Kathryn Tickell & The Darkening explore the connecting threads of music, landscape and people. Songs range from themes of freedom, nature and venturing out into the world after times of darkness.

The Darkening’s inspiration comes from the wild, dramatic, weather-bitten countryside along Hadrian’s Wall, which seems so quintessentially Northumbrian, but one bearing the influences of several thousand years of landscape inhabited by people from the furthest reaches of the Roman Empire, worshipping different gods and following different customs.

Kathryn Tickell & The Darkening’s new album, Cloud Horizons, embraces that global perspective, full of magic, myth, history, and tradition, all driven by the recognisable smallpipe and fiddle sounds, with added rock edge.

Featuring Kathryn Tickell (Northumbrian smallpipes, fiddle, vocals), Amy Thatcher (accordion, synth, clogs, vocals), Kieran Szifris (octave mandolin), Joe Truswell (drums, percussion, programming), plus Stef Conner from Cambridge (vocals, lyres, sistrum) and Josie Duncan from the Isle of Lewis (vocals, clarsach.)

‘No one has evoked the landscape and traditions of Northumbria more affectingly than Kathryn Tickell; a champion of the Northumbrian pipes, she is steeped in the songs and mythology of the north-east.’ The Observer

This event will last approximately 2 hours, including an interval.