Fraser Fifield and Graeme Stephen

Two of Scotland’s most innovative and skilled young musicians Fraser Fifield and Graeme Stephen have created and played music together for over a decade; ranging from duo to the jazz inflected Fraser Fifield Trio with drummer Stu Ritchie, through soundscaping/improvising ensemble with choreographer Frank McConnell, international collaboration with Bulgarian virtuosos Nedyalko Nedyalkov and Georgi Petrov who recorded and toured with the Fraser Fifield Band to Stephen’s own award winning sextet. More recently, Fifield and Stephen have returned to duo performance, albeit with a difference. Using various looping devices, samplers and other on the floor effects the result is an impressive spectrum of sound from the two musicians. Pre-recorded audio mixes with live looping and live performance on a host of different instrumentation: acoustic/electric guitars, percussion, whistles, soprano sax, kaval, highland pipes.

Fraser Fifield is one of Scotland's most creative musicians. A multi-instrumentalist, he is always in great demand to play on other musicians projects. The list of groups and musicians he's performed and recorded with reads as a who's who of Scottish Roots music. Fifield is both a Jazz musician and a Traditional musician. An unlikely combination perhaps but one that developed naturally since his childhood, more explicable given the main instruments he performs on: Bagpipes, Whistles and Saxophones. His stylistic versatility partially accounts for his busy schedule as a session musician, however, when composing and performing his own material the genre tags aren't so applicable; "Fifield doesn't so much fuse different styles - including jazz, rock, Celtic, Scandinavian and Eastern European elements - as sublimate the need for such distinctions" (The Herald). Fifield’s main musical collaborator for a decade has been guitarist Graeme Stephen. Emerging as a major new talent in the UK jazz scene, Stephen’s guitar style is unique and exceptionally fluid. He has performed in Scotland with many well known jazz musicians and leads his own groups in trio, quartet and sextet formats to critical acclaim. 

Tickets priced £10/£8 and £3 for chidren under 16

Available at the door or by contacting the Cromarty Arts Trust