THE HILL: Highland landscape folk album fundraiser

Aim

To produce an album of new folk music celebrating the hills of Strathspey and the Cairngorms, with accompanying folklore booklet.

You can pre-order the album now (delivered to you by Summer 2026).

I am a folk musician and composer, creating a musical odyssey of five albums about my homeland of Strathspey in the Scottish Highlands...'The Hill' is number 4 in the series.   

It's a BEAST! Since its conception in 2020, 'The Hill' has grown arms and legs and is now nearly 75 minutes long with no less than 20 tracks - close to being a double album.

This is my 4th album, and will be released in Summer 2026,. It follows on from The River (2016), The Railway (2018) and The Woods (2020).  These, along with The Sky in a few years time, will form my Strathspey Pentology project - an epic 12 year musical odyssey to produce five albums that celebrate and explore the heritage of my local area - more details here on my Patreon page. 

The Hill is not just about one hill. It refers to all the hills and mountain landscape that feed into the River Spey in my native Strathspey & Badenoch.

The first stages of The Hill are complete (or at least are well under way):

• initial funds raised through the generosity of my Patreon supporters in the last 4 years, as well as full album track commissions from 2 public organisations and 10 private composition commissioners.
• the bulk of the research into mountain folklore in heritage maps, books and local archives.
• collating 68 special Gaelic hill terms specific to my local area. These rare words are precious jewels, and the cornerstone, driving force and inspiration of The Hill album.
• composing brand new music, over an hour and quarter long, spread over 20 album tracks and consisting of of 28 trad folk tunes, 2 piano pieces and pibroch (a large-scale piece of classical music for the Great Highland Bagpipe). 
• midway through album recording in the studio with some of Scotland's finest folk musicians, including:  Iain MacFarlane, Su-a Lee, Ross Ainslie, Duncan Chisholm, Sarah-Jane Summers, Andrea Gobbi, James Lindsay, Ewan Robertson (Breabach), Fraser Stone, Calum MacCrimmon, Patsy Reid and a string quartet (to be announced). 

Through Crowdfunder, it is the remaining stages that I am seeking your financial support for:

• completing the recording process with the musicians at GloWorm Recording studios in Glasgow.
• mixing and mastering of the album by maverick soundsmith and engineer Andrea Gobbi.
• collating my research and writing a book that accompanies the album - a culmination of my local Gaelic hill names and mountain folk lore research. I will also write about the inspiration behind each piece.
• commissioning album artwork - ace multimedia designer Somhairle MacDonald  did the stunning cover art for my first 3 solo albums.
• album manufacturing and distribution for online streaming 
• promotion of the album online, in my local area and internationally.

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made