Scottish harp and fiddle duo Catriona McKay and Chris Stout have won a Herald Angel award at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
McKay and Stout, who have worked together as a duo for almost 20 years and also appear together in the Shetland band Fiddlers’ Bid, won the award following their concert as part of the Clarsach Society’s Scotland’s Harps series at St Andrew’s and St George’s church, where they were joined for part of the concert by Finlay MacDonald on pipes and whistles.
Now in their 20th year, the Herald Angels are awarded by Glasgow-based newspaper The Herald for excellence across the range of festivals taking place in Edinburgh each August. Previous winners of the coveted awards include pipers Gordon Duncan and Allan MacDonald, Gaelic singer Flora MacNeil, fiddler Duncan Chisholm, and fiddle quartet Rant.
Collecting the statuette on behalf of the duo, Catriona McKay said: “What a truly lovely surprise. We’re delighted to win the Herald Angel, especially when we see the quality of performers from across the whole range of the arts that this puts us alongside.”
Read more about the awards; read more about Catriona McKay; download the January-February 2005 issue of Harp Column, which includes our feature interview with Catriona McKay.
