Under Canvas: Rachel Campbell’s Trad Magic Meets FifiDiny’s Reggae/Afrobeats Vibes
To show the eclectic nature of the Under Canvas sessions, Eden Court put Scottish traditional + Reggae/afrobeats on the same bill to great success.
Rachel Campbell
First up was well known Rachel Campbell. I first heard Rachel when she played with Tartan Paint at Belladrum a couple of years ago and thought she was a class musician and tonight’s performance at Under Canvas confirmed to my initial thoughts. Rachel on fiddle accompanied on piano and double bass made for a superb sound, the audience loved every note and her wee stories between pieces. Rachel is also a tutor of some note, if you have someone wanting to learn fiddle then I suggest hitting Rachel up, a class musician for sure.
FIFIDINY
I love it when the Under Canvas people decide to throw in a talent that’s not in the Scottish Trad genre and tonight, they did themselves proud by introducing FifiDiny. This was an unknown artist to me so I had to do some digging to see what they were about and here is what I found out. The lead singer is actually from Dingwall! She left the town about 10 years ago and moved to Edinburgh, before that she spent 2 years at the UHI College in Alness studying music where she won Two “Proudly Black” awards which celebrates diversity and achievement within the Black community in Scotland, and well deserved too. I read that her sound was afrobeats and electropop which of course pricked up my ears as it’s so different to what we usually hear at “Under Canvas” however on the night I’d say her sound was more Reggae/Afrobeats, I think Fifidiny was a little nervous how she and her band would go down with this particular audience but she need not have been concerned, the audience were open very much to her sound and rightly so, her songs are beautifully crafted and the audience lapped her sound up.
Words and photos by © Alan Cruickshank
