Edinburgh Tradfest: We have won the Land

We Have Won The Land is the new collaborative project between Glasgow based folk musicians Rory Matheson and Graham Rorie. This suite of new music has been inspired by Rory’s local area of Assynt in the North-West Highlands of Scotland and the community buy-out of the North Lochinver Estate by the Assynt Crofter’s Trust in 1993.

Both former finalists in the BBC Radio Scotland Young Musician of The Year, Rory and Graham have worked together on a number of albums as session musicians but came together in 2022 to combine their musical influences on this new album for their first collaborative effort. They are joined by an impressive team of musicians including Anna Massie, Charlie Stewart, Craig Baxter, Fraser Stone, James Graham, Kristan Harvey and Tiernan Courell.

Rory Mathesonbegan his musical journey on the accordion before moving to the piano as a teenager. His style is heavily influenced by the music of the Highlands and islands, with elements of jazz and blues also influencing his approach to traditional music, creating a powerful and sympathetic rhythm player. Having only recently graduated from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Rory has already toured throughout Europe, U.S.A and Australia. He is a founding member of Glasgow band TRIPand can also be seen touring with fiddle-led quartet Fara.

Orcadian fiddle and mandolin player Graham Rorie grew up surrounded by traditional music in Orkney before also moving to Glasgow to study at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. As a founding member of three-time MG Alba Scots Trad Music award nominees Gnoss, Graham has gained extensive touring and recording experience. In his latest project, Graham brought together a selection of musicians to present a suite of newly-composed music inspired by his fellow Orcadians who travelled to northern Canada to work for the Hudson’s Bay Company during the 18th and 19th centuries. The Orcadians of Hudson Bay was nominated for Original Work of the Year at the Scots Trad Music Awards and was released in album format in May 2021.

We Have Won The Landcelebrates the unprecedented success of the Assynt Crofter’s Trust in buying back the 21,300 acre North Lochinver Estate from a Swedish land speculator. Their efforts went on to inspire many other communities to pursue similar projects and eventually own the land they live and work on. The album was released in Spring 2022 and went on to be nominated for Album of The Year at the MG Alba Scots Trad Music Awardsthe same year.

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