Blue Rose Code put on a spectacular performance at Edinburgh’s Queen’s Hall for his Homecoming show. One which featured some of Scotland’s finest musicians, as well as a more than fifty members of Edinburgh and Glasgow Contemporary choirs – a musical celebration of everything that’s wonderful about this region of the country.

As they days draw near their darkest, it’s tempting to sit by an open fire and listen to wintry folk music with fiddles and traditional tunes. But if you want to inject a splash of summer (with a melancholy edge), then this release will get you singing, dancing and pondering. Sometimes a pendulum swing helps you see life from a fresh perspective.

Watch Meg and Laura Baird perform ‘Down Where the Waters Flow’ from their new album Until You Find Your Green. The session was filmed at Brickbat Books in Philadelphia, PA.

When Hands Up For Trad, the organisation that promotes and supports developing talent in Scots traditional music, invited Folk Radio UK to attend this year’s MG Alba Scots Trad Music Awards we knew we’d be in for a treat, and we weren’t disappointed. Neil shares his highlights and details of the winners.

We have a song premiere (also our Song of the Day) from Enderby’s Room – fiddler Dan Mayfield, once from rural Lincolnshire, has now found home living in London. His folk-tinged songs reflect on his traditional folk upbringing, which included playing fiddle for Morris dancing sides around the country.

Dodgy Bastards, the latest offering from Steeleye Span, places an audible degree of emphasis on a heavier-duty rock sound. There is a wealth of classic nimble prog-rock-styled guitar manœuvres and an outstanding strength and flexibility in the coordinated harmony work. The newer band members are also given the chance to shine.

Our Song of the Day is Katie Cruel, performed by Irish folk trio Rue in Dublin’s Fumbally Stables. The trio features Brian Flanagan alongside Cormac Mac Diarmada and Radie Peat of Dublin folk miscreants Lynched.

Birds is a five track EP from the driving force behind Cambrian Records, guitarist/composer Toby Hay. The music forms part of a larger artistic enterprise, a collaborative exhibition, shared between Hay, artist Keith How, and blacksmiths Nick Buchan and Tom Robinson of Gofannon Forge. The twelve string technique is flawless; the music delightful.

Seamless, powerful, thought-provoking…As promised in the publicity surrounding the series, this was indeed a truly unique event: not just a concert, not just a book reading, but a journey of discovery, and one which lingers in the mind long after the tube ride home.

This week’s mix features all new music, some of which is yet to be released. The one thing they all share is that they push the boundaries in terms of creating original music, and it is this which sets this particular playlist apart.

The Unthanks announce new book: The Memory Book, a warm and personal history compiled by The Unthanks themselves; their final and most candid tenth anniversary release.

In the two years since we first featured Austin Basham, an independent folk singer-songwriter from Austin, Texas, he has gone from strength to strength. Listen to his new single ‘Sounds Like Help’ as he continues on that ascending road.