This is perhaps no surprise given his pedigree as the great-nephew of the legendary Django Reinhardt.
Lulo played Carolan when he visited the Djanogly Theatre at Nottingham Lakeside Arts in October 2014 and also shared some stories about his guitars, music and playing, including how he names his guitars after his grandchildren and also how he once hand-decorated a guitar using a sharpie.
Click here to visit Lulo’s website.
Click here to watch a video of Lulo playing Carolan.
Kevin Armstrong
Kevin is one of that most revered breed of guitarists, the professional session player, as well as a producer, songwriter and composer for film and TV. He has played with David Bowie, Iggy Pop, Brian Eno, Thomas Dolby, Sinéad O’Connor, Morrissey and Prefab Sprout among many others. He was guitarist in the house band on the Jonathan Ross show. And he played guitar with Bowie at Live Aid! Are we gushing a bit here? Probably so, but it’s clear that Kevin knows a thing or two about guitars.
We met Kevin back in blogpost 39 where he shared his thoughts on his collection of guitars, the challenges of reproducing sounds, and also played us a tune of course.
Click here to visit Kevin’s website.
Click here to watch a video of Kevin playing Carolan.
Ben Trott
Ben Trott is another highly talented acoustic guitarist and also a recent member of the legendary Albion Band. Click here for Ben’s performance of Bert Jansch’s ‘Angie’ after his gig with Tim Edey.
Nick Perez
Nick Perez
Nick Perez is the luther who built the Carolan guitar. He is also a Gypsy Jazz guitarist. You can see him play Carolan’s first song back on blog post 23. Find out more about his work at his website.
Click here to visit Nick’s website.
Click here for a video of Nick playing Carolan.
Steve Pinnock
Based in Nottingham, Steve is an innovative acoustic guitarist, well known for his solo gigs as well as a founding member of swing-combo Mood Indigo. Steve, who was recently acclaimed by Acoustic legend Antonio Forcione, stretches the acoustic guitar beyond its conventional boundaries through an eye-watering array of playing techniques.
Click here for videos and recordings of Steve playing Carolan
Jimmy Wigginton
Jimmy is a great blues guitarist, teacher and also owner of The Guitar Spot, Beeston’s legendary music shop that hosted Carolan during the 2014 Beeston Oxjam Takeover festival.
Click here to visit Jimmy’s website.
Click here for a video of Jimmy playing Carolan
Phil Langran
Phil Langran’s is a songwriter and lyricist steeped in the poetic traditions of Robert Frost and Langston Hughes. Like all the best songwriters, Phil has created his own genre, where Harlem nights and New York cityscapes rub shoulders with the West coast of Ireland and scenes from Werner Herzog’s films. He formed the Phil Langran Band to record his 2010 album ‘Here’, creating a unique sound firmly rooted in folk, interweaving elements of American, Celtic, blues and jazz traditions. Phil’s 2011 album ‘Jukebox Love Songs, Leaving Blues, Border Crossings and Lovers’ Laments’ was released on the Nottingham-based Folkwit label and features a selection of Phil’s songs alongside musical settings of poems by Langston Hughes. He has recently released a four-song EP, ‘Still the Heart’. Phil dropped by the Guitar Spot during the Beeston Oxjam Takeover festival to record his song “Meeting by the River” on the Carolan guitar.
Click here to visit Phil’s website.
Click here for a video of Phil playing Carolan
Joe Barber
Joe Barber is an up-and-coming blues guitarist who plays raw acoustic slide blues from the heart of Nottinghamshire. The first player to take a slide to Carolan.
Click here to visit Joe’s website.
Click here for a video of Joe playing Carolan
Gav Shannon
Gav is a guitarist and mandolin player from Nottingham who runs the longstanding Vat and Fiddle Irish session and is a stalwart of many sessions around the town.
Click here for Gav playing Carolan.
Jeremy Galgut
Singer-songwrier Jemermy Galgut was founder of Nottingham legends Moose Malloy and key member of their spin-off and arch-rivals Goose McCoy who can still be heard rocking the suburbs today.
Click here for a video of Jeremy playing Carolan
Jon Crowcroft
Jon Crowcroft is the Marconi Professor of Communications Systems in the Computer Lab, at the University of Cambridge and also an avid guitarist.
We caught up with Jon to play Carolan and write a guest article about music and the mysterious Internet of Things back in blogposst 37.
Steve Benford
Steve Benford created the concept for the Carolan guitar. He is also a keen acoustic guitarist, specialising in celtic music while also playing with the Phil Langran Band. You can see him playing a tune at the end of the Computerhpile video interview back in blog post 24.
Click here to visit Steve’s website.
Click here to watch a video of Steve explaining and playing Carolan. You can also see and hear some of Steve’s home recordings on Carolan in blogpost 38.
Sean Riley
Sean is a journalist and videographer for the Computerphile YouTube channel who produced a video interview with Steve Benford explaining the Carolan project in October 2014. he also knows a few guitar chords to and so was kind enough to play too.
Click here to watch a video of Sean playing Stairway to Heaven on Carolan.
Emma Bladon Jones
Emma played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Chris Zwingel
Chris played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Jasmin Issaka
Jasmin played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Paul and Anna Heery
Paul played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Matt and Elaine
Matt and Elaine from Pop Orchestra played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Marc Block
Marc played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Alan Windsor
Alan played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Jim Dunn
Jim played Carolan in The Guitar Spot shop during Beeston’s Oxjam Takeover music festival in October 2014.
Tasha King
Tasha played Carolan when it appeared at the Near Know Know How event at Nottingham’s Broadway Media Centre on 20th November 2014.
Sarah Drummond
Sarah played Carolan when it appeared at the Near Know Know How event at Nottingham’s Broadway Media Centre on 20th November 2014.
Andy Young
Andy played Carolan when it appeared at the Near Know Know How event at Nottingham’s Broadway Media Centre on 20th November 2014.
Rachel Jennings
Rachel Jennings played Carolan at the Traditional Irish Session at the Bell Inn in Nottingham on Novemeber 23rd 2014. Rachel is a professional musical arranger. You can follow her activities on her Facebook page.
Corina Sas
Corina is a Senior Lecturer in Computing at Lancaster University who played Carolan when she visited the Mixed Reality Lab to give a seminar.
Carolan Guitar 