This is a first time visit to HTH for two time BBC Folk Award winners Greg Russell and Ciaran Algar. They met in 2011 and were signed to Fellside Records and in July 2012 released their debut album, The Queen’s Lover. In January 2013, the pair picked up the BBC Radio 2 Young Folk award and a touring schedule saw them play venues and festivals such as Cambridge Folk Festival and Fairport’s Cropredy Convention as well as appearing live on Mark Radcliffe’s BBC Radio 2 Folk Show.In 2013 Russell and Algar received the Horizon Award for Best breakthrough act at the 2014 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards. The second album, The Call, was then released in July receiving 5 Stars in fRoots, 4 Stars in both R2 Magazine and The Telegraph and a host of other brilliant reviews, Bright Young Folk describing it as an “outstanding show of maturity” with “enormous promise”. The duo come from musical households and both began to develop their musical skills long before joining forces. Algar, originally a member of TRI became All Ireland Champion, and All Britain Champion on numerous occasions before the age of 16 and Russell had begun a career as a solo musician supporting acts such as Karine Polwart and Lau, amongst others.
