Fergus McCreadie signs to Edition Records.
Saturday, May 02, 2020
The Scottish pianist and composer Fergus McCreadie has signed to Edition for the release of his second album ‘Cairn’, due in early 2021. Press release attached.
We have received the following press release from Edition Records;
SCOTTISH PIANIST FERGUS McCREADIE SIGNS TO EDITION
SCOTTISH WUNDERKIND PIANIST FERGUS McCREADIE SIGNS TO EDITION RECORDS.
The Scottish pianist and composer Fergus McCreadie signs to Edition for the release of his second album ‘Cairn’, due in early 2021.
Fergus McCreadie on signing to Edition:
“I’m excited and honoured to be signing up to the Edition roster of artists, joining musicians who I’ve respected and looked up to for many years. Edition is known for having an eclectic and forward-looking catalogue and a strong presence on the European scene, and so to be part of the output of such great music is a real pleasure.
With my bandmates, David Bowden and Stephen Henderson, we independently released our first album ’Turas’ to a positive reception in 2018. It was an album that we were really happy with musically and pleased to put out into the world. However, our second album I believe represents a major step forward for the band, both musically and career-wise. We’ve played a number of shows since the first album was recorded and so I believe we are much stronger as a unit, moving closer to that goal of sounding like one musician. The compositions also feel more mature and a more natural fusion of the two types of music I love so much - Jazz and Scottish Folk. With the larger number of shows we’ve been playing, I believe we’re ready for a new chapter in our career as a band, and signing to Edition represents that next step. I’m excited for the opportunities that will come from being part of a prestigious enclave of musicians, and I’m really looking forward to working closely with Dave and the rest of the great team on pushing this music that we’re proud of as far as we can.”
Fergus McCreadie burst onto the national scene with his self-released debut album Turas in 2018. Rooted in a Scottish folk tradition and expressing advanced rhythmical flair, the album sparked a wake of interest from global promoters and industry, collecting Album of the Year at the Parliamentary and Scottish Jazz Awards and shortlisted for the cross-genre Scottish Album of the Year Award 2019. In 2018 he was a BBC Jazz Musician of the Year Finalist.
Fergus is a complete and well-rounded musician, a passionate communicator and consummate performer, a composer of elegant, nuanced and captivating music as well as a pianist and improviser of exceptional ability and originality.
With his trio, featuring long term cohorts David Bowden and Stephen Henderson, he encompasses a rare freshness of sound in this well-trodden format reminiscent of the originality and personality with which the likes of The Bad Plus and EST emerged almost two decades ago. In a vastly changed era since then, Fergus and his trio, with their profoundly mesmerising and compelling music, look set to evoke similar trajectories in developing a global audience. They certainly have the necessary instrumental command, communication and originality.
As founder and CEO of Edition Records, Dave Stapleton, explains: “I first became aware of Fergus from his personal, handwritten letter introducing his trio to me. Following him closely over subsequent months I was drawn by how the trio were able to command my attention as imaginative improvisers with a strong Scots voice, deeply emotive music performed with a high degree of energy and spirit. As a team at Edition, we all feel Fergus and his trio have the originality and talent to build large global audiences for this music and we can’t wait to share their journey with them”.
About Fergus McCreadie
Pianist Fergus McCreadie is one of Scotland’s most exciting young talents. Born in Jamestown, near Strathpeffer, he grew up in Dollar and graduated from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in 2018.
As well as winning the prestigious Peter Whittingham Jazz Award with his trio in 2016, he has twice won the Young Scottish Jazz Musician of the year under-17s Prize and is the winner of the Guy Jones Prize, the Joe Temperley Prize from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, and the Linda Trahan Memorial Prize from St Andrews University.
His trio has featured at the Glasgow, Edinburgh, Fife, Aberdeen and Islay jazz festivals regularly and has toured in Norway, Sweden, Lithuania and Estonia. The group has also appeared at Oslo and Stockholm jazz festivals and Ronnie Scott’s International Piano Trio Festival.
Released in Spring 2018, the trio’s debut album, Turas, has been praised for “reflecting his engagement with the Scottish landscape and musical traditions while also showing a firm grasp of the jazz piano tradition” (Jazz in Europe). Turas won Album of the Year at the Parliamentary Jazz Awards 2019 and Best Album at the Scottish Jazz Awards 2019, following on from McCreadie’s Best Instrumentalist title at the 2018 awards.
The album was also shortlisted for the cross-genre Scottish Album of the Year Award 2019, reaching the final ten from 290-plus candidates, a rare feat for a jazz album.
McCreadie’s music is an innovative blend of jazz and Scottish traditional music. Turas (Scottish Gaelic for ‘Journey’) featured eight original compositions designed to take the listener on an auditory journey of Scotland. Depicting scenes from the Western Isles to the East Neuk of Fife, the music evoked the landscapes from which it took its inspiration.
McCreadie, who also works with drummer Graham Costello’s widely acclaimed STRATA, among other groups, performs with bassist, David Bowden, the winner of the Young Scottish Jazz Musician of the Year title in 2017 and leader of the acclaimed, world music influenced band Mezcla, and drummer Stephen Henderson, a Jazzwise magazine One to Watch in 2018.
Fergus McCreadie is one of Scotland’s most exciting new-generation young artists
Cairn continues his stellar trajectory applying the themes and melodies of Scotland folk music to impressive jazz ability
Fergus’ debut album, Turas, won ‘Album of the Year’ at the Parliamentary and Scottish Jazz Awards 2019 and was shortlisted for the cross-genre Scottish Album of the Year Award 2019
By the age of 15, Fergus had already won the U17s Young Scottish Jazz Musician award 2013 and went on to win it a second time the next year, the only time this feat has been achieved
BBC Jazz Musician of the Year 2018 Finalist
The trio are influenced by fusing Scottish folk music and Jazz – both David Bowden and Stephen Henderson play in the Celtic band Dosca
Fergus’ piano playing influenced by heroes Keith Jarrett, Pat Metheny and Brad Mehldau
Fergus is part of a vibrant Glasgow scene
http://www.fergusmccreadie.co.uk